Andre, John, Major (McKechnie Section 1)

Recorded by Jackson (Dictionary).

Major André is a figure better known in military history than as a profilist, in which capacity he was an amateur. He was born in London on 2 May 1750 of a Genevese father and a French mother.

Through a mutual friend, the poetess Anna Seward, he met and became engaged to Honoria Sneyd. This engagement was later broken, whereupon André bought a commission in the army in 1771. He was on the Continent until 1774, when he joined his regiment in Quebec.

At the surrender of Fort St John's on 3 November 1775 André was taken prisoner. He was first of all interned in Pennsylvania, and was exchanged at the end of 1776. He then went to New York as aide-de-camp to General Charles Grey, and during the winter of 1777, when Philadelphia was occupied, he cut some of his silhouettes and also wrote light verse. After Philadelphia had necessarily been evacuated, André went to New York, this time as aide to General Sir Henry Clinton, who was the new Commander-in-Chief.

André, who was in charge of intelligence, negotiated the secret correspondence between the American General Benedict Arnold and General Clinton in May 1779, after Arnold had agreed to transfer his services to the British side. Arnold proposed that he should surrender West Point to the British, in return for a sum of money and his own appointment as commandant of the establishment. The negotiations were conducted through the General's wife, whom André knew well. They were broken off in October when the British declared their unwillingness to commit themselves in the matter of payment. In 1780 fortune turned against André. He had been in Charleston with General Clinton the year before, having been given the rank of Major as Deputy-Adjutant-General to Clinton. On his return from Charleston to New York, he found a note from Arnold. André arranged to meet Arnold under a 'flag of truce'. On 21 September 1780 the two met on the Hudson River, and it was finally agreed that West Point be placed under Arnold's command on payment of the sum of £20,000 (with certain provisos). The British sloop Vulture, which had carried André to the meeting-place, came under fire and was compelled to retire, leaving André behind the American lines. The next day he was persuaded to change his uniform for civilian disguise, and Arnold provided him with an overland pass to New York. He was arrested by American militiamen, and the West Point papers which he had concealed on himself were discovered. André was thus revealed as a spy. General Washington cautiously convened a board of officers to examine the prisoner; they concluded that he was indeed a spy, and condemned him to death. During a few days' grace, it was suggested to General Clinton that, to save André's life, Arnold should be given up. Clinton refused, and André was hanged at Tappan, New York, on 2 October 1780. André had hoped for a soldier's death and had asked General Washington to grant him this privilege, but no reply was received. When the young soldier saw the gallows he is reported to have said, `I dread not death, but the manner of it'.

André, the gifted victim of circumstance who died young, became something of a posthumous hero. A memorial was erected to him in Westminster Abbey, the British army went into mourning, and his brother was made a baronet. André had kept a military journal from June 1777 until the end of 1778; this was taken to England and eventually published in 1904.

Some of André's silhouettes were cut in England while he was on leave. Others were cut during his service and remained in the United States; one series was in the ownership of the Pennington family, who had inherited them from the daughter of one Dr Redmond, a friend of George Washington. This series included a fine portrait of Washington himself, another of Phineas Bond (a close friend of the President) and portraits of Benjamin Franklin and General John Burgoyne. André cut a self-portrait (now in the Yale University Art Gallery), which was later engraved by J. K. Sherwin (1751-90). He cut this when he was twenty-seven years old; another portrait, of his friend Captain Lord Cathcart, was cut at about the same time. The two young men were White Knights at the festival called Mischianza (a medley of parades and medieval tournaments) held in May 1778.

Perhaps Major John André is the only artist recorded in this book to have been honoured by a memorial tablet in Westminster Abbey. This, on the south wall of the nave, is inscribed as follows:

Sacred to the memory of Major John André, who raised by his merit at an early period of life to the rank of Adjutant-General of the British forces in America, and employed in an important but hazardous enterprise, fell a sacrifice to his zeal for his King and Country on the 2nd of October, AD. 1780. Aged 29. Universally beloved and esteemed by the army in which he served and lamented even by his foes. His Gracious Sovereign King George the Third has caused this monument to be erected.

The remains of Major André on the 10th of August 1821 removed from Tappan by James Buchanan, Esq., His Majesty's Consul at New York under instructions from his Royal Highness the Duke of York and with the permission of the Dean and Chapter finally deposited in a grave contiguous to this monument on the 28th of November, 1821.

As the example of André's work which is illustrated (the silhouette of Captain Batwell) is a print, it is not possible to describe the exact technique which he used for it. This silhouette was no doubt cut freehand, and the 'teardrops' which form an oval round it were either painted or were small pieces of paper cut out and stuck carefully round the oval. Most of André's works were, however, inscribed with the names of the sitters. Other sitters included General Horatio Gates (signed 'André' ), Captain Noel (signed 'André') Sir John Woollaston (signed 'André 1773') and Captain Cathcart (signed 'André 1778').

Jackson illustrated in her Dictionary the silhouettes of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. These were both rather crudely cut, much in the manner of the silhouette of Captain Batwell.

Signatures vary between 'A', 'André' and 'Major André'. Sometimes the year, ranging from 1773 to 1778,was added.

Ill. 271