Antietam photo journal: Evidence of a family's pain

In a letter to his son Louis, Daniel Tarbox Sr. noted the circumstances of the 
death of Daniel Jr. at Antietam. (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

 Richard and Joyce Arnold, descendants of  Pvt. Daniel Tarbox of 
the 11th Connecticut,  have preserved many of the letters Daniel
 wrote home during the Civil War. Richard holds an image
of Daniel as a youngster.  (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

Twelve days after 18-year-old Daniel Tarbox suffered a mortal gunshot wound through the bowels at the Battle of Antietam, Daniel Sr. worried about how to arrange for the return of his son's body home to Brooklyn, Conn.  "Geo. Preston ... buried Daniel near the hospital in Middletown, [Md.]" Daniel Sr. wrote to his son, Louis, on Sept. 29, 1862, "and placed a board at the head of his grave so that he might be found at any time (bearing his name, etc.) Capt. John Kies writes from Sharpsburg [and] says he died next day after he was shot -- but we have no particulars yet. We are very anxious that his remains be brought home, but how to bring so desirable a thing about is the question.

Daniel Tarbox, 18, was shot through the bowels at Antietam. 
He died Sept. 18, 1862, a day after the battle.  
(Photo courtesy of Scott Hann)

"I have no idea what  the expense will be," added Daniel Sr., "but be it what it may I want his body if it is possible to get. The cheapest kind of metallic coffin will do providing it is air tight. Contrive some plan to get his body home without delay. He [Daniel] has always intended to keep funds enough by him to pay his expenses home, but George says he has nothing left but his pipe & tobacco and a pocket knife -- I think his money was concealed in his clothes."

As they awaited news of Daniel's fate, the last two weeks of September 1862 must have been excruciatingly painful for the Tarbox family, which had qualms about Daniel Jr. serving in the Union army in the first place. On Sept. 21, 11th Connecticut Capt. John Kies wrote a letter to Daniel Sr. informing him of his son's death at Antietam, but that note may have arrived in Brooklyn days after the family read the dreadful news in newspaper accounts. (Kies wrote a similar letter to the mother of Private Fennimore Weeks, who was killed at Antietam.) Louis, who lived in New Brunswick, N.J., saw Daniel's name among those killed at Antietam in a list published in the New York Tribune on Sept. 25. Daniel's name also was listed among the dead in a lengthy list of Connecticut casualties printed in the Hartford Courant on Sept. 23.

Thankfully, much of the historical record of the demise of 11th Connecticut private survives. His descendants have preserved many of the letters Daniel wrote home during the Civil War as well as Louis' letter to his father after Antietam  inquiring about his half-brother's fate and the note Kies wrote to Daniel Sr. informing him of  his son's death.

 In the end, Louis followed through on the wishes of his father, who insisted later in the letter to his son that "no matter what the expenses are, bring his [Daniel's] body home." Louis arranged to have his half-brother's body disinterred in Maryland and paid for the zinc coffin for Daniel to be transported in back to Brooklyn. It cost him $30, according to a receipt that has survived 150-plus years and remains in possession of Tarbox's descendants. Sometime in early October 1862, Louis accompanied the body back to Connecticut, where Daniel was buried in South Cemetery in Brooklyn. "Father and brothers," it notes on his memorial marker, "all a long farewell!"

Eight days after Antietam, Louis Tarbox saw his half-brother Daniel's name published 
in the New York Tribune among those killed in action. "I have every reason to believe
the list is true," Louis wrote his father in this letter, dated Sept. 25, 1862.

In this envelope addressed to Daniel Tarbox's father ...

.... this letter from 11th Connecticut Capt. John Kies, dated Sept. 21, 1862, informed 
him of the death of his son. "I did not see Daniel after he was taken 
from the field," Kies wrote.  (CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE.)

Louis Tarbox received this receipt for the cost of disinterring his half-brother's body
 and the purchase  of a zinc coffin to transport him in back to Brooklyn, Conn.
(CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

Pennies, Lincoln side up, on gravestone of Daniel Tarbox in South Cemetery in Brooklyn, Conn.

Close-up of Tarbox's memorial in Brooklyn, Conn. Daniel "fell wounded while defending the bridge
at the battle of  Antietam, Md.," it notes.

Faces of the Civil War: Private Daniel Tarbox

Wearing a uniform with corporal's stripes, Private Daniel Tarbox of the
 11th Connecticut posed for this photo at a Hartford studio. The 18-year-old
 from Brooklyn, Conn., was  mortally wounded at Antietam. 
(Photo courtesy Scott Hann.)

In his final letter home, Daniel Tarbox had a sense of impending doom.

"I expect we are going into it now for good," the private in the 11th Connecticut wrote his father, Daniel Sr., from Washington on Sept. 6, 1862. "Right where grape & shrapnel and chain shot fly thick. And whole company’s and Reg’ts are mowed down at one volley.

"If we go in, we can’t think of coming out," he continued. "If I do fall, you take what money I have sent home and get my bounty and appropriate it to yourself as a present. But I hope for the best."

Wrapping up the letter by noting that dead horses lay in the middle of the road from Alexandria and members of Congress "rode by in hacks," the teenager signed off:

From your Affect. Son
Daniel Tarbox

Eleven days after he wrote that letter home, the 18-year-old soldier from Brooklyn, Conn., was mortally wounded near Burnside Bridge at Antietam on Sept. 17, 1862. He expired a day later, one of more than 2,000 Union soldiers to die at Antietam.

