1. GW’s letter to Timothy Matlack, secretary of the Pennsylvania Supreme Executive Council, on this date reads: “I take occasion to inform You by the conveyance which now offers by Express—that Monday the 20th Instant is appointed for proceeding on the Trial of Major General Arnold. The Court Martial will sit at the Camp in the vicinity of Morristown” (Df, in Robert Hanson Harrison’s writing, DLC:GW; Varick transcript, DLC:GW).

2. Arnold’s court-martial for improprieties while military commander at Philadelphia had been suspended in early June (see Council of General Officers, 1 June, and General Orders, 2 June, and n.1 to that document; see also GW to Reed, 9 Feb., and notes 1 and 2 to that document, and Arnold to GW, 19 March, and the notes to that document). For more on the events leading to the court-martial, see Arnold to GW, c.18 April, and n.2 to that document.

Efforts to reconvene Arnold’s court-martial already had begun (see GW to John Laurance, 2 Dec.). Difficulties securing witnesses and settling members delayed the court-martial’s resumption until 23 Dec. (see John Mitchell to GW, 17 Dec., and n.1 to that document; General Orders, 19 Dec., and n.1 to that document; GW to William Smallwood, 20 Dec.; GW to Nathanael Greene, 23 Dec., and notes 1 and 2 to that document; and Arnold, Proceedings, description begins Proceedings of a General Court Martial of the Line, Held at Raritan, in the State of New-Jersey, By Order of his Excellency George Washington, Esq., General and Commander in Chief Of the Army of The United States of America, For the Trial of Major General Arnold, June 1, 1779. Major General Howe, President. Philadelphia, 1780. description ends 3–9; see also GW to the Board of War, 24 Dec., and Board of War to GW, 26 Dec.). For the attendance of Maj. Gen. Robert Howe, who served as president of Arnold’s court-martial, see GW to William Heath, 12 Dec., and n.1 to that document, and Howe’s second letter to GW, 14 December.

Arnold’s court-martial continued into January 1780 at Norris’s tavern in Morristown with interspersed adjournments. After the submission of evidence ended on 21 Jan., Arnold addressed the court: “Mr. president, and gentlemen of this honourable court, I APPEAR before you, to answer charges brought against me by the late supreme executive council of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It is disagreeable to be accused; but when an accusation is made, I feel it a great source of consolation, to have an opportunity of being tried by gentlemen, whose delicate and refined sensations of honour, will lead them to entertain similar sentiments concerning those who accuse unjustly, and those who are justly accused. In the former case, your feelings revolt against the conduct of the prosecutors; in the latter, against those who are deserved objects of a prosecution. Whether those feelings will be directed against me, or against those, whose charges have brought me before you, will be known by your just and impartial determination of this cause.” Arnold’s address continued with allusions to his financial losses incurred while in the army, a recitation of his military accomplishments and honors, and a blunt statement “that my conduct and character have been most unwarrantably traduced, and that the charges brought against me are, false, malicious, and scandalous” (Arnold, Proceedings, description begins Proceedings of a General Court Martial of the Line, Held at Raritan, in the State of New-Jersey, By Order of his Excellency George Washington, Esq., General and Commander in Chief Of the Army of The United States of America, For the Trial of Major General Arnold, June 1, 1779. Major General Howe, President. Philadelphia, 1780. description ends 39–42).

Arnold then refuted each specific charge before reaching his closing remarks: “On this occasion I think I may be allowed to say, without vanity, that my conduct, from the earliest period of the war to the present time, has been steady and uniform. I have ever obeyed the calls of my country, and stepped forth in her defence, in every hour of danger, when many were deserting her cause, which appeared desperate: I have often bled in it; the marks that I bear, are sufficient evidence of my conduct. The impartial public will judge of my services, and whether the returns that I have met with are not tinctured with the basest ingratitude. Conscious of my own innocence, and the unworthy methods taken to injure me, I can with boldness say to my persecutors in general, and to the chief of them in particular, that in the hour of danger, when the affairs of America wore a gloomy aspect, when our illustrious general was retreating through New Jersey, with a handful of men, I did not propose to my associates, basely to quit the general, and sacrifice the cause of my country to my personal safety, by going over to the enemy, and making my peace. I can say I never basked in the sunshine of my general’s favour, and courted him to his face, when I was at the same time treating him with the greatest disrespect, and villifying his character when absent. This is more than a ruling member of the council of the state of Pennsylvania [Joseph Reed] can say, ‘as is alledged and believed.’

