Did the apostle John hear an angel on the island of Patmos?

Many writings from the early Church Fathers however testify that John, the beloved apostle of Jesus, indeed wrote Revelations and also was banned by the tyrant Domitian, who reigned after his brother Titus from 81 to 96 AD.

After the death of Domitian in 96 AD John was able to leave Patmos.

When Trajan, not long since, succeeded to the empire of the Romans, Ignatius, the disciple of John the apostle, a man in all respects of an apostolic character, governed the Church of the Antiochians with great care, having with difficulty escaped the former storms of the many persecutions under Domitian... Ignatius Martyrdom 1,1

For when, on the tyrant's death, he returned to Ephesus from the isle of

Patmos, he went away, being invited, to the contiguous territories of the nations, here to appoint bishops, there to set in order whole Churches, there to ordain such as were marked out by the Spirit.

Clemens Salvation Rich Man 42,1

John left Patmos after the death of Domitian. Certainly the guards appointed by the tyrant were no longer interested in keeping him in exile, for after the death of Domitian the persecutions stopped for a short time.

A: We do not know how or how often John left Patmos. In fact we do not even know who "John of Patmos" was, in spite of a later tradition that he might have been the apostle John, based on the coincidence of names. Patmos was a busy transit port and it would have been easy for John to catch any one of the many boats plying the route and stopping over at the Island of Patmos. It is for this very reason that Patmos would be one of the least likely places to incarcerate anyone.