Soon after the fight the report was current that this regiment had been moved into position while the flag of truce was being respected.
Another story that gained circulation, and that has believers to this day, was to the effect that our command murdered all the occupants of the fort; and that fight in which our army took all the hazards of a difficult and dangerous attack was widely called the “massacre of Fort Pillow.”
After the war, a committee composed of Northern men investigated these charges against General Forrest and his command, and, upon all information gathered, the accused were, by the decision of the committee, cleared of the charge.
In every army there are bad men, and of such we may expect fiendish conduct when the business of the best of men is to kill.
When we fought it out at Fort Pillow and were forced to scale the walls and found the negro troops defending the place with death-dealing weapons in their hands, I am sure that, in the flame of prejudice and passion, there were some unnecessary killings; but they were the exceptions and formed no part of any plan of the Confederate commander. Neither did they reflect the will and spirit of the mass of his soldiers.
A great many of the panic-stricken negroes ran toward the river, and some were drowned by jumping into the water in an effort to reach the transport, which in alarm was pulling away from the shore. In the stampede there were many who paid no attention when they were called upon to halt, and this gave our men the right under the rules of war to shoot.
CHAPTER XVIII
A PERSONAL SORROW
FTER my return from this fight, it was my lot to undergo the saddest experience of my war life.
My brother, one year my junior, had just joined the command, when we went with a scouting party toward the railroad and met a small party of Union soldiers. It was the first time my brother had been on the firing line. He and I were on the extreme left of the line on the edge of a road, in touch with each other, and we received the first fire from the enemy. He was killed instantly and never spoke, but looked straight at me, with a silent understanding reflected in his eyes, and I caught him as he fell. The ball that killed him struck near his heart and passed through his body. I wrapped his body in a blanket and carried it sixty miles until I reached the main column. Then Gen. S. D. Lee furnished me an ambulance, and I carried the body to Pontotoc, Miss., for burial. After the war I placed a monument over the grave of this beloved brother and youthful soldier.