Queering Benedict Arnold 9 Brooklyn: July 29, 2012 By Jake Preston
"Queering Benedict Arnold" is historical gay fiction. The story alternates between twenty-first century scenes in which Jake Preston and Ben Arnold (a descendent) investigate Benedict's life, and eighteenth-century scenes imagined by Jake and Ben. Some characters and allusions hark back to "Wayward Island" (in nifty's file on Beginnings). Jake Preston is the narrator in both works.
Most episodes are faithful to history, except for sexual encounters, which are fictional. You should not read this story if you are a minor, or if you are offended by explicit gay sex.
Benedict Arnold was an American military genius who was treated unfairly by jealous rivals while he lived. After his death, he was demonized as the archetypal traitor in history and folklore, but he was a target of inexplicable hatred long before his treasonable conspiracy with John André to surrender the fort at West Point to the British. Taken as a whole, "Queering Benedict Arnold" is an attempt to discover the origins of that hatred. Comments and suggestions welcome: contact Jake at jemtling@gmail.com.
Chapter 9 delves into aspects of Ben's and Benedict Arnold's character. There are no sex scenes in this chapter, but there will be in Chapter 10. I believe that fullness of character adds to the intensity and interest of sexual episodes, so in this chapter we are working on character.
Nifty stories are free to Readers, but donations are encouraged.
On Sunday morning, Ben and I went with Red and Chaim to Trinity Church, where Red played organ and Chaim played piano. It reminded me of the first time I heard Red Feather play a Mendelsohn prelude at the Mission Church in Crane Lake. Trinity Brooklyn identifies itself officially as an "open and affirming" church. The sign at the front door reads "GLBT Welcome!"
The Pastor preached from the Sermon on the Mount: "Judge not, that you be not judged; for you will be measured according to the same standard that you impose on others. And why do you gawk at the mote in your brother's eye, all the while unaware of the beam in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me pull the mote out of your eye', when you have a beam in your own eye?"
Midway through the sermon, we heard a commotion outside the church. It got louder when someone started sounding off with hate-speech with a loudspeaker. "Jesus hates gays!" "Jesus hates you!" "GLBT Die!"- that sort of thing. The church ushers had opened the front doors to let in fresh summer air, but closed them to block out the noise. This wasn't the first time Trinity was picketed by sidewalk demonstrators. The Pastor reminded us of the Gay Pride mantra: "Ignore, ignore, ignore." After the service, we encountered fifteen or twenty people standing on the sidewalk in front of Trinity, carrying signs with the same message. We got a laugh out of one of the signs: "Sodomites are Bottomites!" "How strange that these hateful straights should take an anatomical interest," Ben said. Two of the more curious signs read: "Abortion is Murder!" and "Stop Lezzies from Killing Babies!" I hadn't heard that Lesbians needed abortions.
"They're not very good at this, are they?" Ben said.
"Ours is a message of love! Repent of sodomy or you'll go to hell," said the man with the loudspeaker. He singled out churchgoers two elderly ladies as 'faggots' and 'queers'.
"Pretend you're straight and maybe we'll let you live," Chaim muttered.
The protest-leaders were plump white men who would have done well to exchange their sidewalk demonstration for a gym membership. Aside on the sidewalk, seven women and children stood silently, looking a bit abject. "I'll bet they're abused at home," Ben said.
"What did you think of the service, Jake?" Red asked when we walked home.
"The music was wonderful; the sermon was thoughtful; the sidewalk demonstrators told me that I had come to the right place," I replied.
We returned from church and sunned ourselves on blankets and towels in the back yard. Benzion brought lawn chairs for himself and his wife. Sarah prepared sandwiches and iced tea. Red helped in the kitchen. The day's New York Times and USA Today were passed around in sections and stimulated political discussion. It's difficult for six outspoken liberals to have a genuine debate, but Ben found much to criticize in an article in USA Today, in an article in the left lower corner of the front page:
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - The NATO military coalition in Afghanistan says two of its service members have been killed in an insurgent attack in the east of the country.
The military alliance says the attack happened on Saturday but doesn't provide further details.
NATO also did not provide the nationalities of the dead. Most of the troops in eastern Afghanistan are American.
"How ironic! The Marines disappear from the news. In their place we read of a 'military coalition' and a 'military alliance'," Ben said. "NATO has turned cagey about the 'nationalities of the dead'. They don't want it known that most of the dead are Americans. A mass protest at home would put an end to the pipeline of soldiers used as fodder, just like it did in Vietnam." Ben read the last paragraph of the article:
Saturday's deaths bring the number of international service members killed in Afghanistan so far this month to at least 42. July 2011 saw 52 international service members killed.
"There we go again," Ben said. "'International service members' used twice, as if they weren't almost all Americans. They stumble over cumbersome phrases: 'international service members'; 'military coalition service members'. Who talks like that? Casualties are counted piecemeal month to month, instead of counting corpses as the total cost of war. It's as if Associated Press and USA Today are press agents for a government that wants to prolong the war in Afghanistan. News editors are either lazy or lapdogs."
"Ben needs a fresh application of ointment," I said to Chaim. "Too much sun on his skin had made him irritable." Ben gave me a mock-grimace-a pretended quarrel between lovers, as Sarah and Benzion saw it. Chaim returned with the ointment. Ben lay on his right side. Chaim knelt at Ben's right and massaged oil from his face to his torso. Sarah moved her chair behind Ben, exchanging the idyllic view of four youthful bodies for the scars of a wounded Marine.
"I fear you're getting a rather horrid view of the human condition, Mrs. Haiam," Ben said.
"I wouldn't say 'horrid', Ben," Sarah replied. "I would say 'sacred', like the wounds of Saint Sebastian, or Jesus. Did you know that in Salvador Dali's paintings, Sebastian always has a wound at his left side? Usually it's an open vein."
