American Patriots and Founders
  • Obadiah Moore, Revolutionary Patriot, fought at Battle of Charleston, POW
    • Some Descendants of Obediah More I and his wife Prudence Willoughy
  • Adam Peck, Ensign, Virginia - Some Ancestors and Descendants
  • The Gayle Family: Josiah & Christopher
  • Alfred Alexander Sawyer (1845 TN-1933 OK) and his wife, Elizabeth "Eliza" Ann Morris (1845 TN-1920 OK
  • The Bewley Family: Methodist Circuit Rider Pastors in the Southern Frontier
  • Discovering and writing about American History and my own family's connection to it has been a hobby since I was a child. I welcome e-mail, letters, photos and pedigrees or family history from others. - Susan.
  • The Saxons: The Whitner/Weidner, Summerour and Wininger Family History
  • Levi Wininger - The Story of His life during the Civil War
  • Hans Kierstede, Refugee from Saxony, one of the first Colonial American Doctors, a John Teller, Pvt. NY patriot Ancestor
  • Adam Peck Jr. in the War of 1812
  • Alexander Maddux at Valley Forge
  • Lester Morris, Pvt. NC at the Battle of New Orleans, POW, Revolutionary War
  • John Harrison Burnett at Valley Forge
  • John Harrison Burnett at Valley Forge
  • Historical Biographies by Susan Moore Teller
  • Adam Peck Sr.. and his wife, Elizabeth Sharkey, first generation of the Peck Clan in America.
  • ADAM PECK'S SONS: ADAM THE YOUNGER AND THE WAR OF 1812 --
  • The Gayle Line: Adam the Younger's Eliza

Stories about the men and women who founded the United States of America 

by Susan Moore Teller: smt100@cox.net 

John Harrison Burnett was a Virginian who followed General George Washington during the American Revolution in his retreat to Valley Forge, in rural Pennsylvania, after their defeat in their attempt to re-capture Philadelphia, then the effective capital of the brand new  United States of America.  

John, like a quarter of the men who were there with Washington, died there in 1780, likely of disease. 

He has many descendants living in this nation today. 


JOHN Harrison BURNETT  was born in 1750 in Albemarle, Virginia, USA1. He died between Oct 1778-Feb 1779 in Valley Forge, Chester, Pennsylvania, USA. He married MARY HOWARD in 1772 in Amherst, Virginia, USA1 . She was born in 1746 in York, Virginia, USA1, 2. She died in 1830 in Roane, Tennessee, USA.
 
Notes for John H Burnett:

Valley Forge, winter 1777-78 , Valley Forge
John served in the Revolutionary War from Amherst Co., Virginia and died at Valley Forge, PA. In the Amherst county court Records, widow Mary "Molly"  Burnett received supplies for the service of her husband John, proving his service.

​There were so many Mary's in those days, they had a system for nicknames to distinguish one Mary from another: lst, Molly, 2nd Polly, 3rd Dolly. Also there were many Sarah's often called "Sally."


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The photo is of  the American Revolutionary War winter encampment Valley Forge
 
Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, was the site of the camp of the American Continental Army over the winter of 1777-1778 in the American Revolutionary War. This was a time of great suffering for George Washington's Army, but it was also a time of retraining and rejuvenation.
 
With the winter setting in, the prospects for further campaigning were greatly diminished, and Washington sought quarters for his men. Though several locations were proposed, he selected Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, 22 miles northwest of Philadelphia. It proved to be an excellent choice. Named for an iron forge on Valley Creek, the area was close enough to the British to keep their raiding and foraging parties out of the interior of Pennsylvania, yet far enough away to halt the threat of British surprise attacks. The high ground of Mount Joy and Mount Misery, combined with the Schuylkill River to the north, made the area easily defensible.
On December 19, 1777, when Washington's poorly fed, ill-equipped army, weary from long marches, struggled into Valley Forge, winds blew as the 12,000 Continentals prepared for winter's fury. Grounds for brigade encampments were selected, and defense lines were planned and begun. Within days of the army's arrival, the Schuylkill River was covered with ice. Snow was six inches deep. Though construction of more than 1,000 huts provided shelter, it did little to offset the critical shortages that continually plagued the army.
 
Soldiers received irregular supplies of meat and bread, some getting their only nourishment from "firecake," a tasteless mixture of flour and water. So severe were conditions at times that Washington despaired "that unless some great and capital change suddenly takes place ... this Army must inevitably ... Starve, dissolve, or disperse, in order to obtain subsistence in the best manner they can." Animals fared no better. Gen. Henry Knox, Washington's Chief of Artillery, wrote that hundreds of horses either starved to death or died of exhaustion.
 
Clothing, too, was wholly inadequate. Long marches had destroyed shoes. Blankets were scarce. Tattered garments were seldom replaced. At one point these shortages caused nearly 4,000 men to be listed as unfit for duty.
 
Undernourished and poorly clothed, living in crowded, damp quarters, the army was ravaged by sickness and disease. Typhus, typhoid, dysentery, and pneumonia were among the killers that felled as many as 2,000 men that winter. Although Washington repeatedly petitioned for relief, the Congress was unable to provide it, and the soldiers continued to suffer. Women, relatives of enlisted men, alleviated some of the suffering by providing valuable services such as laundry and nursing that the army desperately needed.
 
Upgrading military efficiency, morale, and discipline were as vital to the army's well-being as was its source of supply. The army had been handicapped in battle because unit training was administered from a variety of field manuals, making coordinated battle movements awkward and difficult. The soldiers were trained, but not uniformly. The task of developing and carrying out an effective training program fell to Baron Friedrich von Steuben. This skilled Prussian drill master, recently arrived from Europe, tirelessly drilled and scolded the regiments into an effective fighting force. Intensive daily training, coupled with von Steuben's forceful manner, instilled in the men renewed confidence in themselves and their ability to succeed.
 
Soon word of the British departure from Philadelphia brought a frenzied activity to the ranks of the Continental Army. On June 19, 1778, six months after its arrival, the army marched away from Valley Forge in pursuit of the British who were moving toward New York. An ordeal had ended. The war would last for another five years, but for Washington, his men, and the nation to which they sought to give birth, a decisive victory had been won -- a victory not of weapons but of will


This is a page showing John Burnett as a patient in the military hospital. 
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​This file shows some of the descendants of John Harrison Burnett Jr.. Write sm0634@gmail.com for more information or smt100@cox.net 

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