Written by J. B. S. Dimitry, of New Orleans, La., who served with him at Shiloh.  Copied and transcribed by a lady unknown, who is said to have found the lines written in pencil and tacked on the headboard of Johnson's temporary resting place at New Orleans:

 "Beneath this stone is laid for a season Albert Sydney Johnston, a General in the Army of the Confederate States, who fell at Shiloh, Tennessee, on the6th day of April, 1862.  A man tried in many high offices and critical enterprises, and found faithful in all.  His life was one long sacrifice of interest to conscience, and even that life on a woeful Sabbath did he yield as a holocaust at his county's need.  Not wholly understood was he while he lived; but in his death his greatness stands confessed in people's tears.  Resolute, moderately clear of envy, yet not wanting in that finer ambition which makes men great and pure.  In his honor impregnable; in his simplicity sublime; no county ever had a truer son, no cause a nobler champion, no people a bolder defender, no principle a purer victim, than the dead soldier who sleeps here.  The cause for which he perished is lost; the people for whom he fought are crushed; the hopes in which he trusted are shattered; the flag he loved guides no more the charging lines.  But his fame, consigned to the keeping of that time which happily is not so much the tomb of virtue as its shrine, shall in years to come fire modest worth to nobler ends.  In honor now our great Captain rests; a bereaved people mourn him, three commonwealths proudly claim him, and history shall cherish him among those choicer spirits who, holding their consciences unmixed with blame, have been in all conjectures, true to themselves, their country and their God."