How Did Benedict Arnold Become So Infamous?

the Unknown Soldier kind of situation. The hero's name was left off of the monument for a reason. Benedict Arnold, despite his bravery on the battlefield, eventually switched sides and became the most infamous trader in American history. After trying and failing to hand the Continental fort at West Point over to the British, he joined the Royal Army and took up arms against the rebellious colonists and even put a Connecticut town to the torch. For the article, this

episode is based on How Stuff Works. Spoke with Steve Shinkin, the author of an award winning biography for young adult readers. Called the Notorious Benedict Arnold a true story of adventure, heroism and treachery. He said, there's no other story like Arnold's. He was at the absolute top, one of the great American heroes, and fell all the way to the bottom, a kind of devil figure. And in both cases rise

and fall, he did it by himself. It's a measure of Arnold's infamy that nearly two centuries after his death he remained so infamously reviled that Americans still sometimes refer to someone viewed as disloyal as a Benedict Arnold. Houstuff Works also spoke by email with Eric D. Lemmon, an associate professor of English at the University of Bridgeport and author of Homegrown Terror, Benedict Arnold and the Burning of

New London. He said Arnold's case is so disturbing not because he decided to back the British, which which many others in America did. It's because he was a hero to the American side. First, because he had so many friends and comrades who fought beside him. To fight beside someone and then to switch sides and fight against them

is anathema to most people. It is so much more troubling than the mere political betrayal, and that is why it's so incredibly rare, particularly for a general in the army. Lemon sees parallels between Arnold and another infamous figure in early American history, Aaron Burr, who yes killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel, but was also later tried unsuccessfully for treason for his role in an ill fated plot to lore States to leave the US and join a new empire.

Lemon said both were competent war heroes who, in one way or another, had their careers stalled or ruined by their own actions, and then plotted against their perceived enemies in the American government. Both had the misperception or a flaw, that the government was the name, and when elements in that government, in Arnold's case, Congress or in Burr's case, Thomas Jefferson became antagonistic to them, they responded by trying to burn the whole thing down. In some ways, Arnold's

treachery may have been forged by resentment and frustration. Born in Norwich, Connecticut, in seventeen forty one, he spent his youth preparing to attend Yale, but the bankruptcy of his alcoholic father dashed those dreams. He instead apprenticed as an apothecary the eighteenth century version of a pharmacy, and served in the French and Indian War before settling in New Haven, Connecticut, where he built a drug store business and worked as a merchant and sea captain, involved in trade with the

Caribbean and Canada. By the time Arnold was in his mid thirties, he had become successful enough to build one of the grandest homes in New Haven, but he was never quite content. A lemon said, he had great gifts of intelligence and physical prowess. He always felt that they were being overlooked. He had the sort of prickly personality that took offense very easily. He was often threatening to quit or to fight a duel with someone who insulted him.

I would say he was certainly a narcissist, but the tragedy is that he could have gone another way. He had a lot of people pulling for him, helping him and loving him, but he ultimately chose to betray many of them. In the spring of seventeen seventy five, Arnold was serving as the captain of a local militia in new Haven. When the British attacked Lexington in Concord, Arnold took some of New Haven's gunpowder supply and headed to

Massachusetts to join the fight. Early on, Arnold distinguished himself as a competent, even gifted military leader, but one who frequently became immersed in political squabbles that stymied his rise. Arnold got Massachusetts officials to back his plan to capture Fort Taekwonderoga in New York so that the rebels could

seize its eighty or so cannons. But as it turned out, Arnold wasn't the only one who wanted that artillery, and when he got to New York with his expedition, he was compelled to team up with Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys. The Americans rode across Lake Champlain from what's now Vermont and staged daring late night surprise attack to seize the fort. Their success was a major early

victory in the war. Though Arnold and Alan coled the raid, it was Allan who rashly demanded the British render quote in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress who ended up with more of the credit. But Arnold had even bigger ambitions. He pitched the Continental Congress and George Washington, the new head of the American forces, on a scheme to invade Canada, overwhelmed the few hundred troops that the British kept there, and emboldened Canadian colonists

