On 24th September, the day following his capture, Major André, of whose real name and rank the American officers were still ignorant, indited his famous letter to Washington, full of rhetoric and self-justification, in which he advanced several considerations for his release from captivity. Mentioning his name and military rank, he only wrote, he said, to vindicate his good fame, not to solicit security. He was not, he vowed with a strange distortion of actuality, accustomed to duplicity. He justified his negotiations with "a person" (Arnold, unnamed) who was to give him intelligence which should prove serviceable to British arms, a fair ruse of war, he thought. Having concluded these negotiations, he proceeded, he was conducted without his knowledge into the American lines. He had thus become a prisoner and was justified in his endeavour to escape by all means available, and having reached neutral ground, through a disguise, he had been arrested by irregulars. There were gentlemen at Charleston, he concluded, in a half-menacing and highly impolitic phrase, whose rank might be set in exchange for his; in any case they were persons whom the treatment he received could not fail to affect. Washington received this communication after the flight of Arnold who, learning from Jameson's letter, duly delivered by Allen, how perilously matters stood for him, had taken refuge on board the British vessel _Vulture_. The American commander-in-chief gave immediate orders for the transfer of André to West Point, where he arrived on 26th September, under the care of a strong escort commanded by Major Tallmadge, the officer who had advised Jameson to countermand the first order sending the prisoner to Arnold. It was to Tallmadge that André made the memorable confession that he had engaged in the adventure "for military glory, the applause of his King and country and perhaps a brigadiership." The Major asked the American in what light General Washington was likely to regard him. "He will regard you," replied Tallmadge simply, "just as the British regarded my old comrade and schoolfellow, Nathan Hale. Your fate will be the same as Hale's."