Wayne, Putnam, Knox and Heath are there, Steuben, proud Prussia's honored son; Brave Lafayette from France the fair, And chief of all our Washington.
Andre's fate on the other hand was widely lamented. He was universally beloved by his comrades and possessed a rich fund of humor which often bubbled over in verse. It is a strange coincidence that his best poetic attempt on one of Anthony Wayne's exploits near Fort Lee, entitled "The Cow Chase," closed with a graphically prophetic verse:
"And now I've closed my epic strain, I tremble as I show it, Lest this same Warrior-Drover Wayne Should ever catch the poet."
By a singular coincidence he did: General Wayne was in command of the Tarrytown and Tappan country where Andre was captured and executed. It is also said that these lines were published by one of the Tory papers in New York the very day of Andre's capture. One of the old-time characters on the Hudson, known as Uncle Richard, has recently thrown new light on the capture of Andre by claiming, with a touch of genuine humor, that it was entirely due to the "effects" of cider which had been freely "dispensed" that day by a certain Mr. Horton, a farmer in the neighborhood.
In view of all he lost,--his youth, his love, And possibilities that wait the brave, Inward and outward bound dim visions move Like passing sails upon the Hudson's wave.
It is impossible even in these later years, not to speak of twenty-five or fifty years ago, to travel along the shores of Haverstraw Bay or among the passes of the Highlands, without hearing some old-time stories about Arnold and Andre, and it would be strange indeed if a little romance had not here and there become blended with the real facts. Uncle Richard's account is undoubtedly the best since the days of Knickerbocker. "Benedict Arnold, you know, had command of West Point, and he knew that the place was essential to the success of the Continental cause. He plotted, as everybody knows, to turn it over to the enemy, and in the correspondence which he carried on with General Clinton, young Andre, Clinton's aid, did all the writing. Things were coming to a focus, when a meeting took place between Arnold and Clinton's representative, Andre, at the house of Joshua Hett Smith, near Haverstraw. Andre came on the British ship "Vulture," which he left at Croton Point, in Haverstraw Bay. Well," so runs Uncle Richard's story, "it took a long time to get matters settled; they 'confabbed' till after daybreak. Then Arnold started back to the post which he had plotted to surrender. But daylight was no time for Andre to return to the "Vulture," so he hung round waiting for night.