"Yesterday we saw some Dali photos at the Brooklyn Museum, but none of his paintings," I said.
My attempt to change the subject was frustrated when Chaim's massaging hands reached Ben's thigh. He pulled Ben's shorts down and off, baring his butt. Sarah looked closely at the scarred flesh. The scene reminded me of times when Red and I posed for Anna Ravitch, and sometimes fucked. On those occasions, Mrs. Ravitch ignored the sex (or rather, took it for granted) and focused on some technical detail like the quality of light and color, or some problem in perspective due to in the way we positioned our bodies.
Sarah continued: "Sebastian was a military saint, like the archangel Michael, and like St. George and his older companion, Demetrius of Thessalonica, eromenos and erostes in Christianized form." I wondered why Sarah knew so much about Christian saints. "We've visited the Church of St. George in Lod, where George was born," Sarah said. "It's not far from the airport in Tel Aviv. In art history, Sebastian is an Apollo-figure, and Apollo is an eromenos too, as you know from Anna Ravitch's sketch of you and Red that's hanging above your bed in the guestroom."
"That brings back memories," I replied.... "The lengths we went to, posing for 'Apollo and Admetus'." Red blushed, recalling his 'Lake Ashawa' identity as Red Feather.
"It was worth the sacrifice," Sarah said; "such a glorious painting!" On the day when she learned for certain that Chaim was gay and that Red was his lover, Sarah recognized Anna Ravitch as a kindred spirit. For Sarah as for Anna, art history conferred dignity to the gay male condition. Mrs. Ravitch gave her some of her sketches. Every year at Hanukah, Mrs. Ravitch mailed her a new painting, a new batch of sketches, and a book about male nudes. The Haiams lived modestly in Brooklyn-for Benzion, a kosher butcher, was not a wealthy man; but their house was loaded with Ravitch sketches and paintings worth thousands of dollars-not that Sarah would ever agree to part with them.
"Your Golgotha was Ganjigal, Lieutenant Arnold," Sarah said. Now that Ben's body was disrobed in all its glory, she reverted to his military title.
Ben: "September the sixth-that evening, Aziz and I were alone in Com Central when I got a call from a Staff Sergeant in Camp Joyce with our marching orders for the next day. We were to head south down the Kunar River Valley to Camp Joyce. I wanted to know what our mission would be. 'Negative', the Staff Sergeant said: 'operational security, Sir'.
"'What shall I tell the Askars?' Aziz asked me. 'They won't like it if they think our mission is an American secret'.
"'Just say it's a KLE in a village somewhere near FOB Joyce.' Since our orders were communicated by a Staff Sergeant, I figured it must be a routine mission."
"FOB? KLE?" Benzion asked what these acronyms meant.
"Forward Operations Base Joyce, otherwise known as Camp Joyce," Ben explained. "KLE is the acronym for a 'Key Leader Engagement'. "That's what we call it when Marines and Askars descend on a village. The officers meet with the village elders for tea and a chat while Marines and Askars search the village for munitions, maps, and signs of a Taliban presence. It's the Vietnam War all over again. During the Vietnam War, Marines and ARVN interrogated elders and searched villages for signs of Viet Cong, without the hypocritical civility of tea- time. The Marines were supposed to pretend that the ARVN was in charge then, too, even though everyone knew it wasn't true.
"For this expedition we had sixty Askars [ANA], twenty cops [ANP], thirteen Marines, two Army officers and a Navy Corpsman. For Aziz and me, Sunday [September 6] was our last night together...."
Ben's voice trailed off. His eyes assumed a 'forty-yard stare'. I moved close to him and sat cross-legged at his shoulders. Ben squeezed my arm and held tight. "Ben's body is inscribed with the double sorrow of Ganjigal," I said. "His unit was betrayed by the 'Kabul Cops' and by Command at FOB Joyce, and he lost touch with the love of his life." I kept my cool, but Benzion and Saran saw alarm in my eyes. Never before had Ben told the story of Ganjigal. Was he on the verge of a breakdown, or a breakthrough? Maybe he had to risk the former to achieve the latter.
"On Monday just after noon, we reached Camp Joyce in a convoy of eight transport trucks. A Staff Sergeant told us that our mission was a routine KLE in Ganjigal, a village in Ganjga Valley, two miles northeast of Camp Joyce. Later we learned that the Ganjigal mission would be anything but routine. For months the Askars kept an informal truce with the villagers, but this fell apart after a firefight in Dam Dura, a village a mile from Ganjigal four days earlier [on September 3]. An ETT [Embedded Training Team] held a (supposedly) peaceful KLE there, but when they departed the village, the ETT took Taliban fire from the ridge. About the same time, rockets fired from the ridge destroyed some fuel tanks in Camp Joyce. The Ganjigal elders denied responsibility. They broadcast their support for the Afghani Government on public radio. They requested that an ETT come to Ganjigal to take a census of all men of military age, from which to recruit a tribal militia that would prevent further rocket attacks. The elders also demanded that the ANA build a new mosque in Ganjigal, to be paid for by the Marines.
"Aziz warned me that the elders could not be trusted. 'Ganjigal is a bad village, it's Taliban', one of the Kabul Cops (the ANP) had told him. 'It's a point of departure for mule-caravans that smuggle cedar planks into Pakistan and return with munitions for the Taliban'. But the commander at FOB Joyce (Major Williams) had already decided to send us there. 'We don't want to lose the initiative, and we need to ensure the safety of the elders in Ganjigal', Williams said. It was obvious that he trusted the elders. He summoned our unit for an intelligence briefing, which turned out to be superficial and defective at every possible level.
