On the night of September 21, 1780, Benedict Arnold, commanding the American garrison at West Point, met secretly with British Major John André at a farmhouse near the Hudson River and handed him detailed plans of the fort’s defenses, sealing a deal to surrender the strategic post to the British for cash and a commission. André tucked the papers into his boot for the journey back to British lines, a decision that undid them both: he was stopped and searched by militia near Tarrytown two days later, and the discovery exposed Arnold’s plot just in time for him to flee to a British warship rather than face capture. This 1874 engraving, published by Johnson, Wilson & Co. of New York, imagines that candlelit exchange. From the Library of Congress collection, item 2010651755, no known restrictions on publication.