Open main menu
Open main menu
![[no picture yet]](images/none.gif)
[no picture yet]
(c. 1820 - 1862)
Home State: Connecticut
Branch of Service: Infantry
Unit: 8th Connecticut Infantry
Before Antietam
In 1860 he was a 40 year old farmer at Sterling, Windham County, CT. He enlisted on 3 October 1861 and mustered as a Private in Company F, 8th Connecticut Infantry on 5 October.
On the Campaign
He was mortally wounded in the ankle in action at Antietam on 17 September 1862.
The rest of the War
He was treated at the Big Spring/Locust Spring/Crystal Springs field hospital on the Geeting farm near Keedysville, MD and died there of wounds on 17 October 1862. He was originally buried near the hospital, then reinterred in the new National Cemetery in about 1867.
References & notes
Burial information from the Antietam Cemetery History.1 His service from the Record of Service,2 as John Bently. Wound and hospital details from Nelson3 and Major Ward's after-action report, also as Bently. Personal details from the US Census of 1860 and research in his widow's pension and other records by John Banks, posted to his Civil War blog. His gravesite is on Findagrave.
He married Zilpha (?, c. 1824-) and they had at least 6 children.
His son William (c. 1841), a Corporal in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, died of wounds near Richmond, VA in June 1862.
Birth
c. 1820 in RI
Death
10/17/1862; Keedysville, MD; burial in Antietam National Cemetery, Sharpsburg, MD
1 Antietam National Cemetery, Board of Trustees, History of Antietam National Cemetery, Baltimore: John W. Woods, Steam Printer, 1869 [AotW citation 3215]
2 State of Connecticut, Adjutant General's Office, and AGs Smith, Camp, and Barbour, and AAG White, Record of Service of Connecticut Men in the Army and Navy of the United States during the War of the Rebellion, Hartford: Press of the Case, Lockwood, and Brainard Company, 1889, pg. 345 [AotW citation 24706]
3 Nelson, John H., As Grain Falls Before the Reaper: The Federal Hospital Sites and Identified Federal Casualties at Antietam, Hagerstown: John H. Nelson, 2004, p. 130 [AotW citation 30640]