"First, Major Williams said that ANA Major Talib (his Afghan counterpart) would be in command of the mission. It would be up to Major Talib to call for aerial or artillery support in the event of an emergency. This was ludicrous on its face, for none of the Afghans (except for Aziz, who was never consulted) had either the linguistic or the technical knowledge needed to call for support. Major Talib's command was just a fiction-as was obvious from the fact that our briefing was conducted by Williams, not by Talib, who wasn't qualified to give a briefing. 'Whatever happened to the basic principle that a military commander does not share command?' I whispered to Aziz. In fact the command structure was even worse than we thought. We assumed that tactical decisions would be made in the combat zone, as had always been the case. No one told us that the rules of combat had changed, and command decisions would now be made by Staff at Camp Joyce!
"Second, Major Williams said that the Taliban were aware of our mission and had set up ambush positions inside Ganjigal. According to military intelligence, there were only twenty Taliban. (In the event, we were attacked by over 150 Taliban.)
"Third, our briefing of the terrain around Ganjigal was limited to a single slide of a military map. It showed Ganjigal as a village located on a Wash that branched eastward from the Kunar River, with cliffs and high ridges all the way. The village consisted of two settlements on the north and south banks of the Wash. We were to approach the village going east on the south side of the Wash. 'Why is the Major divulging this information?' Aziz asked me. 'The Taliban are sure to know we'll be on the south side of the Wash!' 'Maybe they're planning a last minute change', I replied, but that didn't happen. 'Either way, we'll be boxed in on three sides. It's a booby-trap waiting to be sprung. Whoever planned this mission is a military idiot'.
"Fourth, Major Williams announced that no air support would be dedicated to the Ganjigal mission, because the helicopters would be engaged in another mission in a neighboring valley. 'If there's an emergency', he said, 'some helicopters can be diverted to Ganjigal within five minutes'. Aziz and I shared a skeptical glance. We were alarmed at Williams's complacency.
"Fifth, there was the issue of military equipment. Toward the conclusion of the briefing, Aziz asked Major Williams if we would have high-explosive munitions, and smoke bombs. Williams looked at Aziz rather contemptuously, as if he had spoken out of turn. He ignored the question about high-explosive munitions. A Supply Sergeant told him that Camp Joyce had no conventional smoke bombs, only Willy Peters. 'Well, there's your answer, Lieutenant Rahul', Williams said. 'You'll have Willy Peters'. Aziz and I exchanged dark looks. We both knew Willy Peters [white phosphorous chemicals] were outlawed by the Geneva Convention, and could not be used unless the Major authorized them.
"If this wasn't bad enough, the leader of the Afghan National Police [ANP] appealed for more time to prepare his men for the mission. I didn't know what he meant by that, since the 'Kabul Cops' (as we called them) played paramilitary roles in ETT missions. Major Williams agreed to postpone the Ganjigal mission to the next day.
"'What a disaster!' I said to Aziz. 'The Major just gave the Taliban time to strengthen their fighting force, and he gave away our position. We've got such a bad history of intelligence leaks, it won't take the Taliban long to find out what our plans are'. 'I'm sure they already know', Aziz replied. 'All the Afghans have cellphones, and they chatter on them constantly. My guess is that the Taliban are already positioning ambush sites on the south side of the Wash'.
"In the light of a full moon, we departed FOB Joyce in a caravan of trucks and Humvees at 0300 [3:00 AM] 'to maintain the element of surprise', the Major said. 'Element of surprise, my ass!' I exclaimed to Aziz. 'The Taliban already know about our mission, our numbers, our command structure (such as it is), and our position, thanks to the Major'.
"Aziz was more philosophical: 'With or without the Major, they would have known everything anyway. The only way to secure these missions is to keep the ANP out of them. It would be better for us if the Kabul Cops weren't here at all. Even then, there's no way that a contingent of sixty chatterbox Askars can maintain an element of surprise'.
"'Spoken like a U.S. Marine', I replied.
"At 0400 we left our trucks and walked for a mile on foot toward Ganjigal. 'Ben, I have a bad feeling about Ganjigal', Aziz said. 'In case something happens, I want you to know you're the only man I've ever loved'. We were surrounded by Askars, so Aziz spoke in English, though at this point he didn't much care who overheard him. I held his hand and told him I felt the same way. At least among Afghanis, men could hold hands without calling attention to themselves.
"At the first light of dawn-0530-our unit took fire from the ridge just outside Ganjigal: one or two shots at first, and then a barrage from at least a hundred attackers, not twenty. One of the Marines ran up to me to say that he saw women and children carrying fresh ammunition to the Taliban attackers. Aziz appealed to Major Talib to call in a TIC."
"What's a TIC?" Benzion asked.
"Troops in Contact," Ben replied. "TIC was always accepted as a call for aerial and artillery support. Little did we know that in the weeks before Ganjigal, Army and Air Force generals had been debating about TICs in Afghanistan. 'There are too many TICs', they complained. Go figure! One general compared TICs to the fable of the girl who called 'wolf'-primae facia a false analogy, since every TIC on record in the Afghan War was preceded by enemy fire. There were no false alarms, none! We should be worried about generals who can't think logically. If there are too many TICs, that's a sign that the American strategy of Afghanizing the Afghan War is a failure-just like Nixon's plan to 'Vietnamize' the Vietnam War was a failure. It's not a sign that our soldiers are calling for aerial support when they don't need it.
"For twenty minutes we took fire from both the north and south ridges, and from the village. We were ambushed on three sides. At 0550, General Talib gave the word and Captain Swenson made a call to a Staff Sergeant at FOB Joyce, requesting aerial support. This went beyond TIC: it was a specific appeal for support. 'Sorry, no helicopters available', he was told. Captain Swenson: 'This is unbelievable. We have a platoon [of ANA] out there and we've got no Hotel Eco. We're pinned down!'"
