Okla-homey
9/22/2010, 06:16 AM
September 22, 1776 American Patriot executed for spying
234 years ago today in New York City, Nathan Hale, a 21 year old Connecticut schoolteacher and captain in the Continental Army, is executed by the British for spying. Take a moment at 11:00 eastern/10:00 central time to remember Nathan at the hour of his hanging 234 years ago.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/6634/nathan21zy.jpg
Nathan Hale statue outside CIA headquarters, Langley VA.
A graduate of Yale University, Hale joined a Connecticut regiment in 1775 and served in the successful siege of British-occupied Boston. In the summer of 1776, he crossed behind British lines on Long Island in civilian clothes to spy on the British. While returning with the intelligence information on Saturday Sept 21, 1776, British troops captured Hale near the American lines and charged him with espionage.
Under the rules of war, a spy caught in uniform could be held as a prisoner, but a spy in civilian clothes could be executed. Further, if convicted, a captured spy taken out of uniform would not be afforded the courtesy of an "honorable" death by firing squad as is a soldier's right and preference, but was hanged like a common criminal.
Hale had left Manhattan and crossed to Long Island from Connecticut on Sept 10, 1776, seeking to discover what the British planned to do next. The redcoats had already forced the colonials to retreat from Brooklyn. Unbeknownst to Hale, they had already made their next move, landing in the Kip’s Bay area on the East River side of Manhattan. It is not known whether he was apprehended on Long Island or back in Manhattan.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/558/nathanhale5bk.jpg
Hale, depicted here at the point of being busted by the British.
The British commanding general, Lord William Howe, interrogated and sentenced Hale at headquarters in a mansion near the site of today’s Beekman Place and the United Nations. He was held overnight in the mansion's greenhouse, then led to the rope the next morning. He wrote two letters; one to his mother and one to a brother officer. The British Army provost-marshal destroyed those letters, and assigned a reason that the rebels should not know that they had a man in their army who could die with so much firmness.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/6964/photo152io.gif
Nathan Hale, about to be hung from an apple tree.
An officer on Howe's staff noted in his diary:
"Nathaniel Hales [sic]…was apprehended as a Spy last night... and having made a full and free confession... was hanged at 11 o'Clock in front of the Park of Artillery.... He behaved with great composure and resolution, saying he thought it the duty of every good Officer, to obey any orders given him by his Commander-in-Chief; and desired the Spectators to be at all times prepared to meet death in whatever shape it might appear."
0f course, these are not quite the remarks Hale is famous for uttering before his death: "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.” The source of that quote is Hale’s friend and fellow officer, Captain (later a general) William Hull—they were students at Yale together—who heard them from still another British officer who had witnessed the execution.
If Hale did say them, they were not entirely original, but paraphrased from Cato, a play by the English writer Joseph Addison, where the following line appears: "What pity is it that we can die but once to save our country."
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/7938/nathanrevoluthale1e5pu.jpg
Hale's statue at his alma mater, Yale University
Research by William Kelby, librarian of the NY Historical Society, turned up the Orderly Book kept by an Officer of the British Foot Guards during the Revolution. Kelby purchased it and it is now in the Historical Society’s Library collection.
From it he learned that the hanging took place at "the Artilery [sic] Park"—an enclosure where the British parked their guns—and set out to find where it was located. He shared his conclusions in a letter to one John Austin Stevens, which was published in the New York Herald on November 26, 1893. Kelby approximately located the site of Hale's hanging to be at the intersection of the modern 3rd Avenue and 66th Street.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/9962/nhaleschoolhouse20022302437va.jpg
Nathan Hale Schoolhouse, Union Plaza, 20 State Street, New London CT. He taught here for two semesters in 1774-1775.
Nathan Hale, RIP
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/7166/insane7zopp6.jpg
234 years ago today in New York City, Nathan Hale, a 21 year old Connecticut schoolteacher and captain in the Continental Army, is executed by the British for spying. Take a moment at 11:00 eastern/10:00 central time to remember Nathan at the hour of his hanging 234 years ago.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/6634/nathan21zy.jpg
Nathan Hale statue outside CIA headquarters, Langley VA.
A graduate of Yale University, Hale joined a Connecticut regiment in 1775 and served in the successful siege of British-occupied Boston. In the summer of 1776, he crossed behind British lines on Long Island in civilian clothes to spy on the British. While returning with the intelligence information on Saturday Sept 21, 1776, British troops captured Hale near the American lines and charged him with espionage.
Under the rules of war, a spy caught in uniform could be held as a prisoner, but a spy in civilian clothes could be executed. Further, if convicted, a captured spy taken out of uniform would not be afforded the courtesy of an "honorable" death by firing squad as is a soldier's right and preference, but was hanged like a common criminal.
Hale had left Manhattan and crossed to Long Island from Connecticut on Sept 10, 1776, seeking to discover what the British planned to do next. The redcoats had already forced the colonials to retreat from Brooklyn. Unbeknownst to Hale, they had already made their next move, landing in the Kip’s Bay area on the East River side of Manhattan. It is not known whether he was apprehended on Long Island or back in Manhattan.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/558/nathanhale5bk.jpg
Hale, depicted here at the point of being busted by the British.
The British commanding general, Lord William Howe, interrogated and sentenced Hale at headquarters in a mansion near the site of today’s Beekman Place and the United Nations. He was held overnight in the mansion's greenhouse, then led to the rope the next morning. He wrote two letters; one to his mother and one to a brother officer. The British Army provost-marshal destroyed those letters, and assigned a reason that the rebels should not know that they had a man in their army who could die with so much firmness.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/6964/photo152io.gif
Nathan Hale, about to be hung from an apple tree.
An officer on Howe's staff noted in his diary:
"Nathaniel Hales [sic]…was apprehended as a Spy last night... and having made a full and free confession... was hanged at 11 o'Clock in front of the Park of Artillery.... He behaved with great composure and resolution, saying he thought it the duty of every good Officer, to obey any orders given him by his Commander-in-Chief; and desired the Spectators to be at all times prepared to meet death in whatever shape it might appear."
0f course, these are not quite the remarks Hale is famous for uttering before his death: "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.” The source of that quote is Hale’s friend and fellow officer, Captain (later a general) William Hull—they were students at Yale together—who heard them from still another British officer who had witnessed the execution.
If Hale did say them, they were not entirely original, but paraphrased from Cato, a play by the English writer Joseph Addison, where the following line appears: "What pity is it that we can die but once to save our country."
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/7938/nathanrevoluthale1e5pu.jpg
Hale's statue at his alma mater, Yale University
Research by William Kelby, librarian of the NY Historical Society, turned up the Orderly Book kept by an Officer of the British Foot Guards during the Revolution. Kelby purchased it and it is now in the Historical Society’s Library collection.
From it he learned that the hanging took place at "the Artilery [sic] Park"—an enclosure where the British parked their guns—and set out to find where it was located. He shared his conclusions in a letter to one John Austin Stevens, which was published in the New York Herald on November 26, 1893. Kelby approximately located the site of Hale's hanging to be at the intersection of the modern 3rd Avenue and 66th Street.
http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/9962/nhaleschoolhouse20022302437va.jpg
Nathan Hale Schoolhouse, Union Plaza, 20 State Street, New London CT. He taught here for two semesters in 1774-1775.
Nathan Hale, RIP
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/7166/insane7zopp6.jpg