Editing Nathan Bedford Forrest (section)

===Fort Pillow massacre===
{{Main|Battle of Fort Pillow}}
[[File:P15138coll19 51 full - The War in Tennessee Confederate massacre of Federal troops after the surrender of Fort Pillow April 12th 1864.jpg|thumb|"The War in Tennessee Confederate massacre of Federal troops after the surrender of Fort Pillow April 12th 1864" (Frank Leslie's Illustrated News, May 7, 1864, colored)]]
Fort Pillow, located {{convert|40|mi|km|abbr=}} upriver from Memphis (near [[Henning, Tennessee]]), was initially constructed by Confederate forces under General [[Gideon Johnson Pillow]] on the bluffs of the Mississippi River, and taken over by U.S. forces in 1862 after the Confederates had abandoned the fort.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}} The fort was defended by 557 U.S. Army troops, 295 white and 262 black, under U.S. Army Maj. L.F. Booth.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}}

On April 12, 1864, Forrest's men, under Brigadier General [[James Ronald Chalmers|James R. Chalmers]], attacked and recaptured Fort Pillow.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}} Booth and his adjutant were killed in the battle, leaving Fort Pillow under the command of Major William Bradford.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}} Forrest had reached the fort at 10 a.m. after a hard ride from Mississippi,{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}} during which two horses were shot out from under him.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=139}} By 3:30&nbsp;p.m., Forrest had concluded that the U.S. troops could not hold the fort; thus, he ordered a flag of truce raised and demanded that the fort be surrendered.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=140}} As he often did to avoid the high casualties that came with having to storm fortifications, Forrest warned Bradford that he could not be held responsible for what his men might do in the heat of such a battle.{{sfn|Rein|2022|p=58}} Bradford refused to surrender, believing his troops could escape to the U.S. Navy gunboat, [[USS New Era (1862)|USS ''New Era'']], on the Mississippi River.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=140}} Forrest's men immediately took over the fort, while U.S. Army soldiers retreated to the lower bluffs of the river, but the gunboat did not come to their rescue.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=140}}

What happened next became known as the Fort Pillow Massacre.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=141}} As the U.S. Army troops surrendered, Forrest's men opened fire, slaughtering black and white U.S. Army soldiers.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=141}}<ref name="WarDept1891610">{{cite book|author=United States. War Dept|title=The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xcVZAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA610|year=1891|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|pages=610–|access-date=March 22, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509172105/https://books.google.com/books?id=xcVZAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA610#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="CimprichMainfort1982">{{cite journal|author1=John Cimprich |author2=Robert C. Mainfort|title=Fort Pillow Revisited: New Evidence about an Old Controversy|journal=Civil War History|date=December 1982 |volume=28|issue=4|pages=293–306|doi=10.1353/cwh.1982.0009 |s2cid=145324569 }}</ref> According to historians John Cimprich and Bruce Tap, although their numbers were roughly equal, two-thirds of the black U.S. Army soldiers were killed, while only a third of the whites were killed.<ref name="Cimprich201168">{{cite book|author=John Cimprich |title=Fort Pillow, a Civil War Massacre, and Public Memory |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=q374hywnjm0C&pg=PP89|year=2011 |publisher=Louisiana State University Press|isbn=978-0-8071-3949-3 |page=lxviii|access-date=September 1, 2019|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509172143/https://books.google.com/books?id=q374hywnjm0C&pg=PP89#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref>{{sfn|Tap|2013|p=113}} The atrocities at Fort Pillow continued throughout the night. Conflicting accounts of what occurred were given later.<ref name=Times>{{cite news|newspaper=The New York Times|title=The Fort Pillow Massacre. Report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War. All Previous Reports Fully Confirmed. The Horrors and Cruelties of the Scene Intensified. Report of the Sub-committee|date=May 6, 1864 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1864/05/06/archives/the-fort-pillow-massacre-report-of-the-committee-on-the-conduct-of.html |access-date=March 5, 2018|archive-date=March 6, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180306082704/https://www.nytimes.com/1864/05/06/archives/the-fort-pillow-massacre-report-of-the-committee-on-the-conduct-of.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=The Black Flag. Horrible Massacre by the Rebels. Fort Pillow Captured After a Desperate Fight. Four Hundred of the Garrison Brutally Murdered. Wounded and Unarmed Men Bayoneted and Their Bodies Burned. White and Black Indiscriminately Butchered. Devilish Atrocities of the Insatiate Fiends.|newspaper=The New York Times|date=April 16, 1864|author=Unsigned (wire reports)|quote=Included in Sheehan-Dean, p. 49}}</ref>{{sfn|Eicher|Eicher|2001|p=240}}

