In October 1776, four years before Benedict Arnold's treasonous attempt to hand control of the Hudson River to the British, his patchwork fleet on Lake Champlain was all that stood between British forces and a swift end to the American rebellion. Benedict Arnold's Navy is the dramatic chronicle of that desperate battle and of the extraordinary events that occurred on the American Revolution's critical northern front. Award-winning historian James L. Nelson tells how Arnold's fearless leadership against staggering odds secured for America the independence he would later try to betray. Book jacket.