Agent 355

Agent 355 was the code name of a female spy during the American Revolution, part of the Culper Ring. Agent 355 is one of the first spies for the United States, but her real identity is unknown.[1] The number, 355, could be de-crypted from the system the Culper Ring used to mean "lady."[2]

Biography

The only direct reference to Agent 355 in any of the Culper Ring's missives was from Abraham Woodhull ("Samuel Culper Sr."), to General George Washington.[3] Woodhull described her as "one who hath been ever serviceable to this correspondence."[4]

The true identity of Agent 355 is still unknown, but some facts about her seem clear. She worked for the US during the Revolutionary War as a spy. She would have been recruited by Woodhull into the spy ring.[1] The way the code is constructed indicates that she may have had "some degree of social prominence."[2] She was likely living in New York City,[5] and at some point had contact with Major John Andre and Benedict Arnold.[6][7] One person who may have been Agent 355 was Anna Strong.[5] She was Woodhull's neighbor.[5] Another theory is that Agent 355 may have been Robert Townsend's common-law wife.[1] Stories about Townsend state that he was in love with Agent 355.[8] John Burke and Andrea Meyer have made a different case for 355's involvement in the spy ring using circumstantial evidence that she may have been close to Major John André and also to Benjamin Tallmadge, thereby protecting Woodhall from accusations of being a spy.[9] Other possible candidates for 355 include Sarah Horton Townsend and Elizabeth Burgin.[10]

It is also occasionally believed that there was no Agent 355, but rather that the code indicated a woman who had useful information, but wasn't "formally connected to the ring."[11] The code itself may have referred to "a woman," not an agent who was a woman.[3]

Agent 355 is thought to have played a major role in exposing Arnold and the arrest of Major John André, who was hanged in Tappan, New York.[1] She may have been member of a prominent Loyalist family which would put her within easy reach of British commanders.[1][4]

Agent 355 was arrested in 1780 when Benedict Arnold defected to the Loyalists.[4] She was imprisoned on the HMS Jersey, a prison ship, where she gave birth to a boy she named Robert Townsend, Jr.[1] She later died on the prison ship.[1][6] However, Alexander Rose disagrees with this narrative, stating that "females were not kept aboard prison ships," and that "there's no record whatsoever of a birth."[12] Strengthening the idea that Agent 355 may have been Anna Strong is the fact that her husband Selah was imprisoned on the Jersey and she was supposedly allowed to bring him food.[3] Her presence on the ship may have led to the legend that Agent 355 was imprisoned there.[3]

In popular culture

Agent 355 has become a part of popular fiction. She is the namesake of one of the main characters in Y: The Last Man from Vertigo Comics.[13] She was also an inspiration for a modern spy also called 355, and being included in Assassins Creed 3's in-game database of historical facts, in which her information was critical in helping the protagonist in discovering the British plot to capture.

See also

Footnotes

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 McCarthy, Linda (2002). "355". National Women's History Museum. Retrieved 19 April 2016.
  2. 1 2 Casey 2015, p. 76.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Phelps, Mark Anthony (2013). "Agent 355". In Frank, Lisa Tendrich. An Encyclopedia of American Women at War: From the Home Front to the Battlefields. 1. ABC-CLIO. p. 529. ISBN 9781598844436.
  4. 1 2 3 "Personalities". CIA. United States Government. 15 March 2007. Archived from the original on 12 March 2008. Retrieved 18 April 2016.
  5. 1 2 3 Casey 2015, p. 77.
  6. 1 2 "David W. Jacobs: Who Was Agent 355?". History News Network. 21 November 2006. Retrieved 18 April 2016.
  7. ↑ Rose 2006.
  8. ↑ Allen, Thomas B.; Harness, Cheryl (2004). George Washington, Spymaster: How the Americans Outspied the British and Won the Revolutionary War. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic. p. 60. ISBN 9781426300417.
  9. ↑ Burke, John A.; Meyer, Andrea (2009). "Spies of the Revolution". New York Archives. 9 (2). Archived from the original on 23 February 2011. Retrieved 18 April 2016.
  10. ↑ Kilmeade, Brian (5 November 2014). "Women at War: The 'Lady' and George Washington's Secret Six". Fox News. Retrieved 18 April 2016.
  11. ↑ Kilmeade and Yeager 2013, p. Afterword, p.1.
  12. ↑ Rose 2013, p. np.
  13. ↑ Mafe, Diana Adesola (2015). "'We Don't Need Another Hero': Agent 355 as an Original Black Female Hero in Y: The Last Man". African American Review. 48 (1): 33. Retrieved 18 April 2016 – via Project MUSE. (subscription required (help)).

Sources

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