"Hotel Echo?" Benzion asked. Ben explained that 'Hotel Echo' was military code for 'high explosive artillery shells'. 'Hotel' is H; 'Echo' is E; HE is 'high explosives'. The Marines and the Askars were outnumbered and fighting with small arms, deprived of aerial and artillery support.
"While all this was going on, we could see that the Taliban on the ridges were on the move, getting into position to outflank us on the rear. Every time we requested support, the Command at Joyce responded with a game of 'twenty questions'-what was our position? Were there civilians in the line of fire? And so on. 'If these jerks at Camp Joyce have no military expertise, didn't they at least play football in high school?' I asked Aziz. Major Talib got on the phone to Major Williams and explained the situation (through translators). 'What are you going to do?' Talib asked Williams several times. Each time he replied 'We're getting air'. Why did I have the feeling that Major Williams was just trying telling Talib what he wanted to hear, to get him off the phone?
"At 0600 a Staff Sergeant at Camp Joyce told us that helicopter support would arrive in fifteen minutes. 0605 we made the 'combat zone' decision that our position was untenable and we would have to retreat to the rocks. We dropped the fiction that Major Talib and the Afghans were in charge. We also dropped the fiction that the Staff at Camp Joyce were capable of making tactical decisions.
"For the next 50 minutes, the command failures at Camp Joyce went from bad to worse. The immediate issue was smoke-cover, which we needed to retreat to safety in the rocks. Otherwise we were sitting ducks. Since we didn't have smoke-bombs, Captain Swenson requested permission to use Willy Pete. Request denied (several times over). He asked for aerial support. Request denied (several times over). The Staff Sergeant at Camp Joyce was just as frustrated as Swenson, but Swenson was never allowed to speak directly to the Major-in fact, we didn't even know which Major was in charge at Camp Joyce! During this time, three Marines and one Navy Corpsman were killed, along with eight Askars. At 0655, we received permission to use Willy Pete. The Marines and Askars made a mad dash and crowded together behind a stone wall. Our situation was still dangerous. Crowded together, we made a target. Captain Swenson was injured in crossfire. I was injured by a Willy Pete that boomeranged from one of the terrace walls. That's all I remember. I was told later that I was carried to the wall by Aziz. Blackhawk support didn't arrive until 0710, and the fighting continued for another seven hours. I was told that Aziz took me back to Camp Joyce in a Humvee, around 1400. That's all I know."
"Ben, I would give you a hug if you weren't naked!" Sarah said. I tossed Ben a beach towel and Chaim helped to wrap it around his midsection. Sarah knelt by Ben and hugged him. "Jake tells me you've never talked about Ganjigal before," she said. "I feel honored. We all do, Ben. But why here, and now, and why share your story with us?"
"Because I'm among friends who won't judge me for being damaged, or for being gay," Ben said. "I'm glad I got Ganjigal off my chest, but still, I probably won't talk about it again. During World War II, my grandfather fought with the Canadian Army in Europe. He returned to Saskatchewan with a France & Germany Star and a Conspicuous Valour Medal, but he never wore them, and he never spoke of his years in the Army. After the Battle of Ganjigal, I understood why."
"So it was friendly fire, then, the cause of your injuries," Benzion said. He changed the subject himself: "Ben, I'm impressed at your detailed memory of Ganjigal, and I'm impressed that your account if it is so analytical."
"Fighting for a cause that was lost from the start," Ben said.
"Never mind about that," Benzion said. "Politicians and generals were responsible for that, not you."
"Thanks for that, Mr. Haiam," Ben said.
We moved indoors and got dressed. Sarah Haiam served coffee and sandwiches at the dining room table. Chaim presented Ben with a remarkable gift, in an unusual way. "Chaim has a gift for you, Ben," Red said. "It's something he found last year at a garage sale. He's afraid that you might not accept it, so it's my job to tell you that you must."
Chaim handed Ben an old leather-bound book, somewhat tattered at the edges. It was by James M. Adair. The title: History of the American-Indians, Particularly Those Nations Adjoining to the Mississippi, East and West Florida, Georgia, South & North Carolina and Virginia, published in London for Edward & Charles Dilley, in Poultry, A.D. MDCCLXXV. "The M. is for Makittrick, John Adair's middle name," Chaim explained. "Poultry Street was a continuation of Cheapside, on the east side of London."
"You're right," Ben said, "this book must be worth a fortune. You shouldn't part with it, Chaim."
"The book was in the bottom of a box of old music scores," Chaim said. "I paid $5.00 for the whole box. Look at the 'ex libris' on the inside cover, and you'll see why I want you to have it."
He looked at the faded medallion, EX LIBRIS, and below it, in bold handwriting, Benedict Arnold, the signature of Ben's ancestor.
"When we stayed at the Lathrop Bed & Breakfast in Norwich, the proprietor, Eliza Jethrop, told us that no book from Benedict Arnold's library has ever been found, although he was a great reader, and books were part of his trade as an apothecary," Ben said. "This book is a first in the reconstruction of Benedict Arnold's life."
"The book caught my eye because Adair was one of a few colonial writers who believed that the American Indians descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel," Chaim said. He turned to a passage halfway through the book and read it aloud:
Robert Williams, the first Englishman in New-England, who is said to have learned the Indian language, in order to convert the natives, believed them to be Jews: and he assures us, that their tradition records that their ancestors came from the south-west, and that they return there at death; that their women separate themselves from the rest of the people at certain periods; and that their language bore some affinity to the Hebrew.