“Before I conclude, I beg leave to read before this honourable court a report of a committee of enquiry of congress, on the charges published against me by the council of Pennsylvania, with several letters I did myself the honour to write to congress, and a letter from their committee in answer: I do not presume to offer these as evidence, but as they shew the anxiety I had to have my conduct investigated, and the reluctance of my accusers to bring matters to an issue, I think it incumbent on me as an officer, to lay them before you. …

“If, in the course of my defence, I have taken up the time of the court longer than they expected, they will, I trust, impute it to the nature of the accusations against me; many of which, though not immediately before you as charges, were alledged as facts, and were of such a complexion as to render it necessary to make some observations upon them; because they were evidently calculated to raise a prejudice against me, not only among the people at large, but in the minds of those who were to be my judges.

“I have looked forward with pleasing anxiety to the present day, when, by the judgment of my fellow soldiers, I shall (I doubt not) stand honourably acquitted of all the charges brought against me, and again share with them the glory and danger of this just war” (Arnold, Proceedings, description begins Proceedings of a General Court Martial of the Line, Held at Raritan, in the State of New-Jersey, By Order of his Excellency George Washington, Esq., General and Commander in Chief Of the Army of The United States of America, For the Trial of Major General Arnold, June 1, 1779. Major General Howe, President. Philadelphia, 1780. description ends 42–55).

The court issued its verdict on 26 January. A copy of this decision over the names of Howe and Judge Advocate Gen. John Laurance reads: “The Court met agreeable to adjournment, and having considered the several charges exhibited against General Arnold—the Evidence produced on the trial and his defence—are of opinion with respect to the first charge that he gave permission for a vessel to leave a port in possession of the enemy to enter into a Port in the United States, which permission circumstanced as he was, they are clearly of opinion he had no right to give being a breach of Article 5th Section 18th of the rules and articles of war—Respecting the second charge that although it has been fully proved that the shops and stores were shut by General Arnold’s order on his arrival in Philadelphia they are of opinion that he was justifiable in the order by the resolution of Congress of the [4]th of June 1778 and His Excellency the Commander in chief’s Instructions of the 18th of June 1778 and with respect to the latter part of the same charge, the making considerable purchases while the shops and stores were shut, they are clearly of opinion that it is entirely unsupported, and they do fully acquit General Arnold of it—They do acquit General Arnold of the third charge—Respecting the fourth Charge—It appears to the Court that General Arnold made application to the Deputy Quarter Master General to supply him with waggons to remove property then in imminent Danger from the enemy—that Waggons were supplied him by the Deputy Quarter Master General on this application, which had been drawn from the State of Pensylvania for the Public service and it also appears that General Arnold intended this application as a private request and that he had no design of employing the waggons otherwise than at his private expence nor of defrauding the public nor injuring or impeding the public service. But considering the Delicacy attending the high Station in which the General acted and that requests from him might operate as commands—they are of opinion the request was imprudent and improper and that therefore it ought not to have been made—The Court in consequence of their determinations respecting the first and last charges exhibited against Major General Arnold do sentence him to receive a reprimand from His Excellency the Commander in Chief” (DLC:GW; see also Arnold, Proceedings, description begins Proceedings of a General Court Martial of the Line, Held at Raritan, in the State of New-Jersey, By Order of his Excellency George Washington, Esq., General and Commander in Chief Of the Army of The United States of America, For the Trial of Major General Arnold, June 1, 1779. Major General Howe, President. Philadelphia, 1780. description ends 55; JCC, description begins Worthington Chauncey Ford et al., eds. Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789. 34 vols. Washington, D.C., 1904–37. description ends 11:571; and GW’s third letter to Henry Laurens, 18 June 1778). For the fifth article of the eighteenth section of the articles of war, see General Orders, 7 Nov., n.4.

GW transmitted the proceedings to Congress when he wrote Samuel Huntington on 30 Jan. (DNA:PCC, item 152). Congress subsequently confirmed the verdict, which led to GW reprimanding Arnold in general orders (see JCC, description begins Worthington Chauncey Ford et al., eds. Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789. 34 vols. Washington, D.C., 1904–37. description ends 16:135, 153, 161–62; Huntington to GW, 11 and 29 March, both DLC:GW; and General Orders, 6 April).