Nathan Bedford Forrest

Nathan Bedford Forrest (July 13, 1821 – October 29, 1877), was a Confederate general and perhaps the American Civil War's most highly regarded cavalry and partisan ranger (guerrilla leader). He was one of the war's most innovative and successful generals; his tactics of mobile warfare are still studied by modern soldiers. After the war, Forrest became the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.http://www.iupui.edu/~aao/kkk.html

Military career

Given that Forrest had earned much of his fortune engaging in the slave trade (as much as $50,000 per year), he favored the continuation of States rights to determine the slavery issues, and therefore supported the Confederate side in the war. After war was declared (April 12, 1861), Forrest returned to Tennessee and enlisted in the Confederate States Army. On July 14, 1861, he joined Captain J.S. White's Company "E", Tennesee Mounted Rifles.http://www.tngenweb.org/civilwar/csacav/csalog.html Upon seeing how badly equipped the CSA was, he made an offer to buy horses and equip a regiment of Tennessee volunteer soldiers, using his own money. His superior officers and the state governor, surprised that someone of his wealth and prominence had enlisted as a private, commissioned him a colonel and in October gave him command of his own regiment, "Forrest's Tennessee Calvary Battalion". Forrest had no prior military training or experience. He applied himself diligently to learn, and having an innate sense of successful tactics and strong leadership ability, Forrest soon became an exemplary officer. In Tennessee there was much public debate concerning the state's decision to join the Confederacy and both the CSA and the Union armies were actively seeking recruits from that state.http://www.blueshoenashville.com/history.html Forrest sought to recruit men eager for battle, promising them that they would have "ample opportunity to Kill Yankees."

Related Topics:
Slave trade - States rights - Confederate - (April 12, - 1861 - Confederate States Army - July 14 - Regiment - Private - Colonel - Military training - Tactics - Union

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Forrest was also physically imposing—six-foot, two-inches tall (1.88 m), 210 pounds (95 kg) and as such, he could be an intimidating presence. He was known to be a hard rider and fierce swordsman (he sharpened both the top and bottom edges of his heavy saber), skills he used to great effect during battle.

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Cavalry command

Forrest first distinguished himself in battle at the Battle of Fort Donelson in February 1862, where he led a cavalry charge against a Union artillery battery and captured it, and then led a breakout from a siege by the Union army under Ulysses S. Grant. He had tried to persuade his superiors of the feasibility of retreating out of the fort across the Cumberland River, but they refused to listen. Forrest angrily walked out of a meeting and declared that he had not led his men into battle to surrender. He proved his point when he rallied nearly 4,000 troops. These men followed Forrest across the river and were thus spared to fight again. A few days later, with the fall of Nashville imminent, Forrest took command of the city and evacuated several government officials and millions of dollars in heavy machinery used to make weapons, something the Confederacy could ill afford to lose.

Related Topics:
Battle of Fort Donelson - 1862 - Ulysses S. Grant - Cumberland River - Nashville

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A month later, Forrest was back in action at the Battle of Shiloh (April 6–7, 1862). Once again, he found himself in command of the Confederate rear guard after a lost battle, and again he distinguished himself. Late in the battle he charged the Union skirmish line, driving through it. Finding himself in the midst of the enemy without any of his own troops around him, he first emptied his pistols and then pulled his saber. A union infantryman on the ground beside him fired a rifle at Forrest, hitting him in the side, and lifting him out of his saddle. The ball went through his pelvis and lodged near his spine. Steadying himself and his mount, with one arm he lifted the Union soldier by the shirt collar, and used him as a human shield to avoid more gunfire before casting him aside. Forrest is acknowledged to have been the last man wounded at the Battle of Shiloh.

Related Topics:
Battle of Shiloh - April 6 - 7 - 1862 - Skirmish line

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Forrest recovered from the injury soon enough that he was back in the saddle by early summer, in command of a new brigade of green cavalry regiments. In July, he led them back into middle Tennessee after receiving an order from the commanding general, Braxton Bragg, to launch a cavalry raid. It proved another stunning success. On Forrest's birthday, July 13, 1862, his men descended on the Union-held city of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and, in the First Battle of Murfreesboro, defeated and captured a force of twice their number.

Related Topics:
Braxton Bragg - July 13 - 1862 - Murfreesboro, Tennessee - First Battle of Murfreesboro

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Murfreesboro proved to be just the first of many victories Forrest would win; he remained undefeated in battle until the final days of the war, when he faced overwhelming numbers. But he and Bragg could not get along, and the Confederate high command did not realize the degree of Forrest's talent until far too late in the war. In their postwar writings, both Confederate President Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee lamented this oversight.

Related Topics:
Jefferson Davis - Robert E. Lee

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Forrest's early successes gained a promotion (July) to brigadier general and he was given command of a Confederate cavalry brigade. In battle he was quick to take the offensive, using speedy deployment of horse cavalry to position his troops, where they would often dismount and fight. Commonly he would seek to circle the enemy flank and cut off their rear guard support. These tactics foreshadowed the mechanized infantry in World War II and had little relationship to the formal cavalry traditions of reconnaissance, screening, and mounted assaults with sabers.