"This is one of many passages in which Benedict Arnold made notes in the margins," Chaim said. See, in this one, he crossed out "-bert" and wrote "Roger" in the left margin. He underlined "Indian language" and wrote "Narragansett" in the right margin, and below it, "Also Wm. Arnold, for advantage in business. B.A. learned Narragansett and Wampanoeg."
"I think he disputed the opinion that Roger Williams and William Arnold had religious reasons for learning Narragansett for religious reasons. B.A. must be the first Benedict Arnold," Ben said.
Chaim turned the pages to an early chapter in which Adair described Indian ethnicity and speculated about race. In this discussion, the Genesis-based notion of three races (descended from Shem, Ham, and Japheth) was combined with deductive arguments reflective of eighteenth-century Enlightenment thought:
Observations on the colour, shape, temper, and dress of the Indians of America.
The Indians are of a copper or red-clay colour -- and they delight in every thing, which they imagine may promote and increase it: accordingly, they paint their faces with vermilion, as the best and most beautiful ingredient.
The left margin has a faint note in Benedict Arnold's hand: "Caribou Brave likes his war-paint!So do I," Again, on the same page:
All the Indians are so strongly attached to, and prejudiced in favour of, their own colour, that they think as meanly of the whites, as we possibly can do of them. The English traders among them, experience much of it, and are often very glad to be allowed to pass muster with the Indian chieftains, as fellow-brethren of the human species.
Benedict Arnold disputed this passage. He wrote in the left margin: "Not so the Mohegans. And Caribou Brave takes pride in his colonial disguises, which fool everyone who doesn't know him."
"Adair lived with the Choctaws for years, so his examples are drawn from tribes in the Southern Colonies, and from Alabama and Mississippi," Chaim said. He pointed to a passage later in the book:
The Creeks having a particular friendship for some of the traders, who had treated them pretty liberally, took this opportunity to chide the Choktahs, before the traders, in a smart though friendly way, for not allowing to the English the name of human creatures: ? for the general name they give us in their most favourable war- speeches, resembles that of a contemptible, heterogeneous animal.
Beside "heterogeneous animal," Benedict Arnold wrote "mule-offspring of horse and female donkey."
"Mules are sterile. They can't reproduce," Chaim said. "That must be the point of the Choctaw insult."
"It's rather more subtle than Islamists who call Jews the sons of monkeys and pigs," Benzion interjected.
Chaim turned to another page where Benedict Arnold wrote notes in the margins. "This is where Adair gets into race theory. We have to read carefully, 'cause it's gonna get deep. Adair contrasts two theories about the origins of race. First there's the notion of three races, black, white, and yellow, based on the story of Noah's three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Then there's an Enlightenment theory of four races, black, white, yellow, and red, created by God in four separate acts of creation. Adair holds to the Genesis-based theory, and he argues that the Indians are racially white, and that they are the Lost Tribes of Israel."
That the Indian colour is merely accidental, or artificial, appears pretty evident. Their own traditions record them to have come to their present lands by the way of the west, from a far distant country, and where there was no variegation of colour in human beings; and they are entirely ignorant which was the first or primitive colour. Besides, their rites, customs, &c. as we shall presently see, prove them to be orientalists: and, as the difference of colour among the human species, is one of the principal causes of separation, strife, and bloodshed, would it not greatly reflect on the goodness and justice of the Divine Being, ignominiously to brand numerous tribes and their posterity, with a colour odious and hateful in the sight and opinion of those of a different colour.
Beside "orientalists" in the text, Arnold wrote "Lost Tribes."
Some writers have contended, from the diversity of colour, that America was not peopled from any part of Asia, or of the old world, but that the natives were a separate creation. Of this opinion, is Lord Kames, and which he labours to establish in his late publication, entitled, Sketches of the History of Man.
At this point Benedict Arnold wrote in the margin, "Henry Home, Lord Kane, 1774."
"From this note, I would infer that Benedict Arnold had a copy of Sketches of the History of Man in his library," Ben said. "He kept up with the latest books published in London."
But his reasoning on this point, for a local creation, is contrary both to revelation, and facts. His chief argument, that "there is not a single hair on the body of any American, nor the least appearance of a beard," is utterly destitute of foundation, as can be attested by all who have had any communication with them--of this more presently--Moreover, to form one creation of whites, a second creation for the yellows, and a third for the blacks, is a weakness, of which infinite wisdom is incapable. Its operations are plain, easy, constant, and perfect. The variegation therefore of colours among the human race, depends upon a second cause. Lord Kames himself acknowledges, that "the Spanish inhabitants of Carthagena in South-America lose their vigour and colour in a few months."
At the point where Adair quoted Kames? "there is not a single hair on the body of any American"? Benedict Arnold wrote a revealing marginal note: "Red Feather & Caribou Brave have hair on their thighs and in the cleft of the arse." Enough said. Beside "Carthagena," Arnold wrote "slave-trading port in New Spain."
We are informed by the anatomical observations of our American physicians, concerning the Indians, that they have discerned a certain fine cowl, or web, of a red gluey substance, close under the outer skin, to which it reflects the colour; as the epidermis, or outer skin, is alike clear in every different creature. And experience, which is the best medium to discover truth, gives the true cause why this corpus mucosum or gluish web, is red in the Indians, and white in us; the parching winds, and hot sun-beams, beating upon their naked bodies, in their various gradations of life, necessarily tarnish their skins with the tawny red colour.
Beside "corpus mucosum," Arnold wrote in the margin: "most visible in the scrotum & inside the prepuce, also in ridges of the bung-hole-Red Feather & Caribou Brave. Wind and sun not the cause!"
"How extraordinary!" Benzion exclaimed. "He turned Adair's empirical argument upside down in a shrewd observation. It goes without saying that Benedict Arnold had plenty of opportunities to observe."
