Brief description:
From the dust jacket:
The lives of Benedict Arnold, Peggy Shippen, and John Andre are of peculiar significance for our time. Their story, in which the elements of heroism and greed, loyalty and ambition, passion and frivolity, are combined, culminated in the classic treason of American history.
Mr. Flexner has presented the facts of these three lives in a graphic and powerful style. Shorn of obscuring legend, the conspirators emerge from his pages as from life, colorful and real. ‘We are shown the tragic figure of Arnold, the greatest combat general of the Revolution, impelled by his darker nature to betray the cause he had so courageously served. His lovely wife Peggy emerges as a key figure in the communications between the traitor and the spy; in her tempestuous girlhood she had carried on lively flirtations with the British officers-includinging Andre-—quartered in Philadelphia. And Andre himself, the sensitive young man, is revealed in later life as an officer so ruthless he urged that captured American soldiers be tried for treason and hanged; when taken himself, he died so bravely he was mourned on two continents.
The lives of Benedict Arnold, Peggy Shippen, and John Andre are of peculiar significance for our time. Their story, in which the elements of heroism and greed, loyalty and ambition, passion and frivolity, are combined, culminated in the classic treason of American history.
Mr. Flexner has presented the facts of these three lives in a graphic and powerful style. Shorn of obscuring legend, the conspirators emerge from his pages as from life, colorful and real. ‘We are shown the tragic figure of Arnold, the greatest combat general of the Revolution, impelled by his darker nature to betray the cause he had so courageously served. His lovely wife Peggy emerges as a key figure in the communications between the traitor and the spy; in her tempestuous girlhood she had carried on lively flirtations with the British officers-includinging Andre-—quartered in Philadelphia. And Andre himself, the sensitive young man, is revealed in later life as an officer so ruthless he urged that captured American soldiers be tried for treason and hanged; when taken himself, he died so bravely he was mourned on two continents.
Publication
Harcourt, Brace, (1953) 1st,Hdbk,,,Good