Lieutenant John D. Isbell.

Lieut. John D. Isbell, after whom Isbell Post, G. A. R., is named, was born in Naugatuck, April 9, 1840, the son of the late John L. and Eliza J. Isbell. He remained at home, a scholar in the public school until the age of eighteen. He was a boy of active mind and most attractive personal qualities, well fitted to make a good soldier.

He went to Springfield, Mass., April 1, 1858, and took a position in the mercantile house of H. N. Carter, in which he remained until the opening of the war. The respect which he won was shown in his appointment as Sunday School Superintendent in Christ Church parish. He received a Lieutenant’s Commission in Co. H of the Eighteenth Massachusetts Regiment, and went out in the first summer of the war. He had not quite filled out his first year of service, when towards the end of the Peninsular campaign, he fell a victim to the typhoid fever. He was about coming home for a short furlough to recruit his shattered health. But the disease had too strong a hold upon him. He had performed faithfully his duties in the campaign and in the battles with which it culminated, and he was exhausted. It was hardly known that he was ill, when he was hopelessly sick. All was done by tender, loving hands that camp life permitted, but in vain. He died July 16, 1862, at Harrison’s Landing, Va.

Col. James Barnes, in writing to Lieut. Isbell’s father, after giving the particulars of his death, said: “It grieves me to communicate this sad intelligence to you, because prizing him as much as I did, I know what an affliction it must be to you. It is a great consolation, however, to all who mourn his loss, to feel as we all do, that he was undoubtedly well prepared for the great change.”

Lieut. Isbell’s body was brought home, and on July 24, 1862, he was buried with military honors from St. Michael’s Church. The funeral sermon was preached by the late Rev. Edwin E. Johnson, then in charge of the church by reason of the absence of the Rector, Rev. C. T. Woodruff, Chaplain of the Sixth Connecticut Regiment. The preacher spoke with deep feeling for he could say of the dead: “We grew up almost side by side, attended the same school, were baptized and confirmed at the same altar.”

In the course of the sermon, Mr. Johnson said of Lieut. Isbell: “It is a pleasant testimony which I am able to give, that in all the varied pursuits with which he has been engaged since he left your midst, he has furnished those who knew him best an example of work, modestly, quietly, and yet faithfully done.” . . . . “The letters of him whose death we mourn, breathing as they did of sincere piety, as well as the testimony of his superior officers acquaint us with the comforting fact, that in all his labors, dangers and privations, ‘he endured as seeing Him who is invisible.’”

“Some few facts have been sent home by those who were with him during the last weeks of his life. They tell us that he suffered much from wearisome marches, yet bore every burden placed upon, nobly, without a murmur. Though we cannot know how acutely the pains of disease preyed upon his youthful constitution, it is pleasant to be assured that he met his end calmly as a true Christian and soldier.” . . . . “We know that he died trusting in the Saviour to whom he gave himself here while yet the dew was fresh around his early path of life. There has been given us an example of one who ever sought to act rightly, who feared not to follow where duty pointed, striving only to accomplish in faith the work given him to do. It has been given us also to trust that he has exchanged a scene of tumult and toil, of bloodshed and passion for the rest that broods over the sleep of the faithful.”

All that was mortal of him whose honored name is borne by Isbell Post, G. A. R., rests in Hillside Cemetery, upon the knoll near the northwest side which overlooks the road along which and the river beside which, he as a boy went day by day to school.

This inscription is upon his monument:

Lieut. John D. Isbell. Co. H, Eighteenth Mass. Regt.
Died at Harrison’s Landing, Virginia, July 16, 1862.
Buried at Naugatuck, July 24.

An only son in the garb of a soldier lies buried here. His superior officers bear testimony that he was much beloved,—a faithful soldier to his country and to the Cross of his Redeemer.

Source - Soldiers’ Monument Dedication Booklet