Their Traitor, Our Patriot

Nathan Hale, born in Connecticut, educated at Yale and a graduate of the class of 1773, was executed by the British as a traitor and spy on September 22, 1776.

It is reported that Nathan Hale had infiltrated British lines and was captured with sketches of troop formations and fortifications. When captured, Hale admitted that he was on a secret mission for Gen. George Washington. With neither trial nor due process, British General William Howe ordered Hale's execution on the following morning at 11:00. Hale asked to speak to a clergyman, and for a Bible, but both requests were refused.

Nathan Hale's last words: "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country."

Washington learned of Hale's fate later that evening when an aide to General Howe visited the Americans under a flag of truce to discuss a prisoner exchange. In those negotiations, the aide mentioned that an American, Capt. Nathan Hale, had been hanged as a spy at 11 o'clock that morning.

Nathan Hale was hanged at the age of 21, left grotesquely suspended for three days as a lesson to the hated rebels, then cut down and cast into an unmarked grave somewhere on Manhattan Island.

They hanged our patriot, Nathan Hale.

The information above is from The Connecticut Society of the Sons of the American Revolution which contains more information about our patriot, Nathan Hale, along with information about other American patriots as well.