According to Tarbox descendant, this is the approximate location and time of the
 private's mortal wounding at Antietam. This photo was taken by famed Civil War
 photographer Alexander Gardner  after the battle. (Library of Congress collection)

Thanks to Antietam collector Scott Hann, who provided the carte de visite of Daniel above, and a Tarbox descendant, who e-mailed me a copy of his ancestor's final letter, I have a more complete picture of the teen-aged soldier.

Word of Daniel's death apparently traveled slowly back to Brooklyn, a small farming community about 45 miles east of Hartford. On Sept. 25, eight days after the battle, a worried Louis Tarbox, obviously eager for news on his brother's fate, wrote his father from New York about the Antietam casualty list that had appeared in the New York Tribune:

Dear Father:

I noticed in this morning's Tribune a list of the killed & wounded in the 11th Regt. Conn. Vols, among which is Daniel's name as killed. I will send you a copy of the Tribune & you can see for yourself. I have every reason to believe the list in here.

On Sept. 26, 1862, the Hartford Courant published a list 
of Antietam  casualties. Daniel Tarbox of Company F
 was listed as killed.

Hopefully you have heard from another source as it is the Captain's (Kies) duty to inform you. Please write to me whether you have heard or not.

Yours affectionately, Louis.

Perhaps the family first found out the terrible news of Daniel's fate when the Hartford Courant published a list of Antietam casualties on Sept. 26. Daniel's name was one of 37 soldiers listed as killed in the 11th Connecticut.

Or perhaps the Tarbox family first got word when they received this letter, dated Sept. 21, 1862:

Mr. Tarbox


Dear sir, it becomes my pain full duty to inform you of the death of your son Daniel Tarbox. Your son was wounded in the battle of Sharpsburg on the 17th and died the next day of his wound. His effects were taken pocession of by G. Preston. I did not see Daniel after he was taken from the field but as soon as I see Preston I will write you all the particulars.

Yours Respectfully,
John Kies Capt. Co F

Because the Union army was ill-equpped to deal with death on such a massive scale, many families had to arrange to retreive their dead loved ones from the battlefield. That duty fell to Louis, who paid a man named Augustus Martin to disinter his brother's body and provide a zinc coffin for his return to Connecticut.

Sometime in early October, Louis returned to Brooklyn with Daniel's body. A funeral was held and Daniel Tarbox Jr., the son of a prosperous farmer, was buried in South Cemetery, about a quarter-mile from the center of town.

Receipt provided Louis Tarbox for payment to disinter his brother's body and 
purchase of a zinc coffin  to transport him back to Connecticut. Daniel Tarbox 
was buried in Brooklyn, Conn. (Receipt courtesy of Daniel Tarbox Jr. descendant)
CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.

Daniel Tarbox's memorial marker in South Cemetery in Brooklyn, Conn.
 At the bottom are these words: "Father and brothers, all a long farewell!"

Antietam dead: 18-year-old Private Daniel Tarbox

Mortally wounded at Burnside Bridge at Antietam, Daniel Tarbox died a day after the battle,
 on Sept. 18, 1862. Only 18 years old,  Tarbox is buried in South Cemetery in Brooklyn, Conn.

Scores of Connecticut dead from Antietam are buried throughout the state, in large cemeteries such as Spring Grove Cemetery in Hartford in the west to tiny, rural cemeteries such as Bedlam Road Cemetery in Chaplin in the east.

Close-up of G.A.R. marker embedded next to Tarbox's gravestone.

On Sunday afternoon in historic Brooklyn, Conn., about 45 miles east of Hartford, I found the final resting place of Daniel Tarbox Jr. of the 11th Connecticut among many other well-marked gravestones of Civil War veterans in South Cemetery.

A private in Company F,  the son of  a prosperous farmer was mortally wounded at Burnside Bridge and died the day after Antietam, on Sept. 18, 1862. Like fellow Antietam casualties Lieutenant Marvin Wait of the 8th Connecticut and Private John Bingham of the 16th Connecticut, Tarbox, 18, was just a teenager.

According to a post-war history of Connecticut Civil War service, Tarbox was cut down along with Sergeant John R. Read of Hartford, Sergeant Hiram C. Roberts of Winchester, Corporal Theodore S. Bates of Norfolk, Private Oliver R Ormsby of Franklin, Sergeant George E. Bailey of Saybrook, "and a score of others, in the fatal charge on the bridge." (1)

Of  105 soldiers from Brooklyn who served during the Civil War, 22 died, undoubtedly a huge toll on a small farming community that had a population of barely over 2,000 in 1860. (2)

An American flag and a heavy, old Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.) marker, perhaps embedded near Tarbox's gravestone for a century or more, mark the teenager's gravestone in the cemetery about a quarter-mile from the center of town. I added a penny atop his marker in his memory. The circumstances of the young man's death are noted on a nearby family memorial, which also includes these barely legible words:

Mother I may not hear thy voice again.

Father and brothers, all a long farewell!

(1) The Military and Civil History of Connecticut During the War of 1861-65, William A. Croffut and John Moses Morris, Ledyard Bill, 1869, Page 281

(2) 1860 U.S. census

According to the 1860 U.S. census, Daniel Tarbox was one of five children living with
Daniel Tarbox Sr. and his wife, Lucelia in Brooklyn, Conn. Tarbox Sr. was a farmer.

The small, well-marked gravestone of Private Daniel Tarbox of the 11th Connecticut.

A penny in memory of  Daniel Tarbox Jr. atop his gravestone..