The Message for the Defector

During the Revolutionary War, a Pennsylvania man was tried for high treason. The prosecution alleged that he had tried to persuade others to enlist in the armies of the enemy, and that he had set out for a place called the Head of Elk to pass information to a man who had gone over to the enemy. Two witnesses testified to an overt act committed in Chester County, and the prosecution also relied on statements and confessions the man had made out of court. The defence argued that "persuading" others meant actually succeeding in getting them to enlist, and that a confession made anywhere other than in open court had never been evidence capable of convicting a man of treason.