Massacre at Fort Pillow

5fish

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Yes, the presence of Forrest at Ft Pillow is key.
Here again Fan Boys of Forrest claim it was a ruse when he threaten "no quarter" to union post.

He used this ruse more than once and from what I see it was not a ruse. If you look at each time he used the ruse it either worked or the union soldier repulsed his assaults but the one place were they resisted and failed to repulse Forrest men there was a massacre of union soldiers. It was not a ruse when Forrest threatened "no quarter" because the one time the ruse was ignore and he succeed in overrunning the union fort death followed.

Here are some of the union post he attacked before Ft Pillow... See the pattern...


As the Confederate raiders set out on March 22, Forrest looked to ground in western Tennessee and Kentucky that had already proven lucrative for his command. Earlier raids through the region had secured supplies and recruits and thrown his opponents into nervous turmoil. Determined to make his mark once more, Forrest dispatched various forces to obtain maximum results. Colonel William L. Duckworth approached Union City, Tenn., employing the common Forrest stratagem of bluff and intimidation to convince his opponent, Col. Isaac R. Hawkins, to surrender some 500 men and 300 horses. Captain Henry A. Tyler attempted a similar ruse at Columbus, Ky. With only 150 men at his disposal, Tyler’s command was too weak to assault the Union garrison directly. Using the name of his superior, “A[braham] Buford,” to give the impression of a larger force, the captain offered his counterpart terms that also took a racial tone. “Should you surrender, the negroes now in arms will be returned to their masters,” Tyler explained. “Should I, however, be compelled to take the place, no quarter will be shown to the negro troops whatever; the white troops will be treated as prisoners of war.” Tyler knew that such a hyperbolic demand was the only means by which he could hope to capture the post. So did the Union commander, who refused to surrender.

In the meantime, Forrest headed for Paducah, Ky. The river town promised greater spoils, but offered more significant challenges. In addition to the garrison, which included African-American troops and featured formidable Fort Anderson, the Union defenders enjoyed the benefit of support from two gunboats, the Paw Paw and the Peosta. A foolhardy and unauthorized assault by Col. Albert P. Thompson resulted in that officer’s death and additional casualties. A bloodcurdling surrender demand, laced with Forrest’s traditional threat of “no quarter,” failed. Yet the aggressive Confederate general remained undeterred.

He had inflicted considerable damage, setting the Union losses in his various operations at 79 killed, 102 wounded and 612 captured, while placing his own at 15 killed and 42 wounded. But as he turned back to Tennessee, he recognized that more remained to be achieved—and chose his next target: “There is a Federal force of 500 or 600 at Fort Pillow, which I shall attend to in a day or two, as they have horses and supplies which we need,” he reported on April 4.
 

diane

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Forrest almost always used the 'no quarter' ruse - it very often saved lives because Forrest's reputation preceded him. Simply being present in person at a battle would often deliver a victory, or an advantage. However, Ft Pillow is a unique case - there was a massacre there. No other happened any time during Forrest's military career, no mistreatment of any prisoners, and USCT prisoners were sent back to Forrest's superiors in accordance with Confederate policy.

As to subordinates using Forrest's name on a demand of their own, quite often this was without Forrest's knowledge. Never, on any occasion, did he threaten USCT in his surrender demands.
 

5fish

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Forrest almost always used the 'no quarter' ruse - it very often saved lives because Forrest's reputation preceded him. Simply being present in person at a battle would often deliver a victory, or an advantage.
Look at the history... There was only one place that refuse or ignored his threat of "No Quarter" and then was overrun by his men... and a massacre ensued... Ft Pillow... The evidence seems to point to the fact he meant the threat... If he threaten and did overrun a place and did not kill everyone all future encounters would know the threat was false... NO... Forrest was planning to murdering union post that refuse his threat because its his old game, he declare "He gave them a chance and its union post that picked its fate." Again it always the others fault not his...
 

diane

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There were several instances where the threat of 'no quarter' was ignored - and no massacre or anything close to it occurred. Here's the funny thing about that trick - nobody seemed to notice the grim threat was never carried out. Forrest's reputation preceded him, always greatly embellished, and did 99% of the work for him.
 

5fish

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There were several instances where the threat of 'no quarter' was ignored - and no massacre or anything close to it occurred.
Was Forrest able to storm these places or was he repulsed or chose to move on... Where did he do this "no quarter" threat and successfully storm the place and no massacre happened. I do not see one in history...
 