Forrest's Confederate forces were accused of subjecting captured U.S. Army soldiers to extreme brutality, with allegations of back-shooting soldiers who fled into the river, shooting wounded soldiers, burning men alive, nailing men to barrels and igniting them, [[crucifixion]], and hacking men to death with sabers.{{sfn|Buhk|2012|p=142}} Forrest's men were alleged to have set fire to a U.S. [[barracks]] with wounded U.S. Army soldiers inside.<ref name="WarDept1891570">{{cite book|author=United States. War Dept|title=The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xcVZAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA570 |year=1891|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|page=570 |access-date=March 22, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509172144/https://books.google.com/books?id=xcVZAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA570#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{citation |last1=Jordon |first1=Thomas |last2=Pryor |first2=J. P. |title=The Campaigns Of General Nathan Bedford Forrest And Of Forrest's Cavalry |year=1868 |pages=430–435}}</ref> In defense of their actions, Forrest's men insisted that the U.S. soldiers, although fleeing, kept their weapons and frequently turned to shoot, forcing the Confederates to keep firing in [[self-defense]].{{sfn|Bailey|1985|p=25}} The rebels said the U.S. flag was still flying over the fort, which indicated that the force had not formally surrendered. A contemporary newspaper account from [[Jackson, Tennessee]], stated that "General Forrest begged them to surrender", but "not the first sign of surrender was ever given". Similar accounts were reported in many Confederate newspapers at the time.<ref name="CimprichMainfort1982"/> These statements were contradicted by U.S. Army survivors and by the letter of Achilles Clark, a Confederate soldier with the 20th Tennessee Cavalry who graphically recounted a massacre. Clark wrote to his sisters immediately after the battle:

{{blockquote|The slaughter was awful. Words cannot describe the scene. The poor deluded negroes would run up to our men fall upon their knees and with uplifted hands scream for mercy but they were ordered to their feet and then shot down. The white men fared but little better. Their fort turned out to be a great slaughter pen. Blood, human blood stood about in pools and brains could have been gathered up in any quantity.<ref name="Cimprich201164">{{cite book|author=John Cimprich|title=Fort Pillow, a Civil War Massacre, and Public Memory |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BeFiumliWOEC&pg=PR64|year=2011|publisher=LSU Press|isbn=978-0-8071-3918-9|page=lxiv|access-date=March 22, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173100/https://books.google.com/books?id=BeFiumliWOEC&pg=PR64#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Burkhardt2013">{{cite book|author=George S Burkhardt |title=Confederate Rage, Yankee Wrath: No Quarter in the Civil War |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uaDEAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA110 |year=2013|publisher=SIU Press|isbn=978-0-8093-8954-4|page=110 |access-date=February 28, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173107/https://books.google.com/books?id=uaDEAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA110#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref>}}

