“Among the gracious lilies across the sea, Christ is born, By His blood, by His body the world around is transformed
He died for us on the Cross - we will die for Freedom, Since God is taking a step here."
("Battle Anthem of the Republic")
Last time, in the material about mortar rafts, it was told how the Confederate fort, which bore the funny name Pillow ("Pillow"), surrendered to the northerners after being bombed with 330-mm mortars mounted on armored rafts. And by the way, it is not at all surprising that he gave up. Well, and it was named that way, by the way, it was not just like that, but after the name of its builder, Brigadier General Gideon Pillow, already at the very beginning of the war. It was at a distance of 40 miles (64 km) north of Memphis, that is, it guarded the approaches to it, but with the fall of Island No. 10 on June 4, the defenders of the fort, so that they would not be cut off from the rest of the army, left the fort. The northerners occupied Fort Pillow on June 6 and used it to protect the river approaches to Memphis.
Massacres at Fort Pillow. Colored poster from 1885, designed to keep Americans in mind.
The fort stood on a high hill and was protected by three lines of trenches arranged around it in a semicircle, with a protective parapet 4 feet (1.2 m) thick and 6 to 8 feet (1.8 to 2.4 m) high. surrounded by a moat. During the battles it turned out that this "design" was ill-conceived. Due to the large width of the parapet, the gunners of the fort's artillery guns could not shoot at the attackers as soon as they approached.
Museum building on the territory of Fort Pillow.
However, according to American military historian David George Eiker, Fort Podushka is famous not for these military details, but for the fact that one of the most severe and sad events of American military history is associated with it. Interesting, isn't it? What could it be for such a harsh event to talk about it like that? It turns out that he had every reason for this!
This is how Fort Pillow looks today from the inside.
It must be said here that the civil war in the United States was distinguished from all other civil wars by the presence of a pronounced racial accent in it. Moreover, the use of blacks as soldiers of the Union, in combination with the decree of Abraham Lincoln on the emancipation of slaves, very deeply outraged the Confederation, so outraged that the Confederates called his act uncivilized. As early as May 1863, the Confederation passed a reciprocal law, according to which black American soldiers captured during the war with the Confederation were to be treated as rebels and tried in civilian courts with an automatic death sentence. It was argued that the Confederates should take adequate measures against blacks. Here, of course, banal envy also played its role. Indeed, with one stroke of the pen, Lincoln acquired thousands of brave and disciplined soldiers who … fought just like white soldiers, but saved their lives, which was beneficial for the northerners in all respects, but the southerners basically could not afford this.
One of the old cannons at Fort Pillow.
And then it happened that on March 16, 1864, Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest began his famous month-long cavalry raid with 7000 cavalrymen across the states of West Tennessee and Kentucky. The purpose of the raid was to destroy the supply bases and break through to Memphis.
Location map of Fort Pillow, Mississippi.
Fort Podushka stood on his way, and he decided to capture it, taking advantage of the fact that his garrison consisted of only 600 people.
Rifles of the defenders of the fort in the exposition of his museum.
Well, the "Pillow" garrison really consisted of about 600 soldiers, divided almost equally into black and white. The black soldiers were from the 6th Colored Heavy Artillery Regiment, and part of the soldiers from the Memphis Light Artillery Brigade, under the general command of Major Lionel F. Booth, who was in the fort for only two weeks. Booth was supposed to transfer his regiment from Memphis to Fort Podushka on March 28, but did not have time to do this. The former slaves who served in his regiment were well aware of what threatened them to end up in the hands of the Confederates, because according to the law adopted by the southerners, they were not considered prisoners of war. They heard that the Confederates threatened to kill any blacks from the Union army they met. The White soldiers were mostly recruits to the 13th Tennessee Cavalry, commanded by Major William F. Bradford.
Artilleryman of the army of the northerners.
Forrest's cavalry approached Fort Pillow on April 12 at 10:00. A stray bullet hit Forrest's horse, causing him to fall to the ground along with the horse and hurt himself badly. Moreover, it was only the first horse. And only three horses were killed under him that day (!), But he himself was not seriously injured. By 11:00 the Confederates had captured two rows of barracks 150 yards (140 m) from the southern end of the fort. The northerner soldiers from the fort could not destroy them, and the Confederates took advantage of this and directed aimed fire at the garrison of the fort.
Another cannon that defended Fort Pillow.
