The Battle of Valcour

WHEN BENEDICT ARNOLD WAS THIRTEEN HIS TEACHER, a Congregationalist minister, wrote to his mother, picturing her son as “full of pranks and plays.” His most recent stunt had been to climb to the roof of a barn that had caught fire. He horrified onlookers by walking the ridgepole from end to end. Danger nourished Arnold. Chaos and violence ignited adrenaline-charged sensations that transformed fear into a vital sense of urgency. In action, he became himself.

For all soldiers, battle was an occasion for personal glory, but to Arnold it was more. He knew his family’s distinguished lineage—an ancestor had been an early governor of Rhode Island. His father’s disgrace and loss of fortune had spilled the family’s honor onto the streets of Norwich. Arnold was drawn to any chance, any feat, that might refill the cup. When he awoke on October 11, he sensed that the enemy was near, that the confrontation he had spent three months anticipating was about to unfold.

To a seaman in the age of sail, the wind was the world. Overnight the south wind with its cloudy foreboding had quieted. Now a brisk breeze was mounting from the north, scouring the sky and bringing a fresh coolness to sweep the lake. The Americans, like their British counterparts, were up early. They were always on alert, with sentries floating in bateaux to the north, watching for a sail. Half the crew-men in each of the gondolas and schooners stood ready for action at all times.

Before dawn that Friday, Arnold had sent a squad of soldiers, along with some