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The Last Days of Camp Security
After Sergeant Lamb left, it appears that life at the camp continued as he described it for
one more year. The soldier’s of Cornwallis’ army remained under heavy guard, but the
residents of Camp Indulgence lived in the village, producing handmade articles and raising their
children there.
However, in the winter of 1782-1783, a camp fever broke out among the prisoners, and a large
number of them died. They were buried in a small valley near the camp. Gibson, reporting in
the 1880’s, said, “the graves are still visible, marked with stones”. It was rumored
at the turn of the century that the gravesite was robbed by doctors needing specimen collections,
and the bones of the British soldiers were said to inhabit the doctors’ offices of the time.
It was also at this time that the gravesite became the location for a haunted ghost story. The
tale, written in a poem entitled “Hessian Thal”, tells of the ghosts of the British
soldiers that come awake every Christmas Eve, to jeer at their commanding officer who caused
them to lose the battle and become captured, only to die at Camp Security.
The prisoners were held at Camp Security until the British signed the Treaty of Paris,
formally ending the war, on April 19, 1783. After their release, some former prisoners stayed
in America, while others returned to their former homes.
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