The Forgotten Soldier: Nathan Hale

Nathan Hale was just twenty-one years old when the British caught him in New York and arrested him as a spy. Hale was a graduate of Yale University and, by the time of the War for Independence, was already a seasoned schoolteacher. By all accounts he was a quiet, peaceable young man, but he was also patriotic and sacrificial.

He was nineteen years old when, in 1774, joined his local militia unit. After the conflict at Lexington and Concord, Nathan Hale resigned his position as a teacher in New London, Connecticut, and joined the official Continental Army. Hale was chosen to be a part of a special unit that was called “Norton’s Rangers” some people say that we would call them in today’s term “Special Forces.”

In September of 1776, George Washington, desperate to gain intelligence of the British activities, assigned Norton the task of coming up with a plan to get that information. Hale volunteered to infiltrate the city of New York disguised as a Dutch schoolteacher. He was turned by some suspicious loyalists in New York and hanged to death September 22, 1776.

Executions in those days were nothing like they would be today. He was hanged very shortly after his sentence and with very few witnesses except for British military personnel. However, one of the British officers present did briefly record the event in his personal journal and one of Nathan Hale’s Yale classmates, and a personal friend, William Hull, was able under a flag of truce, to interview the officer in charge the next day. It was Hull that reported that among Hale’s last words was the famous line, “I regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.”

As famous as that statement is, the sacrifice of Nathan Hale almost became a forgotten event in the history of the United States. Hundreds of soldiers lost their lives that September. Hale was only one of them. George Washington never mentioned the name of Nathan Hale in any of his written documents. Neither did any of the other founders of our country. It wasn’t until the early 1900’s that the story of Nathan Hale began to take on the fame it has today.

For that reason Nathan Hale serves as a representative for all of those forgotten men who lost their lives to purchase the liberty we enjoy today.