The text continues:
Add to this, their constant anointing themselves with bear's oil, or grease, mixt with a certain red root, which, by a peculiar property, is able alone, in a few years time, to produce the Indian colour in those who are white born, and who have even advanced to maturity. These metamorphoses I have often seen.
Beside "bear's oil," Benedict Arnold wrote in the left margin, "also used for buggery." In the right margin, Arnold revealed his 'apothecary' side: he glossed "a certain red root" as "Lachnanthus caroliniana, L. tinctora."
At the Shawano main camp, I saw a Pensylvanian, a white man by birth, and in profession a christian, who, by the inclemency of the sun, and his endeavours of improving the red colour, was tarnished with as deep an Indian hue, as any of the camp, though they had been in the woods only the space of four years.
Benedict Arnold's marginal note: "I can pass as Mohegan or Abenaki as well as Caribou Brave can pass as English."
As the American Indians are of a reddish or copper colour,--so in general they are strong, well proportioned in body and limbs, surprisingly active and nimble, and hardy in their own way of living.
Arnold's marginal note: "Beautiful Red Men, Abenaki are gorgeous, especially when painted for war!"
"It's a good thing for Benedict Arnold that the Puritans never inspected his library," Benzion mused.
They are ingenious, witty, cunning, and deceitful; very faithful indeed to their own tribes, but privately dishonest, and mischievous to the Europeans and christians. Their being honest and harmless to each other, may be through fear of resentment and reprisal--which is unavoidable in case of any injury. They are very close, and retentive of their secrets; never forget injuries; revengeful of blood, to a degree of distraction.
Benedict Arnold wrote his objections in the margins. On the left, he wrote: "C.B. noble as Charles d'Orléans, kept faith as war-prisoner, kept Abenaki out of Pontiac's rebellion." In the right margin he wrote: "R.F. my only friend in Concord. R.F. and C.B. the only men I would trust at sea."
"People in New England despised Benedict Arnold for an Indian lover," Ben remarked. "His partiality to the Mohegans and Abenaki was based on experience."
"It's even more interesting that Benedict Arnold knew about the life of Charles d'Orléans, since he alludes to Charles's life as a prisoner of war in England after the Battle of Agincourt," Chaim remarked. I've looked for eighteenth-century editions of Charles's ballads and songs, but so far I haven't found any. He might have learned about Charles d'Orléans from the Encyclopédie raisonné des sciences, published by Denis Diderot in 28 volumes from 1751 to 1772. The Encyclopédie is just the sort of book that Arnold would have had for sale in his apothecary in New Haven. Even so, I haven't found any hint in Arnold's notes that he might have known the French Encyclopedia."
They are timorous, and, consequently, cautious; very jealous of encroachments from their christian neighbours; and, likewise content with freedom, in every turn of fortune. They are possessed of a strong comprehensive judgment,--can form surprisingly crafty schemes, and conduct them with equal caution, silence, and address; they admit none but distinguished warriors, and old beloved men, into their councils. They are slow, but very persevering in their undertakings--commonly temperate in eating, but excessively immoderate in drinking.--They often transform themselves by liquor into the likeness of mad foaming bears. The women, in general, are of a mild, amiable, soft disposition: exceedingly modest in their behaviour, and very seldom noisy either in the single, or married state.
In the left margin, Arnold wrote, "Freedom! Like the Scots in Britain, freedom is their main motivation." In the right margin, Arnold wrote: "Chief Benjamin Uncas, Mogehans; Chief Dark Eagle, Abenaki, both wise leaders."
The men are expert in the use of fire-arms,--in shooting the bow,-- and throwing the feathered dart, and tomohawk, into the flying enemy. They resemble the lynx, with their sharp penetrating black eyes, and are exceedingly swift of foot; especially in a long chase: they will stretch away, through the rough woods, by the bare track, for two or three hundred miles, in pursuit of a flying enemy, with the continued speed, and eagerness, of a stanch pack of blood hounds, till they shed blood. When they have allayed this their burning thirst, they return home, at their leisure, unless they chance to be pursued, as is sometimes the case; whence the traders say, "that an Indian is never in a hurry, but when the devil is at his heels."
In the right margin, Arnold wrote: "Good fighting men. C.B. the model & he won't take scalps."
Chaim turned a page. "Now we come to the part about the supposed hairlessness if Indians," he said.
Their eyes are small, sharp, and black; and their hair is lank, coarse, and darkish. I never saw any with curled hair, but one in the Choktah country, where was also another with red hair; probably, they were a mixture of the French and Indians. Romancing travellers, and their credulous copyists, report them to be imbarbes, and as persons impuberes, and they appear so to strangers. But both sexes pluck all the hair off their bodies, with a kind of tweezers, made formerly of clam-shells, now of middle- sized wire, in the shape of a gun-worm; which, being twisted round a small stick, and the ends fastened therein, after being properly tempered, keeps its form: holding this Indian razor between their fore-finger and thumb, they deplume themselves, after the manner of the Jewish novitiate priests, and proselytes.--As the former could not otherwise be purified for the function of his sacerdotal office; or the latter, be admitted to the benefit of religious communion.
Beside imbarbes and impuberes, Arnold wrote in the margin: "No beards, no pubes-I've helped R.F. and C.B. shave beard & pubes!" Beside "gun-worm" he wrote, "spiral screw used to clean the barrel of musket." Beside "Jewish novitiate priests," he wrote, "Lost Tribes of Israel."