The southerners fired at the fort until 3:30, after which Forrest sent Bedford a demand to surrender: “I demand the unconditional surrender of the garrison and promise that you will be treated as prisoners of war. My men have just received a fresh supply of ammunition, and their position is very favorable. If my demand is rejected, I cannot be held responsible for the fate of the people entrusted to you. Bradford asked for an hour to think about it, but Forrest, fearing that he was waiting for help, that he would come up to him by the river, replied that he would only give 20 minutes. Bedford replied that he did not intend to surrender, and Forrest ordered his troops to begin the assault.
Officer of the Army of the Southerners.
While the snipers were firing at the fort, the first wave of attackers descended into the moat and stopped there, while the soldiers of the second wave climbed up their backs like steps. Climbing the parapet, they rushed with bayonets, and after a short fierce fight, they threw the Unionists from the rampart and from the cannons.
Later, the surviving soldiers of the garrison testified that most of them then surrendered and threw down their weapons, but as soon as this happened, they were shot or stabbed to death by the attackers, who shouted: “No Quarter! No quarter! " What this meant, but what: many blacks, trying to escape, shouted that they were Quarterons and had never been slaves in the South. Think of Mine Reed's novel Quarteron. Many Quarterons were indeed very similar to whites, but in the eyes of the Southerners they continued to be slaves. Immediately after the southerners left the fort, the "incident at Fort Pillow" was investigated by a special commission, which concluded that the Confederates had shot most of the garrison after it had surrendered. Historian Andrew Ward also concluded in 2005 that this atrocity against prisoners of war, including the killing of civilians at Fort Pillow, certainly took place, but that it was not sanctioned by the command of the Southerners.
Barrel piece from Fort Pillow's 32-pounder cannon.
Historian Richard Fuchs, wrote: "A real orgy of death took place in Fort" Pillow ", a massacre based on the manifestation of the most base feelings, racism and personal enmity that took place." The intolerance of the southerners manifested itself in the murder of unarmed people with black skin, who dared, against their will, to take up arms for the sake of freedom.
Belt buckles for southern soldiers.
Confirmation that it was all this, and not otherwise, was found in a letter to the home of one of Forrest's sergeants, sent shortly after the battle at Fort Pillow, where it was written that “poor, deceived blacks fell to their knees, and with with a raised hand they prayed for mercy, but in spite of the pleas, they were all killed. True, the southerners then insisted that the soldiers of the Union, even if they fled, still held weapons in their hands and often turned back and fired, so the Confederates also had to shoot at them in self-defense.
Belt and chest buckles for southern soldiers.
The northerners, of course, did not even want to listen to anything like that. Their newspapers reported: “Attack of the southerners on the Podushka fort: total extermination of its defenders. Shocking scenes of savagery!"
Belt buckles for northern states soldiers.
The New York Times reported on April 24: “The Negroes and their officers were killed with bayonets and sabers in the most cold-blooded manner … Of the four hundred Negro soldiers, only about twenty survived! At least three hundred of them were wickedly destroyed after the surrender!"
General Ulysses Grant later wrote that on April 12, 1864, a real massacre took place at Fort "Pillow"! In 1908, the following statistics were given about the northerners in this battle: 350 killed and mortally wounded, 60 were wounded of varying severity, 164 people were taken prisoner or missing, and only 574 people out of 600 defenders of the fort. There are other data, for example, that of the 585 or 605 men who were in the fort, between 277 and 297 were killed. Major Bradford was apparently among those shot after he surrendered.
Breech-loading weapon of the northerners' army.
What happened after that? And here's what: the southerners left the fort that evening, since there was absolutely nothing to do there. Then, on April 17, 1864, General Grant ordered General Benjamin F. Butler, who was negotiating the exchange of prisoners with the Confederation, to demand that black soldiers should be treated as well as whites. But the southerners rejected this demand, explaining that they would not exchange blacks for their soldiers!
The latter, however, is not surprising, since on July 30, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln adopted the so-called "Act of Retribution", the essence of which was that for each soldier of the US Army killed in this war, one of the captured rebels will be sent … to hard labor, with with all the ensuing consequences!
Here in this book about the events at Fort Pillow is told well, just in great detail!
On May 3, 1864, at a meeting with the President, the question of how to respond to the massacre at Fort "Pillow" was discussed, and members of the cabinet made a variety of proposals, in particular, in the case of the capture of Forrest or Chalmers (one of the officers who participated in that battle), put them on trial for violating the laws of war.
Nathan Bedford Forrest.
As a result, Nathan Bedford Forrest was never convicted, and then became the first Great Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, although later he left this "organization"!
