CAPTURE OF ANDRE. 9 1 



intelligent physician of the town, who has 

 gathered a fund of information pertaining to 

 the early history of Westchester County, does 

 not credit the captors with any patriotic 

 motive. 



There is documentary evidence, made 

 public by the Rev. Daniel W. Teller ten years 

 ago, which settles the question absolutely, and 

 displays the conduct of the three "patriots," 

 in a worse light than it had ever been viewed 

 before. The gravest accusation that previ- 

 ously had been made against them was that 

 before they knew anything more of their 

 prisoner than that he was a British officer, 

 they had expressed their willingness to release 

 him if he could offer them a sufficient induce- 

 ment in money ; but it now appears that after 

 having discovered the compromising papers in 

 his boot, they agreed upon a sum of 500 or 

 1000 guineas as his ransom, and that the 

 negotiation failed simply because they could 

 not obtain satisfactory security that it would 

 be paid. Gen. Washington was not aware of 

 all that had transpired between Andre and 

 his captors when he made his first report, in 

 which he says : — 



'* A combination of extraordinary circum- 



