A Historian Reflects on Benedict Arnold’s Complicated Legacy

Marker honoring Benedict Arnold across from Valcour Island in New York Credit: Jim Carrier

That Benedict Arnold was the hero of the Battle of Valcour Island is indisputable. His fearless leadership on Lake Champlain 250 years ago, turning back a vastly superior British enemy through a combination of guile, guts and gunpowder, is the stuff of military epics — what filmmakers like Steven Spielberg and Christopher Nolan make movies about today.

That tracks with Arnold’s résumé throughout most of the American Revolution. He was George Washington’s most trusted general, as respected by his fellow American rebels as he was feared by the Brits. When asked by his superiors to explain how a ragged band of Americans in makeshift warships stymied the mighty Royal Navy at Valcour, a British commander is said to have uttered one sentence: “It was Arnold.”

Simply put, America might not exist without Arnold and his actions at Valcour Island, Ticonderoga, Saratoga and other battles. But Arnold was also a traitor with daddy issues.

In 1779, Arnold is believed to have begun selling military intelligence to the enemy, culminating in a foiled plot to surrender West Point to the Brits in 1780 and his subsequent defection to the British Army. Scholars still debate Arnold’s precise motivations, though it’s generally agreed that he felt grossly underappreciated by the Continental Congress and Washington specifically. Arnold resented a litany of injustices both real and possibly imagined, including being passed over for promotions. He’s also said to have been discouraged by a deeply divided and dysfunctional Congress, causing him to question whether revolution was really a good idea.

America might not exist without Arnold. But he was also a traitor with daddy issues.

Some speculate that his marriage to Peggy Shippen, a beautiful young Philadelphia socialite from a prominent family of British loyalists, may have helped turn his coat red. Still others have suggested that his actions were rooted in childhood trauma.

“Arnold was extremely proud,” Burlington historian Willard Sterne Randall said. “His father had been a failure, the town drunk, and it really mattered to Arnold that he be above reproach and a figure of respect.”

Randall, 84, is a former journalist who taught American history at the University of Vermont and Champlain College. His 1990 biography Benedict Arnold: Patriot and Traitor garnered awards and recognition from the New York Times, which praised it for reading “like a thriller.”

*Benedict Arnold: Patriot and Traitor* by Willard Sterne Randall, William Morrow, 256 pages. $35.

Much of Arnold’s discontent stemmed from allegations of financial fraud. A hero of the Battle of Ticonderoga, Arnold had submitted reimbursement claims to Congress for personal expenses and credit he’d extended to the U.S. military for that battle and later missions into Québec. Congress balked and accused him of war profiteering. Instead of backing his top general, Washington publicly reprimanded Arnold, who felt deeply betrayed. That, according to Randall, was the last straw.

“He was always looking for a father figure, and I think he thought George Washington was it,” he said.

More than two centuries later, Arnold’s name is still synonymous with treachery. But Randall believes that’s not entirely fair and that a more complete picture of the man is required before passing judgment. Seven Days spoke with him to learn more about America’s most famous traitor.

What interested you about Arnold enough to write an entire book about him?

He had been reduced to just a phrase: Benedict Arnold, traitor. And as I studied the Revolution more, it became pretty clear to me that he had first been a great patriot, and then, for a lot of reasons, he turned his coat. So I wanted to tell the whole story. And when I started working on this, I found out that until his treason in 1780, the French considered him the great hero of the Revolution and George Washington just somebody who handled logistics. But his story’s been completely changed, [overlooking his] reasons for turning his coat. I think that deserved a whole book.

What kind of man was Arnold?

I think he was an extremely proud man. This was a time that was closer to the Middle Ages than it is to now. And like in the Middle Ages, if you were a knight, your honor was more important than anything. All of the accusations against him, I think at a certain point it drove him around the bend. Washington valued him terrifically, but Washington didn’t seem to have a lot to say about the treatment Arnold got until the very last minute, when Arnold had already decided that he didn’t want to be part of the revolution anymore.

After Valcour, Arnold went on and was really the great hero of the Battle of Saratoga, the turning point of the whole war that brought France into it as our first ally. After that, when the British attacked Connecticut, it was Arnold who rode in the Battle of Ridgefield and stopped them every time at great personal risk. He was wounded in Québec when he led the invasion of Canada; he was crippled with a wound in his leg, but he overrode all of that. But he could not take criticism at a certain point.

He was accused of not repaying money that he had drawn to help Ethan Allen take Ticonderoga at the beginning of the war. Unfortunately, Arnold’s records of those transactions were on one of the ships in the Battle of Valcour Island, which sank along with his strongbox and the records that would have exonerated him. And I think would have prevented a whole lot of what came after it.

Talk about a historical what-if! What is the one thing you hope people will understand about Benedict Arnold?

You need to know the whole story; you can’t judge a man based on one side. And that it’s important to understand history to make sense of the present. At that time, for example, Congress was as politically divided as it is now. So, if you look at what’s happening now, you’ll see what happened before. And if you look at what happened before, maybe you’ll understand better what’s still going on. ➆

This interview was edited for clarity and length.

The original print version of this article was headlined “Hero Complex | A Vermont historian reflects on the complicated legacy of America’s most notorious traitor, Benedict Arnold”