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rittmeister

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Look at the history... There was only one place that refuse or ignored his threat of "No Quarter" and then was overrun by his men... and a massacre ensued... Ft Pillow... The evidence seems to point to the fact he meant the threat... If he threaten and did overrun a place and did not kill everyone all future encounters would know the threat was false... NO... Forrest was planning to murdering union post that refuse his threat because its his old game, he declare "He gave them a chance and its union post that picked its fate." Again it always the others fault not his...
that's not how statistics works
 

rittmeister

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What stats... I am asking where a union post that was overrun by Forrest men that did not lead to a massacre ..
he did it at every place they gave him a chance is statistics (1/1) you then (when diane told you that threat was neglected and no massacres resulted several times) changed to
Was Forrest able to storm these places or was he repulsed or chose to move on... Where did he do this "no quarter" threat and successfully storm the place and no massacre happened. I do not see one in history...
that's not moving the goalposts that's a goalposts ballet
do we have data where and when that threat was issued and what happened? the fort pillow massacre was in april 1864 so forrest most likely issued that threat before - what happened in these cases? you obviously have an axe to grind with a guy who's dead for nearly 150 years. if he ...
  1. was repulsed that's an empty threat then and he most likely knew it = he didn't mean it
  2. chose to move on = he didn't mean it, either
@diane is there a no quarter list to be had?

... and btw nobody had a problem with no quarter until 1907 when, in the hague convention, it was declared a war crime to behave like that - you can still cut the enemy down if they don't ask to surrender (that's what the russians are doing at mariupol); there's no obligation to offer a chance to surrender (if the enemy asks to surrender you have to accept, though)
 

diane

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What stats... I am asking where a union post that was overrun by Forrest men that did not lead to a massacre ..
Let's not be tricky, Mr 5fish! It is far easier (and more accurate) to answer that question with the reverse numbers - which is one. Ft Pillow.

Reputation went a long way. Just as today, the news said anything it wanted to, and you can find many atrocities 'documented'. It's better to look at the battle reports of both sides. Even they have to be double-checked - most Union commanders overestimated Forrest's strength, reporting it as high as 15-20,000. He never had more than 3,000. Prisoner mistreatment didn't happen because Forrest didn't keep prisoners - he was noted for his mobility and speed, which you don't get dragging around prisoners. Sherman, for one, was dramatically surprised at the reports from these POWs, both black and white, that they were treated well.

The papers loved to portray Forrest as a 'guerilla chieftain', and paint him like Bloody Bill Anderson's vicious doppelganger - which is why people who met him were quite shocked to discover he was a quiet, soft-spoken man with excellent manners and sophistication. Sherman called all the Confederate cavalrymen 'devils' but he had a soft spot for Forrest - he put his toes riiiiight up to the line on offering a bounty, which was definitely illegal even at that time. But he did not consider Forrest to be a savage brute who killed everybody during and after a battle. He looked for evidence of this very thing and found not a shred. Even Ft Pillow was not settled in his mind as being ordered or allowed by Forrest.

Forrest was, like Sherman, a psychological fighter. If he could get a win by making his opponent terrified of him - that was much better than using up his troops and the other guy's. He lived rent-free in Sherman's head for quite a while - permanently in Sturgis' case - and even Grant had to knock the side of his head so Forrest would fall out the other ear. (For him it was the whole family - when told Forrest was about, he'd ask, "Which one?") He used all manner of bluffs, bullying, threats and whatever - kettle drums, rotating cannons so it looked like he had a hundred when he had five, and it very often worked. In fact, when Streight surrendered to Forrest just short of Rome, GA, he did so because he believed Forrest had him far outnumbered. When he saw the real tiny remnant (many had fallen out because of exhaustion and worn out horses) he 'did rare up then!' as Forrest said. Streight demanded to have his arms back so they could go another round. "All is fair in love and war, general," said Forrest with a smile.
 

diane

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he did it at every place they gave him a chance is statistics (1/1) you then (when diane told you that threat was neglected and no massacres resulted several times) changed to

that's not moving the goalposts that's a goalposts ballet
do we have data where and when that threat was issued and what happened? the fort pillow massacre was in april 1864 so forrest most likely issued that threat before - what happened in these cases? you obviously have an axe to grind with a guy who's dead for nearly 150 years. if he ...
  1. was repulsed that's an empty threat then and he most likely knew it = he didn't mean it
  2. chose to move on = he didn't mean it, either
@diane is there a no quarter list to be had?

... and btw nobody had a problem with no quarter until 1907 when, in the hague convention, it was declared a war crime to behave like that - you can still cut the enemy down if they don't ask to surrender (that's what the russians are doing at mariupol); there's no obligation to offer a chance to surrender (if the enemy asks to surrender you have to accept, though)
A 'no quarter' list has not been compiled by anyone I know of. The closest would be Forrest's military notes in the Jordan and Pryor book, Campaigns of Lt Gen Nathan Bedford Forrest. That would be slow-going, however, but his records of what he did are actually the most accurate and can be corroborated by Union reports and documents. (This extra careful documentation of his actions was necessary because of the way he was being portrayed in the newspapers - a blood thirsty savage Edward Teach would be scared to encounter!)
 

