Eighty years ago a tragedy was consummated by the river Hudson, which,
in the character of its victim and the circumstances of his story, goes
far to yield another example to the list of names immortalized by
calamity. On the 2d of October, 1780, a young British officer of
undistinguished birth and inconsiderable rank was hanged at Tappan.
Amiable as his private life was, and respectable as were his
professional abilities, it is improbable that the memory of John Andre,
had he died upon the battle-field or in his bed, would have survived the
generation of those who knew and who loved him. The future, indeed, was
opening brilliantly before him; but it was still nothing more than the
future. So far in his career he had hardly accomplished anything better
than the attainment of the mountain-top that commanded a view of the
Promised Land. It is solely and entirely to the occasion and the
circumstances of his death that we are to ascribe the peculiar and
universal interest in his character that has ever since continued to
hold its seat in the bosom of friend and of foe. To this day, the most
distinguished American and English historians are at issue respecting
the justice of his doom; and to this day, the grave inquirer into the
rise and fall of empires pauses by the way to glean some scanty memorial
of his personal adventures.
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