The Treason of Arnold: David Williams and White Plains
The Cow-boys were a set of plunderers, belonging to the British side, who infested the neutral ground between the outposts of the two armies. They were opposed by another set of bandits, called Skinners, professedly on the American side. The populous territory, some thirty miles in width, which formed the field of operations of these merciless scoundrels, was a dangerous locality for a man in Andre's situation to cross. After parting from Smith he left the road to White Plains, and took the Tarrytown road, having reason to believe that he would there meet with Cow-boys, with whom he hoped to be safe.
It happened that same morning that seven patriotic young men had stationed themselves in ambush on this road, with the object of intercepting suspicious persons, or droves of cattle, that might be seen passing towards New York. Three of them were concealed in the bushes near the road.]
About half a mile north of the village of Tarrytown, and a few hundred yards from the bank of Hudson's River, the road crosses a small brook, from each side of which the ground rises into a hill, and it was at that time covered over with trees and underbrush. Eight or ten rods south of this brook, and on the west side of the road, these men were hidden; and at that point Andre was stopped, after having travelled from Pine's Bridge without interruption.
The particulars of this event I shall here introduce, as they are narrated in the testimony given by Paulding and Williams at Smith's trial, written down at the time by the judge-advocate, and preserved in manuscript among the other papers. This testimony having been taken only eleven days after the capture of Andre, when every circumstance must have been fresh in the recollection of his captors, it may be regarded as exhibiting a greater exactness in its details than any account hitherto published. In answer to the question of the court, Paulding said,--
"Myself, Isaac Van Wart, and David Williams were lying by the side of the road about half a mile above Tarrytown, and about fifteen miles above Kingsbridge, on Saturday morning, between nine and ten o'clock, the 23d of September. We had lain there about an hour and a half, as near as I can recollect, and saw several persons we were acquainted with, whom we let pass. Presently one of the young men who were with me said, `There comes a gentlemanlike-looking man, who appears to be well dressed, and has boots on, and whom you had better step out and stop, if you don't know him.' On that I got up, and presented my firelock at the breast of the person, and told him to stand; and then I asked him which way he was going. `Gentlemen,' said he, `I hope you belong to our party.' I asked him what party. He said, `The Lower Party.' Upon that I told him I did. Then he said, `I am a British officer out of the country on particular business, and I hope you will not detain me a minute;' and to show that he was a British officer he pulled out his watch. Upon which I told him to dismount. He then said, `My God, I must do anything to get along,' and seemed to make a kind of laugh of it, and pulled out General Arnold's pass, which was to John Anderson, to pass all guards to White Plains and below. Upon that he dismounted. Said he, `Gentlemen, you had best let me go, or you will bring yourselves into trouble, for your stopping me will detain the general's business,' and said he was going to Dobb's Ferry to meet a person there and get intelligence for General Arnold. Upon that I told him I hoped he would not be offended, that we did not mean to take anything from him; and I told him there were many bad people, who were going along the road, and I did not know but perhaps he might be one."
When further questioned, Paulding replied that he asked the person his name, who told him it was John Anderson, and that when Anderson produced General Arnold's pass he should have let him go, if he had not before called himself a British officer. Paulding also said that when the person pulled out his watch he understood it as a signal that he was a British officer, and not that he meant to offer it to him as a present.
All these particulars were substantially confirmed by David Williams, whose testimony in regard to the searching of Andre, being more minute than Paulding's, is here inserted.
"We took him into the bushes," said Williams, "and ordered him to pull off his clothes, which he did; but on searching him narrowly we could not find any sort of writings. We told him to pull off his boots, which he seemed to be indifferent about; but we got one boot off, and searched in that boot, and could find nothing. But we found there were some papers in the bottom of his stocking next to his foot; on which we made him pull his stocking off, and found there papers wrapped up. Mr. Paulding looked at the contents, and said he was a spy. We then made him pull off his other boot, and there we found three more papers at the bottom of his foot within his stocking.