The battles and cruel prisoner treatment during the Revolutionary War brought sorrow to many families at home who feared for the welfare of their sons.
The hot climate and wretched condition of the prison ships, unwholesome atmosphere, and insufficient food, made the days of imprisonment in Charleston equal in horror to the worst days at Valley Forge. Of the 1,800 prisoners who were taken captive on May 12, 1780, only 700 survived when they were paroled. One such hero was Colonel John Koen.
According to the fireside tales told by Colonel Koen to the household in the old Koen homestead, this young soldier, then only twenty years old, was with the Armies of Generals Gates, Morgan, and Arnold. He participated in the great victory of Saratoga; and during the winter of that same year—1777—we find him sharing with the army of General Washington, the trials and privations of the days of suffering at Valley Forge.
“I have seen the tears trickling down my grandfather’s face when he told of the sufferings of that awful winter,” said his granddaughter, Mrs. Temple to the writer,” and I used to wonder at seeing a grown man cry, and often I said in my childish way that war should never bring a tear in my eyes. Little did I know then that the bitterest tears I should ever shed would be caused by war, and for eighteen months during the terrible struggle between the North and the South I should mourn as dead my soldier husband, whom God in His mercy restored to me after all hope of seeing him alive again was over.”
Source: In Ancient Albemarle by Catherine Albertson.