"I believe that Benedict Arnold held to the view that the Indians were the Lost Tribes of Israel," Chaim said. "So far as I know, this idea goes back to a Portuguese Sephardic Jew named Antonio de Montezinos, who made a voyage to South America in 1641-1642. In Ecuador he encountered an Indian tribe that practiced Judaic-like rituals. From this he deduced that they were Reubenites and Levites. In Amsterdam in 1649, Montezinos was examined by a Rabbi named Menasseh ben Israel, who concluded that the Ten Tribes had scattered to many lands, including South America. Montezinos died around 1650, but the Rabbi published a narrative of his travels in The Hope of Israel, published in London that year. I've studied Benedict Arnold's marginal notes, looking for signs that he might have known The Hope of Israel, but it's impossible to tell, since John Adair used the Rabbi as one of his sources. The most we can say is that it's a mid-seventeenth-century idea, the notion that the Indians are Lost Tribes of Israel."
"That's quite a contrast to the Spaniards, who speculated about whether or not the Indians even had souls," I said.
Our reading continued:
Their chief dress is very simple, like that of the patriarchal age; of choice, many of their old head-men wear a long wide frock, made of the skins of wild beasts, in honour of that antient custom: It must be necessity that forces them to the pinching sandals for their feet. They seem quite easy, and indifferent, in every various scene of life, as if they were utterly divested of passions, and the sense of feeling. Martial virtue, and not riches, is their invariable standard for preferment; for they neither esteem, nor despite any of their people one jot more or less, on account of riches or dress. They compare both these, to paint on a warrior's face; because it incites others to a spirit of martial benevolence for their country, and pleases his own fancy, and the eyes of spectators, for a little time, but is sweated off, while he is performing his war-dances; or is defaced, by the change of weather.
Here Benedict Arnold wrote in the margin: "This describes the martial simplicity of the Abenaki, but the Mohegans are content in peaceful simplicity too."
A few pages later, Adair turned his attention to Indian costume, another topic that attracted Benedict Arnold's interest:
They formerly wore shirts, made of drest deer-skins, for their summer visiting dress: but their winter-hunting clothes were long and shaggy, made of the skins of panthers, bucks, bears, beavers, and otters; the fleshy sides outward, sometimes doubled, and always softened like velvet-cloth, though they retained their fur and hair. The needles and thread they used formerly, (and now at times) were fish-bones, or the horns and bones of deer, rubbed sharp, and deer's sinews, and a sort of hemp, that grows among them spontaneously, in rich open lands.
Here Arnold wrote in the right margin: "needles & threads highly valued by Abenaki & by Penobscots in Maine, good for apothecary trade."
The women's dress consists only in a broad softened skin, or several small skins sewed together, which they wrap and tye round their waist, reaching a little below their knees: in cold weather, they wrap themselves in the softened skins of buffalo calves, with the wintery shagged wool inward, never forgetting to anoint, and tie up their hair, except in their time of mourning. The men wear, for ornament, and the conveniencies of hunting, thin deer-skin boots, well smoked, that reach so high up their thighs, as with their jackets to secure them from the brambles and braky thickets. They sew them about five inches from the edges, which are formed into toffels, to which they fasten fawns trotters, and small pieces of tinkling metal, or wild turkey-cock-spurs. The beaus used to fasten the like to their war-pipes, with the addition of a piece of an enemy's scalp with a tuft of long hair hanging down from the middle of the stem, each of them painted red: and they still observe that old custom, only they choose bell-buttons, to give a greater sound.
In the right margin, Arnold wrote: "Leather belts & boots valued in Maine, Penobscots and colonial lumbermen will trade for dressed logs & planks." In the left margin, Arnold glossed Adair's description of war-pipes and scalps: "War-pipes (sans scalps) used by Mohegans in ceremonial dances. C.B. no longer attaches a scalp to his war-pipe, but substitutes peacock feathers obtained from Lathrop apothecary, much to the delight of Abenaki."
They have a great aversion to the wearing of breeches; for to that custom, they affix the idea of helplessness, and effeminacy. I know a German of thirty years standing, chiefly among the Chikkasah Indians, who because he kept up his breeches with a narrow piece of cloth that reached across his shoulders, is distinguished by them, as are all his countrymen, by the despicable appellative, Kish-Kish Tar&amacrkshe, or Tied Arse.--They esteem the English much more than the Germans, because our limbs, they say, are less restrained by our apparel from manly exercise, than theirs. The Indian women also discreetly observe, that, as all their men sit down to make water, the ugly breeches would exceedingly incommode them; and that, if they were allowed to wear breeches, it would portend no good to their country: however, they add, should they ever be so unlucky, as to have that pinching custom introduced among them, the English breeches would best suit their own female posture on that occasion; but that it would be exceedingly troublesome either way.
Benedict Arnold wrote in the left margin: "Pieter Van Hueveln tight-breeched like Germans, Caribou Brave rather likes the fashion." In the right margin: "Mohegans and Abenaki piss standing, just like English."
The men wear a slip of cloth, about a quarter of an ell wide, and an ell and an half long, in the lieu of breeches; which they put between their legs, and tye round their haunches, with a convenient broad bandage. The women, since the time we first traded with them, wrap a fathom of the half breadth of Stroud cloth round their waist, and tie it with a leathern belt, which is commonly covered with brass runners or buckles: but this sort of loose petticoat, reaches only to their hams, in order to shew their exquisitely fine proportioned limbs.
Benedict wrote in the right margin: "Stroud cloth, woolen cloth from England & from Connecticut-good for trade in NY and Maine."
They make their shoes for common use, out of the skins of the bear and elk, well dressed and smoked, to prevent hardening; and those for ornament, out of deer-skins, done in the like manner: but they chiefly go bare-footed, and always bare-headed. The men fasten several different sorts of beautiful feathers, frequently in tufts; or the wing of a red bird, or the skin of a small hawk, to a lock of hair on the crown of their heads. And every different Indian nation when at war, trim their hair, after a different manner, through contempt of each other; thus we can distinguish an enemy in the woods, so far off as we can see him.
