George Washington's Secret Six By Brian Kilmeade

The historical nonfiction book i read was titled “George Washington’s Secret Six” and it was written by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger. The book talks about a group of spies known as the culper spy ring. The members of the culper spy ring are an excellent example of the ordinary people that risked their lives to create the world’s greatest nation. The members of the culper ring were not well known nor were they ever rewarded for their extreme courage but they played as important of a role as anyone in the founding of our nation. Washington knew as well as anyone that in order to win the war they would need to control the city of New York. When the british army won the battle of long island and took control of New York, Washington knew it was

Setauket would become one of the key areas in the culper spy ring and would be the home of one of the lead agents Abraham Woodhull. Tallmadge and Woodhull grew up as close childhood friends and when Tallmadge had the task of assembling a ring the first person he reached out to was Woodhull. Woodhull was hesitant at first to join the ring but was motivated by the death of his older brother who served as a general in the New york militia. Soon after Woodhull joined the ring, Washington realized the risk of his spies getting caught for treason was high. Knowing this Washington gave the spy the code name Samuel Culper. Culper would go on to be a lead member in Washington’s spy

First, Townsend discovered a british plan to flood the U.S economy with counterfeit money. This information was then passed to Washington and as a result congress recalled all its bills in circulation an act that made life for citizens more difficult but could possibly have saved the american revolution. Second, in 1780 the culper ring was able to uncover a british plan to ambush the newly arrived american allied french army in Rhode Island. If the culper ring would have never been able to get this information to the french the french and american alliance would have been severely damaged. Finally, the culper spy ring was able to uncover secret of the most recognized traitor in american history Benedict Arnold. Upset with a lack of recognition Benedict arnold was convinced by his wife Peggy Shippen to switch sides and work the British major John Andre. The wife of Arnold, Peggy Shippen was extremely close to Andre and was able to convince Arnold that switching sides was the best thing for him. Arnold then agreed to hand over West point to Andre and the British in exchange for 20,000 dollars. The plan was exposed through major Tallmadge and his intelligence in the Culper spy ring. Andre was captured and hanged and the treason that could have been detrimental to the Americans was