On this day 250 years ago in Cambridge, Massachusetts, General Washington received a deciphered copy of the coded message that Dr. Benjamin Church had attempted to deliver to the British in Boston. The letter showed that Church was reporting to the British the troop strength of the Continental Army in New York and other intelligence. On that day Church wrote a letter to Washington upon learning “that the indiscrete Letter is decyphered,” claiming that he had been providing exaggerated intelligence to the British in a misguided attempt to prompt them into providing intelligence in return. Church admitted

That this foolish Affair was conducted with Irregularity and may have sundry passages equally exceptionable is probable, but I can honestly appeal to Heaven for the purity of my Intentions; that I have much of folly, precipitation and Indiscretion to be forgiven I candidly confess, that forgiveness I most humbly intreat, . . . I condemn my heedless Folly most sincerely; [and] implore the magnanimous the compassionate General Washington to shield me from undeserved Infamy

Washington did not reply to Church’s letter but instead appointed Dr. Isaac Foster to replace Church as superintendent of the Continental Army’s General Hospital

Sources: “Benjamin Church to George Washington, 3 October 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-02-02-0084. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 2, 16 September 1775 – 31 December 1775, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987, pp. 85–87.]; “General Orders, 3 October 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-02-02-0082. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 2, 16 September 1775 – 31 December 1775, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987, pp. 81–82.]; https://justinmuseum.com/tjoschultz/baker.html