Following the cessation of hostilities, Forrest transferred the 14 most seriously wounded [[United States Colored Troops]] (USCT) to the U.S. steamer ''Silver Cloud''.<ref>{{citation|last=Stewart|first=Charles W.|year=1914|title=Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I Volume 26|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fXbhAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA234|location=Washington, DC|publisher=Government Printing Office|page=234 <!--|id={{ASIN|B000KWIXX4}} -->|quote=I hereby acknowledge to have received from Major-General Forrest 2 first and 1 second lieutenants, 43 white privates, and 14 negroes.|access-date=December 11, 2015|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173057/https://books.google.com/books?id=fXbhAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA234#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> The 226 U.S. Army troops taken prisoner at Fort Pillow were marched under guard to [[Holly Springs, Mississippi]], and then convoyed to [[Demopolis, Alabama]]. On April 21, Capt. John Goodwin, of Forrest's cavalry command, forwarded a dispatch listing the prisoners captured. The list included the names of 7 officers and 219 white enlisted soldiers. According to Richard L. Fuchs, "records concerning the fate of the black prisoners are either nonexistent or unreliable".<ref name="Fuchs2001140">{{cite book|author=Richard L. Fuchs|year=2001 |title=An Unerring Fire: The Massacre at Fort Pillow |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PFRqUSZUEOkC&pg=PA140 |publisher=Stackpole Books|isbn=978-0-8117-1824-0 |page=140|access-date=April 15, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173101/https://books.google.com/books?id=PFRqUSZUEOkC&pg=PA140#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> President [[Abraham Lincoln]] asked his cabinet for opinions as to how the United States should respond to the massacre.<ref>{{citation|last=Lincoln|first=Abraham.|chapter=Abraham Lincoln to Cabinet, Tuesday, May 03, 1864 (Fort Pillow massacre)|title=Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress|date=May 3, 1864|chapter-url=http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/alhtml/malhome.html|access-date=July 11, 2015|archive-date=August 4, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080804233156/http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/alhtml/malhome.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[File:Nathan Bedford Forrest - Thomas Nast - Sept 5 1868.jpg|thumb|right|Union and Republican-aligned editorial cartoonist [[Thomas Nast]] often awarded Forrest "with an ironic Fort Pillow 'medal' when he skewered him in a dozen cartoons as a prominent [[white supremacy]], [[Lost Cause of the Confederacy]] symbol."<ref name="ThomasNast">{{Cite book |last=Adler |first=John |title=America's Most Influential Journalist and Premier Political Cartoonist: The Life, Times and Legacy of Thomas Nast |publisher=Harpweek LLC |year=2022 |isbn=978-0-578-29454-4 |location=Sarasota, Fla. |pages=213 |language=en-us}}</ref>]]
At the time of the massacre, General Grant was no longer in Tennessee but had transferred to the east to command all U.S. troops. Grant wrote in his [[Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant|memoirs]] that Forrest, in his report of the battle, had "left out the part which shocks humanity to read".<ref name="Grant1895417">{{cite book|author=Ulysses Simpson Grant|title=Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VrInAWjWVJ0C&pg=PA417|year=1895|publisher=Sampson Low|page=417|quote=These troops fought bravely, but were overpowered. I will leave Forrest in his dispatches to tell what he did with them. "The river was dyed," he says, "with the blood of the slaughtered for two hundred yards. The approximate loss was upward of five hundred killed, but few of the officers escaping. My loss was about twenty killed. It is hoped that these facts will demonstrate to the Northern people that negro soldiers cannot cope with Southerners". Subsequently, Forrest made a report in which he left out the part which shocks humanity to read.|access-date=March 18, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173102/https://books.google.com/books?id=VrInAWjWVJ0C&pg=PA417|url-status=live}}</ref>

Because of the events at Fort Pillow, the U.S. public and press viewed Forrest as a war criminal. A Knoxville correspondent for the ''New York Tribune'' wrote that Forrest and his brothers were "slave drivers and woman whippers", while Forrest himself was described as "mean, vindictive, cruel, and unscrupulous".{{sfn|Davison|Foxx|2007|p=253}} The Confederate press steadfastly defended Forrest's reputation.{{sfn|Ashdown|Caudill|2006|p=91}}<ref name="SachsmanRushing2008">{{cite book|author1=Paul Ashdown|author2=Edward Caudill|editor=David B. Sachsman|editor2=S. Kittrell Rushing|editor3=Roy Morris|title=Words at War: The Civil War and American Journalism|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7n8CSw1xfAsC&pg=PA323 |year=2008|publisher=Purdue University Press|isbn=978-1-55753-494-1|pages=323–325 |chapter=What Can We Say of Such a Hero? |access-date=November 8, 2018|archive-date=May 9, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240509173059/https://books.google.com/books?id=7n8CSw1xfAsC&pg=PA323#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref>

According to a historian studying in the Cumberland River valley during the Civil War, "Fully aware of the significance of the large-scale recruitment of black troops, the Confederates did what they could to disrupt it...Forrest himself, operating in west Tennessee, chose to interpret his stunning victory over a racially mixed garrison at Fort Pillow in April as, in part, a warning about using black troops. He described the battle graphically, recounted exaggerated Union casualty figures, and noted, 'It is hoped that these facts will demonstrate to the Northern people that negro soldiers cannot cope with the Southerners.'"<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gildrie |first=Richard P. |date=1990 |title=Guerrilla Warfare in the Lower Cumberland River Valley, 1862–1865 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/42626879 |journal=Tennessee Historical Quarterly |volume=49 |issue=3 |pages=161–176 |jstor=42626879 |issn=0040-3261 |access-date=December 18, 2023 |archive-date=December 18, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231218013543/https://www.jstor.org/stable/42626879 |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[S. C. Gwynne|S.C. Gwynne]] writes, "Forrest's responsibility for the massacre has been actively debated for a century and a half. ... No direct evidence suggests that he ordered the shooting of surrendering or unarmed men, but to fully exonerate him from responsibility is also impossible".<ref name=":0" />

{{further|Slavery during the American Civil War|Confederate no-quarter policy}}