Related Topics:
Brigadier general - World War II - Saber

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Mobile cavalry warfare

In December 1862, Forrest's veteran troopers were reassigned by Bragg to another officer, against his protest, and he was forced to recruit a new brigade, this one composed of about 2,000 inexperienced recruits, most of whom lacked even weapons with which to fight. Again, Bragg ordered a raid, this one into west Tennessee to disrupt the communications of the Union forces under General Grant, threatening the city of Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Related Topics:
1862 - Vicksburg, Mississippi

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Forrest protested that to send these untrained men behind enemy lines was suicidal, but Bragg insisted, and Forrest obeyed his orders. On the ensuing raid, he again showed his brilliance, leading thousands of Union soldiers in west Tennessee on a "wild goose chase" trying to locate his fast-moving forces. Forrest never stayed in one place long enough to be located, raided as far north as the banks of the Ohio River in southwest Kentucky, and came back to his base in Mississippi with more men than he had started with, and all of them fully armed with captured Union weapons. Grant was forced to revise and delay the strategy of his Vicksburg Campaign significantly.

Related Topics:
Ohio River - Kentucky - Mississippi - Vicksburg Campaign

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Forrest continued to lead his men in smaller-scale operations until April of 1863, when the Confederate army dispatched him into the backcountry of northern Alabama and west Georgia to deal with an attack of 3,000 Union cavalrymen under the command of Col. Abel Streight. Streight had orders to cut the Confederate railroad south of Chattanooga, Tennessee, which would have cut off Bragg's supply line and forced him to retreat into Georgia. Forrest chased Streight's men for 16 days, harassing them all the way, until Streight's lone objective became simply to escape his relentless pursuer. Finally, on May 3, Forrest caught up with Streight at Rome, Georgia, and took 1,700 prisoners.

Related Topics:
1863 - Alabama - Georgia - Abel Streight - Chattanooga, Tennessee - May 3 - Rome, Georgia

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Forrest served with the main army at the Battle of Chickamauga (September 18–20, 1863), where he pursued the retreating Union army and took hundreds of prisoners. Like several others under Bragg's command, he urged an immediate follow-up attack to recapture Chattanooga, which had fallen a few weeks before. Bragg failed to do so, and not long after, Forrest and Bragg had a confrontation (including death threats against Bragg) that resulted in Forrest's re-assignment to an independent command in Mississippi.

Related Topics:
Battle of Chickamauga - September 18 - 20 - 1863 - Mississippi

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Controversial battle of Fort Pillow

Forrest went to work and soon raised a 6,000-man force of his own, which he led back into west Tennessee. He did not have the resources to retake the area and hold it, but he did have enough force to render it useless to the Union army. He led several more raids into the area, from Paducah, Kentucky, on March 25, 1864, to the controversial Battle of Fort Pillow on April 12, 1864. In that battle, Forrest demanded unconditional surrender, or else he would "put every man to the sword", language he frequently used to expedite a surrender. The battle's details remain disputed and controversial to this day. What is known is that Forrest's men stormed the lightly guarded fort, inflicting heavy casualties on its defenders who quickly fell into disarray as the Union command—already short several officers—collapsed. Conflicting reports of what happened next are the source of controversy. Some alleged that the Confederates targeted several hundred African-American soldiers inside the fort, though one battle account says the killing was indiscriminate. Only 80 out of approximately 262 blacks survived the battle. Casualties were also high among white defenders of the fort, with 164 out of about 295 surviving. After the battle, reports surfaced of captured solders being subjected to brutality, including allegations that they were crucified on tent frames and burnt alive. Whether or not these reports are accurate will probably never be known for certain as both sides used the battle as a political rallying cry and were prone to exaggerate the events. Forrest himself does not appear to have participated in or sanctioned brutality in the battle, as witnesses reported his efforts to rein in his troops after arriving on the front line.

Related Topics:
Paducah, Kentucky - March 25 - 1864 - Battle of Fort Pillow - April 12 - African-American

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Conclusion of the war

Forrest's greatest victory came on June 10, 1864, when his 3,500-man force clashed with 8,500 men commanded by General Samuel D. Sturgis at the Battle of Brice's Crossroads. Here, his mobility of force and superior tactics won a remarkable victory, inflicting 2,500 casualties against a loss of 492, and sweeping the Union forces completely from a large expanse of southwest Tennessee and northern Mississippi.

Related Topics:
June 10 - 1864 - Samuel D. Sturgis - Battle of Brice's Crossroads

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Forrest led other raids that summer and fall, including a famous one into Union-held downtown Memphis in August 1864, and another on a huge Union supply depot at Johnsonville, Tennessee, on October 3, 1864, causing millions of dollars in damage. In December, he fought alongside the Confederate Army of Tennessee in the disastrous Franklin-Nashville Campaign. He once again fought bitterly with his superior officer, demanding permission from John Bell Hood to cross the river at Franklin and cut off John M. Schofield's Union army's escape route. He eventually distinguished himself by commanding the Confederate rear-guard in a series of actions that allowed what was left of the army to escape from the disastrous Battle of Nashville. For this, he earned promotion to the rank of lieutenant general.

Related Topics:
Memphis - 1864 - Johnsonville - October 3 - Army of Tennessee - Franklin-Nashville Campaign - John Bell Hood - Franklin - John M. Schofield - Rear-guard - Battle of Nashville - Lieutenant general

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In 1865, Forrest attempted without success to defend the state of Alabama against Union attacks, but he still had an army in the field in April, when news of Lee's surrender reached him. He was urged to flee to Mexico, but chose to share the fate of his men, and surrendered. On May 9, 1865, at Gainesville Forrest read his farewell address to his troops.http://billslater.com/nbf_bye.htm He was later cleared of any violations of the rules of war in regard to the massacre at Fort Pillow, and was allowed to return to private life.

Related Topics:
1865 - Alabama - Mexico - May 9 - Gainesville - Rules of war - Fort Pillow

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In the four years of the war, reputedly a total of 29 horses were shot out from under Forrest and he may have personally killed 31 people.

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