That Devil Forrest: Life of General Nathan Bedford Forrest

For the last two years of the Civil War I was a private soldier in a regiment of Alabama cavalry which had formerly served under Forrest. Four companies of this regiment had formed a portion of the famous battalion which had distinguished itself in the engagement at Fort Donelson, and, refusing to surrender, had marched out with him through the gap in General Grant’s lines. Although I was at no time directly under General Forrest, I was impressed by the enthusiastic devotion to him of these veterans, who had followed his banner for the first year of the war, and who seemed never to tire in speaking of his kind treatment of them, his sympathetic nature as a man, his great personal daring, and especially of his wonderful achievements as a commander. Of these achievements I was at that time not altogether ignorant. His escape from Fort Donelson; the desperate charge which saved Beauregard’s army from Sherman’s vigorous pursuit after Shiloh, in which he was severely wounded; the capture of Murfreesborough with its entire garrison of infantry and artillery, with his small brigade of cavalry without cannon; the charge on and capture of Coburn’s infantry at Thompson’s station; the capture of the garrison at Brentwood; and the relentless pursuit of Streight’s raiders, which ended in the surrender of these gallant Union soldiers to Forrest with less than one-half of their number, had already attracted wide attention and had made him famous. The knowledge of these facts, together with a personal association with the men who had felt the influence of his immediate leadership, naturally interested me in his career, which I closely followed to the end of the great struggle. When the general government, with wise forethought, began to collect and to place at the disposal of its citizens the official reports and correspondence, and all the reliable literature of the war, I undertook, in the light of these and other authentic papers, a closer analysis of his military record. The further my investigations proceeded, the more I became convinced that while Forrest was justly acknowledged to be one of the most famous fighters and leaders of mounted infantry or cavalry which the war produced on either side, he was more than this, and that a careful and unbiased statement of his achievements would place him in history not only as one of the most remarkable and romantic personalities of the Civil War, but as one of the ablest soldiers of the world. While I had hoped, as year after year slipped by since peace was declared, that some one abler than I would undertake the task of placing in readable shape the story of his life, I had determined if this were not done before I should pass into the “sere and yellow leaf” to pay this tribute to his memory myself. It has been a work of years to gather up from every available source the matter relating to this history—his early days, his civil and private life, and the accurate facts of his military record. In 1894, I wrote a condensed sketch, had it printed in single column upon the margin of wide sheets of paper, leaving a large blank space, and these I mailed to every surviving officer or soldier of his command whose address I could obtain, and to others personally acquainted with Forrest before or after the war. All were requested to return the sheet with corrections, and to add everything of interest, for the accuracy of which the sender could vouch. I also caused the publication of this sketch in various newspapers of wide circulation in the section of the South from which his troops were chiefly drawn, and asked as well for private letters of information. As a result of these efforts a great mass of material came into my possession, and an interest was aroused which encouraged me in the laborious task of sifting the reliable from the unreliable, and of making presentable to the reader the matter which was worthy of credence.