ISANBERT, Henry (e-zam'-bair'), French soldier, born in Cahors in 1749; died in Santo Domingo in December, 1800. He served in the colonial troops from 1769 till 1792, and commanded the Royal Martinique regiment in Santo Domingo at the beginning of the French revolution in 1789. He took an active part in the repression of the troubles that the new democratic principles caused in the island among the slaves, advising the summary execution of the rioters, and sometimes denying them even a trial. He was recalled in 1792, and imprisoned during the reign of terror on suspicion of being a royalist; but the downfall of Robespierre, which happened the day before his proposed execution, saved him, and he was afterward released. He was elected a member of the council of the ancients in 1796, but was again arrested and transported, with other distinguished victims of the reaction, to Guiana. His faithful wife, a creole of Martinique, joined him, and he bought an estate to avert suspicion, but in June, 1798, escaped to the Dutch city of Paramaribo and sailed for London. Having obtained his pardon in the following year, Isambert returned to France, where Bonaparte reinstated him in the army with the rank of major-general, and attached him to the staff of General Rochambeau, who was preparing to sail for Santo Domingo. There he distinguished himself against the rebel negroes, and was killed in an engagement near Cayes. He published "Journal des faits relatifs a la journde du 18 fructidor, du transport, du sojour et de l'evasion des deportes, suivi d'un abrogo historique sur la Guiane Francaise" (2 vols., London, 1799), and "Histoire de Saint Domingue, l'element noir et la colonisation Francaise" (Sinnimari, 1798).