“Treason of the Blackest Dye” at West Point

RW250 Executive Committee (left to right): Niles Jaeger, Constance Kehoe, Char Weigel, Marc Cheshire, Frank Kaiman.

The RW250 Executive Committee was thrilled receive an invitation from Douglass Litts, Archive & Special Collections Librarian of the United States Military Academy Library at West Point, to see some of the rare letters, reports and maps related to the treason of Benedict Arnold, along with maps of the Battle of White Plains. To further our mission to bring awareness to the critically important events of the Revolution that played out right here in the Hudson Valley, we work to research and amplify the accurate historical record of events like these.

With Douglass and fellow librarian Susan Lintelman, we were treated to a chance to look closely at an original 1780 letter signed by General Washington in the immediate aftermath of Benedict Arnold’s betrayal, an orderly book recording that “treason of the blackest dye” was discovered the previous day and a letter from an ordinary soldier, recording his reaction to Arnold’s attempt to turn over the fort at West Point to the British—a plan foiled by the capture in Tarrytown of his accomplice, British Major John André, by three militiamen in Tarrytown.

Orderly Book of Captain Samuel Frost (6th. Mass. Rgt.) under General Nathanael Greene, Headquarters, Orange Town, Sept. 26, 1780, using the term “Treason of the Blackest Dye”.