The Traitor and the Spy: Benedict Arnold and John Andre

by James Thomas Flexner

Book Overview

An account of the traitorous trio who almost toppled the American nation at its birth. Benedict Arnold offered to sell his soldiers, with the key fortress of West Point, and to deliver to the enemy,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316286060
• ISBN13: 9780316286060
• Release Date: August 1975
• Publisher: Little Brown and Company
• Length: 453 Pages
• Weight: 2.35 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Excellent

"The Traitor and the Spy" is well researched, well reasoned and well written. Benedict Arnold comes across as a complex figure with three fatal flaws (ego, insecurity and avarice) and star-crossed circumstances in which his accomplishments were underappreciated. This book broke ground when it was published, as partially described in the following excerpt from a 1953 Time magazine review: "Even in a day when the traitor has become a headline staple, the name of Benedict Arnold remains the U.S.'s symbol of ultimate treachery. His was the classic sellout, the shocker that reduced a national hero to a despised knave. Yet there are still those ready to defend him as a maligned soldier who was goaded into villainy, and schoolteachers in his home state of Connecticut have complained that it becomes increasingly difficult to present him as a traitor...This week there is black news for Arnold's sentimental defenders. In The Traitor and the Spy, Author James Thomas Flexner (Doctors on Horseback, A Short History of American Painting) has drawn their hero--and quartered him. His is the most carefully researched study of the Arnold-André story so far published, more searching even than the late Carl Van Doren's Secret History of the American Revolution, which showed Arnold for what he was. Cool, reasoned, and highly readable, The Traitor and the Spy may well stand as the last word on the subject." For this reviewer, this excellent book is the last word on the subject. I offer two criticisms: First, the decision not to publish endnotes is disappointing. Flexner writes that every line of the text can be traced to source materials, but anyone wanting those endnotes is instructed to contact the publisher for a pamphlet to be placed at the back of the book. Now, more than half a century and several mergers later, such a letter will be a waste of a stamp. In effect, the endnotes are lost unless the reader can borrow a complete volume from a library. Second, the book included more about John Andre than most will care to know. But I have a sense that this author was a purist when it came to presenting his research, and simply could not bear to remove this information.

An exciting and dramatic story.

This tale has everything you could ask for in a story. Intrigue and romance played out on a grand scale during the American revolution. The real story behind Benedict Arnold's defection is told in fascinating detail. The reader gets a glimpse of the everyday concerns of our nations greatest heros and it's greatest villians. We meet the beautiful and ambitious Peggy Shippen and the handsome and tragic Major Andre'. A rousing good yarn.