5fish

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A 'no quarter' list has not been compiled by anyone I know of
Forrest "No Quarter" was not a ruse but a fact. It seems once the union army began using Color Troops the "No Quarter" became a thing in the civil war. The Southern whites did not believe color troops were legal combatants or the white officers that led them.


The picture shifts dramatically when one turns to the African American military experience. Official Confederate policy regarded black soldiers and their white officers as illegitimate combatants, with the former subject to reenslavement and the latter to execution as inciters of slave insurrection. In practice, however, the usual fate for black soldiers who could no longer make effective resistance was either a merciless death on the battlefield or cold-blooded execution afterward. Journalist George S. Burkhardt has crafted the most complete exploration of this grisly subject yet written.

Southern troops gave no quarter to African Americans virtually from the time the first black units appeared in combat. Although Confederate soldiers acted largely without orders, Burckhardt argues persuasively that their government had a “de facto policy” of giving no quarter to blacks because the practice “was condoned, never punished, and always denied” (1). Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith, for example, reacted sharply to reports that Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor had taken black prisoners. “I hope this may not be so,” he wrote, “and that your subordinates . . . may have recognized the propriety of giving no quarter to armed negroes and their officers. In this way we may be relieved of a disagreeable dilemma” (6

The union was not swift in defending color troops...

The “disagreeable dilemma” stemmed from the fact that while the Confederacy did not regard U.S. Colored Troops as legitimate combatants, the Union government insisted they were and might make reprisals upon rebel prisoners in order to compel proper treatment for black soldiers. This was indeed the North’s official stance, though Burkhardt observes how frequently it was observed in the breach—in stark contrast to the swift retaliation that generally followed any unlawful killing of whites.

Here is Burckardt book on the topic...

 

rittmeister

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The Southern whites did not believe color troops were legal combatants or the white officers that led them.
... and herein lies the problem my dear biggrin.gif,

of course they didn't - the status of combatants was defined in the additional protocoll to the geneva convention in 1949

so how the fuck could a bunch of guys in grey (civil war edition) have denied it to anyone?

try thinking 1862 (not 2022) - that most likely makes you a racist (even if you are commanding an usct regiment) compared to what you actually know you know squat about the world you live in (germs, what are germs?) and next to everything you get a prescription for today will most likely kill you.

... and don't let me start on your teeth.
 

5fish

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  1. was repulsed that's an empty threat then and he most likely knew it = he didn't mean it
  2. chose to move on = he didn't mean it, either
I was looking for a time line. I showed while Forrest was in Kentucky, he repeated used the "no quarter" threat. In all the Kentucky encounters either Forrest men moved on or the assaulted the union post and was repulsed, Like at Fort Anderson or Paducah...


Burkhardt's work covers the evolution of limited no-quarter combat during the war. For most of the book, Burkhardt conducts a thorough and unbiased examination of the Confederate practice of executing African American soldiers. According to Burkhardt, "discrepancies or questions about a particular event diminish in importance if the incident fits solidly into a pattern" (p. 7). Although not expressly stated by the author, Burkhardt seems to be addressing the debate regarding whether Forrest ordered the executions at Fort Pillow. A pattern of executing African American soldiers is clearly established in the subsequent chapters. In a wonderful narrative, Burkhardt soundly supports the theory of the existence of a de facto policy of executing captured African American soldiers. Burkhardt argues that the significance of these relatively widespread incidents of executing African American soldiers greatly overshadows the issue of whether Forrest had personally ordered the atrocity at Fort Pillow. Regardless of whether Forrest gave the order, his men understood that they would not be punished for their actions.

Here...

According to Burkhardt, the most significant debate over the practice of executing African Americans was within the Confederate government itself. The author charges that the Confederate national government was unable and unwilling to stop the executions of African American soldiers. In fact, the Confederate government could never fully decide what to do with captured African American soldiers. The case regarding those captured at Fort Wagner is particularly interesting. According to Burkhardt, Jefferson Davis originally stated that the African American combatants were insurrectionists and should be killed. Davis, however, later changed his opinion and ordered that captured African Americans be "returned" to slavery. After an attempt to try the group as insurrectionists evaporated, the Confederates eventually sent the Fort Wagner prisoners to a prisoner-of-war camp. With a very telling quotation from Confederate Secretary of War James Seddon, Burkhardt captures the dilemma and ambiguity of what was to be done with African American soldiers: "free negroes should be either promptly executed or the determination arrived at and announced not to execute them during the war
 

5fish

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Here another article about no quarter...