to join the American cause. A Washington agreed, but appointed Major General Richard Montgomery to head the effort and relegated Arnold to commanding a small force that made up its way through the main wilderness to Quebec City. The New Year's Eve assault on the Canadian city turned into a debacle, in which Montgomery was killed. Arnold, though severely wounded, managed to rally the remaining troops and continue the siege until spring,

when he was ordered to return home. Arnold went on to distinguish himself in September seventeen seventy seven in the aforementioned Battle of Saratoga. He quarreled with Major General Horatio Gates, his commander, who tried to keep him back at headquarters as a punishment, but Arnold eventually ignored his orders and rode his horse to the front, where he led a

charge that outflanked a force of German mercenaries. During the fighting, Arnold was shot and a bullet killed his horse and caused it to fall on him, crushing the leg had injured in Quebec. He had to be carried off the field and walked with a limp for the rest of his life. Arnold's courage had helped the Americans win a crucial victory, but again he didn't get the credit or

position he felt he deserved. Instead, in July seventeen seventy eight, Washington put Arnold in charge of the city of Philadelphia, which the British had abandoned kept out of action. Arnold married the young daughter of a local judge, Peggy Shippen, and the couple lived in extravagant lifestyle that was beyond an American general's means. Congress refused to pay some of his expense vouchers, and eventually, in June of seventeen seventy nine,

he was court martialed on charges of corruption. Although Arnold eventually was acquitted, the humiliation might have been the final straw. Even before the trial began, he secretly reached out to the British and began communicating with British spy Major John Andre through coded correspondence. Meanwhile, Arnold asked to be reassigned to West Point, the fort that served as Washington's headquarters.

In September of seventeen eighty he met with Andre at a house near the Hudson River and hatched a plot to hand the fort over to the British in exchange for command in the Royal Army and twenty thousand British pounds that's worth something like four million pounds today or about five million US dollars. But once again Arnold was foiled by fate. Before John Andre could make his way back into British held territory, he was captured by American militiamen.

When Arnold heard the news, he managed to escape on the Hudson in a British ship, the Vulture. Before he could be arrested. From on board, Arnold wrote a letter to Washington complaining of the quote ingratitude of my country and asking that his former superior protect Arnold's wife. He wrote, it ought only to fall on me, and Arnold was about to get even further into the thick of it.

In seventeen eighty one, having become a British officer. He ordered his troops to burn the town of New London in Connecticut, just ten miles away from where he was born and raised. That's around fifteen kilometers. This action was ostensibly meant to punish private who operated out of New

London for capturing a British merchant ship. Arnold's forces torched some one hundred and forty buildings, including residence homes, and after capturing the fort overlooking the town's harbor, slaughtered eighty American militiamen who had already surrendered. Lemon said, I think that once Arnold made the choice to go over to the British, he knew he had to succeed, and he was willing to do anything to make that happen. That's a dangerous place to be in for anyone, and it

led him to a very dark place. In December of seventeen eighty one, Arnold and his wife and children went to live in London, England, supported in part by a portion of the fee had been guaranteed for the failed West Point plot. After America's Revolutionary War was over, he moved to Canada and tried to revive his career as a merchant but his fortune was mostly gone by the time he died in eighteen oh one. Shankin said, this

is a classic rise in falset. We see them over and over, and of course it's usually some character flaw that brings the hero down. That's not just in fiction and theater. And that's happened throughout history and we'll continue to happen. It's a dynamic and in some ways sympathetic story. But to this day, in New London, the city Arnold torched, local residents return the favor by burning an effigy of him each September. Today's episode is based on the article

how did Benedict Arnold Become America's Most Infamous Trader? On how Stuffworks dot Com written by Patrick J. Kyder. Brain Stuff is production of my Heart Radio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.