Life and Treason of Benedict Arnold

He was the bravest man in the Continental Army, the hero of Saratoga, a soldier whose wounds and valor should have secured his place in the founding of a nation. Then he betrayed it all. Jared Sparks's 1835 biography traces the arc of American history's most infamous figure: the ambitious young merchant who rose through military ranks through sheer audacity, the commander who fought brilliantly at Valcour Island and in the decisive campaigns of the Revolution, the man who deserved recognition but received slights instead. Sparks examines the poisonous intersection of wounded pride, crushing debt, and a dangerous romantic entanglement with the loyalist Peggy Shippen that led Arnold to devise the ultimate betrayal: the surrender of West Point to the British. The failure of that plot and Arnold's flight to British lines marked not just one man's fall but the creation of an enduring American myth. This is the story of how a revolutionary hero became a byword for treason, and why the name Benedict Arnold still carries the power to shock. For readers drawn to the dark corners of the American founding, this early biography captures a nation wrestling with its own capacity for betrayal.