The following Original Records extracts concern the battle at Milliken’s Bend, which involved CSA Gen Edmund Kirby Smith, and his subordinate, Gen Richard Taylor. The Official Records are a comprehensive set of military documents from both sides of the Civil War. This correspondence was made in June 1863, way before Fort Pillow
 

diane

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What you've shown, 5fish, is what I mentioned much earlier - one has to understand the racial tensions to understand what happened at Ft Pillow. As you say, everywhere many more colored troops were killed out of hand than white troops, and most of the Confederate soldiers understood this was condoned by their government. Forrest followed Confederate policy by handing over any black prisoners he had, whether civilian or soldiers, for disposition by his superiors. Ft Pillow was not an aberration - there were killings of black soldiers throughout the South - but it was the largest single event. That made it the political hot potato it still is. Many unintended consequences came from this, from publicity about it and from investigations into it. Forrest did not make it his own policy to kill them - some officers did by turning a blind eye - because, unpalatable as it is today, it was poor business. He was a slave dealer and knew the value of these able-bodied men, and that they were a needed resource for the South. And for the North. If the USCT had been used correctly, if the prejudice had not been so strong and they were given the opportunities to perform to the best of their abilities, the war would have been shortened considerably. Nobody knew the enemy better than they did, and nobody had a bigger stake in winning than they did.
 

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Here is an interesting take on the Ft Pillow massacre. It is from the Southern point of view and some Southern eyewitnesses too and a Southern paper... One guy said the Color Troops were getting drunk before the fall...


Even acknowledging the bloodshed, the Confederate press sought to absolve Forrest of the Yankee libel that he had ordered a massacre and took up all lines of counterargument. Many of them can be seen in the following editorial of the Memphis/Atlanta Appeal.

The next day, with Confederates still holding the fort, two Northern vessels appeared offshore. A truce was arranged for the Federals to bury their dead and gather their wounded in and around the fort. These were put onboard one of the transports, the Platte Valley, which steamed upriver to the army hospital at Mound City, Illinois.18
 

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Here is an interesting take on the Ft Pillow massacre. It is from the Southern point of view and some Southern eyewitnesses too and a Southern paper... One guy said the Color Troops were getting drunk before the fall...
Some accounts have them drinking a concoction of whiskey and gunpowder.
 

5fish

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Some accounts have them drinking a concoction of whiskey and gunpowder.
I think you are confused I looked it up... The use of gunpowder was to test for proofing alcohol... can cause a flame or more?


It’s unclear how exactly the gunpowder method originated. Guns and alcohol are a pretty lethal combination, so perhaps the poor soul didn’t survive to tell the story.

The gunpowder method is straightforward. Place a pellet of gunpowder into the beverage you want to test for alcohol proof, then see if the wet powder will still burn. If it does, the spirit is labeled above proof. If it doesn’t, the beverage is underproof.

From a scientific aspect, the potassium nitrate in the gunpowder should dissolve in water, but not in ethanol (alcohol). At high ethanol contents, none of the potassium nitrate should be lost to the beverage and the gunpowder remains active. However, if the beverage contains more water, the potassium nitrate prefers to move into the water phase and leave the gunpowder.

Although this test couldn’t be manipulated with temperature, it did have its flaws. The particle size of the gunpowder could influence above or underproof. Not to mention, the longer the gunpowder was soaked in the spirit, the more time allowed for potassium nitrate to migrate into any water present. Altering the specific conditions of the gunpowder test could still allow falsification of proof.


Another story...

The experiments were a little bit of chemistry and a lot of history. Centuries ago, British sailors supposedly used gunpowder to determine whether their daily tot had been watered down by an unscrupulous purser. Pursers were widely assumed to requisition a portion of official rum supplies for personal use, and to top up the casks with water. Sailors believed that gunpowder splashed with watered-down liquor wouldn’t combust, while liquor containing more than 50 percent alcohol by weight would cause the powder to flare. If it did flare, the liquor was “proved,” giving rise to the term proof. If it didn’t, the purser might find himself tossed overboard. This was known as the “gunpowder proof test,” and I was curious if it would actually work.
 

diane

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Some accounts have them drinking a concoction of whiskey and gunpowder.
The idiot impersonating Booth, who was dead, was Bradford - he was the commander of the 13th TN USA, and they had a bad reputation. Confederate troops under Forrest were the last people he wanted to be captured by. He believed the colored troops would not fight without whiskey and opened up a barrel. Some drank, some didn't. They were not afraid of Forrest or his men - they knew who they were! Bradford, however, was more concerned about saving his own neck than anyone else's - as it turned out, he was mysteriously shot while in route to Duckworth's troops. (Forrest did not keep prisoners but sent them on.) No one knows for sure what happened but he was likely murdered by people who had reason to murder him.
 
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