It was now apparently that he first conceived the plan of betraying some important post to the British. With this in view he sought and obtained from Washington (August 1780) command of West Point, the key to the Hudson River Valley. Arnold's offers now became more explicit, and, in order to perfect the details of the plot, Clinton's adjutant-general, Major John Andre, met him near Stony Point on the night of the 21st of September. On the 23rd, while returning by land, Andre with incriminating papers was captured, and the officer to whom he was entrusted unsuspectingly sent information of his capture to Arnold, who was thus enabled to escape to the British lines. Arnold, commissioned a brigadier-general in the British army, received L6315 in compensation for his property losses, and was employed in leading an expedition into Virginia which burned Richmond, and in an attack upon New London (q.v.) in September 1781. In December 1781 he removed to London and was consulted on American affairs by the king and ministry, but could obtain no further employment in the active service. Disappointed at the failure of his plans and embittered by the neglect and scorn which he met in England, he spent the years 1787-1791 at St John, New Brunswick, once more engaging in the West India trade, but in 1791 he returned to London, and after war had broken out between Great Britain and France, was active in fitting out privateers. Gradually sinking into melancholia, worn down by depression, and suffering from a nervous disease, he died at London on the 14th of June 1801. Arnold had three sons--Benedict, Richard and Henry--by his first wife, and four sons--Edward Shippen, James Robertson, George and William Fitch--by his second wife; five of them, and one grandson, served in the British army. Benedict (1768-1795) was an officer of the artillery and was mortally wounded in the West Indies. Edward Shippen (1780-1813) became lieutenant of the Sixth Bengal Cavalry and later paymaster at Muttra, India. James Robertson (1781-1854) entered the corps of Royal Engineers in 1798, served in the Napoleonic wars, in Egypt and in the West Indies, and rose to the rank of lieutenant-general, was an aide-de-camp to William IV., and was created a knight of the Hanoverian Guelphic order and a knight of the Crescent. George (1787-1828) was a lieutenant-colonel in the Second Bengal Cavalry at the time of his death. William Fitch (1794-1828) became a captain in the Nineteenth Royal Lancers; his son, William Trail (1826-1855) served in the Crimean War as captain of the Fourth Regiment of Foot and was killed during the siege of Sevastopol.