Arnold wrote: "Leathern boots popular with Indians, good for trade. Shoes, not so much."
Their language is copious, and very expressive, for their narrow orbit of ideas, and full of rhetorical tropes and figures, like the orientalists. In early times, when languages were not so copious, rhetoric was invented to supply that defect: and, what barrenness then forced them to, custom now continues as an ornament.
Formerly, at a public meeting of the head-men, and chief orators, of the Choktah nation, I heard one of their eloquent speakers deliver a very pathetic, elaborate, allegorical, tragic oration, in the high praise, and for the great loss, of their great, judicious war-chieftain, Shu-las-hum-máshtà-be, our daring, brave friend, red shoes. The orator compared him to the sun, that enlightens and enlivens the whole system of created beings: and having carried the metaphor to a considerable length, he expatiated on the variety of evils, that necessarily result from the disappearance and absence of the sun; and, with a great deal of judgment, and propriety of expression, he concluded his oration with the same trope, with which he began.
Arnold wrote in the left margin: "Red Feather likes metaphors in John Donne & Jeremy Taylor; memorized some of them. Rhetorical figures common to Indian & English."
They pay no religious worship to stocks, or stones, after the manner of the old eastern pagans; neither do they worship any kind of images whatsoever. And it deserves our notice, in a very particular manner, to invalidate the idle dreams of the jesuitical fry of South-America, that none of all the various nations, from Hudson's Bay to the Missisippi, has ever been known, by our trading people, to attempt to make any image of the great Divine Being, whom they worship. This is consonant to the Jewish observance of the second commandment, and directly contrary to the usage of all the ancient heathen world, who made corporeal representations of their deities--and their conduct, is a reproach to many reputed christian temples, which are littered round with a crowd of ridiculous figures to represent God, spurious angels, pretended saints, and notable villains.
"Nobility of Abenaki religion," Arnold wrote in the left margin. In the right, he wrote: "Mohegans mostly Congregationalists but they have a Shaman."
Here I cannot forbear remarking, that the Indians call the penis of any animal, by the very same name, Hasse; with this difference only, that the termination is in this instance pronounced short, whereas the other is long, on purpose to distinguish the words. This bears a strong analogy to what the rabbins tell us of the purity of the Hebrew language, that "it is so chaste a tongue, as to have no proper names for the parts of generation." The Cheerake can boast of the same decency of style, for they call a corn-house, Watóhre and the penis of any creature, by the very same name; intimating, that as the sun and moon influence and ripen the fruits that are stored in it, so by the help of Ceres and Bacchus, Venus lies warm, whereas on the contrary, sine Cerere & Bacchus, friget Venus.
Benedict Arnold took issue with Adair, and corrected the bit about "corn-house": "Not corn-house or corn-crib; the allusion is to the shape of corn on the cob, as for English in 'corn-holing, Nothing to do with Ceres & Bacchus."
"I found only one passage in Adair relating to gay sex," Chaim said. He turned to the relevant page:
It ought to be remarked, that they are careful of their youth, and fail not to punish them when they transgress. Anno 1766, I saw an old head man, called the Dog-King (from the nature of his office) correct several young persons--some for supposed faults, and others by way of prevention. He began with a lusty young fellow, who was charged with being more effeminate than became a warrior; and with acting contrary to their old religious rites and customs, particularly, because he lived nearer than any of the rest to an opulent and helpless German, by whom they supposed he might have been corrupted. He bastinadoed the young sinner severely, with a thick whip, about a foot and a half long, composed of plaited silk grass, and the fibres of the button snake-root stalks, tapering to the point, which was secured with a knot. He reasoned with him, as he corrected him: he told him that he was Chehakse Kanèba-He, literally, "you are as one who is wicked, and almost lost*." The grey-hair'd corrector said, he treated him in that manner according to ancient custom, through an effect of love, to induce him to shun vice, and to imitate the virtues of his illustrious fore- fathers, which he endeavoured to enumerate largely: when the young sinner had received his supposed due, he went off seemingly well pleased.
Benedict Arnold wrote in the right margin: "In London 'effeminate' men are hanged monthly at Tyburn. He might meet with the same fate in New England. Mohegans and Abenaki are more tolerant. R.F. & C.B. not only escaped whipping, they are respected in their tribes."
We reviewed Benedict Arnold's marginal notes, and decided to make a list of things that they told us about their author. Here's what we came up with:
First, Benedict was a critical reader of books, so much so that sometimes he made notes in the margin.
Second, Benedict's learning extended to knowledge of a medieval French poet (Charles d'Orléans), though this might have come second-hand from Diderot's Encyclopedia.
Third, as an Indian lover, Benedict was thoughtful about race. He studied Lord Kames's Sketches of the History of Man and disagreed with it. He believed that the English and Indians belonged to the same 'white' race. He was persuaded by John Adair's argument that the Indians descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. This was a popular view in colonial times. It was a view that supported his empathy and respect for Indians. Benedict also appreciated the Indians' use of rhetoric, especially metaphor, and saw its kinship with writers like John Donne and Jeremy Taylor.
Fourth, Benedict's marginalia confirms his intimate relations with Red Feather and Caribou Brave. It also confirms his acquaintance with the Dutch farmer near Poughkeepsie, Pieter Van Hueveln-Caribou Brave's lover.
Fifth, Benedict observed the execution of sodomites at Tyburn in London, and praised Indian tribes for their toleration.
Sixth, incidental notes confirm Benedict's knowledge of trade up and down the Atlantic coast, and his knowledge of apothecary science.
"This sketch of Benedict Arnold is different from the one I remember learning in school: 'Benedict the traitor'," Chaim remarked.