What were the circumstances surrounding Forrest's injury at Shiloh?
score:1
As far as I can see, Forrest never spoke or wrote about the incident with the Union soldier publicly while he was alive. However, the story of how he was seriously wounded at Shiloh appeared in several books printed soon after the war, including at least one where Forrest seems to have collaborated closely with the authors.
The story about Forrest using a Union soldier as a human shield seems to have first appeared in the 1902 biography written by Captain James Harvey Mathes with the slightly unimaginative title, 'General Forrest'. Mathes, in turn, claimed to have heard the story from Forrest's son, Willie, who had also been present at the battle.
The story about using a Union soldier as a human shield certainly doesn't appear in The Campaigns of Lieut.-Gen. N. B. Forrest, by General Thomas Jordan and J.P. Pryor. This was written in close collaboration with Nathan Forrest himself, and was published shortly after the war, in 1868. (The account of the incident appears on pp147-148).
This account does, however, record the injury that Forrest received at Shiloh, which - it was thought at the time - might have proved fatal. Clearly, in the event, it obviously wasn't.
The story is certainly repeated in many biographies and accounts of the battle published after Mathes work was published. To be honest, the story is probably just too good for any historian writing for the public to ignore!
We can also be sure that Sherman was present during the incident. We have this from a dispatch included in Sherman's memoirs:
The enemy's cavalry could be seen in this camp; after reconnoisance, I ordered the two advance companies of the Ohio Seventy-seventh, Colonel Hildebrand, to deploy forward as skirmishers, and the regiment itself forward into line, with an interval of one hundred yards. In this order we advanced cautiously until the skirmishers were engaged. Taking it for granted this disposition would clear the camp, I held Colonel Dickey's Fourth Illinois Cavalry ready for the charge. The enemy's cavalry came down boldly at a charge, led by General Forrest in person, breaking through our line of skirmishers; when the regiment of infantry, without cause, broke, threw away their muskets, and fled.
- Sherman, William T: Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman. Volume 1 (My emphasis)
Upvote:0
This site (the American Battlefield Trust) has a quote from Sherman talking about the incident.
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/maps/battle-fallen-timbers-april-8-1862
More post
- 📝 Do historians agree that most wars are caused by religion?
- 📝 Was WW1 generally foreseen?
- 📝 Does the reversal of the ribbon on a military medal (South Africa / UK; WWII) carry meaning or is it simply an error?
- 📝 Where and how did pinky promises / swear originate?
- 📝 How was the Roman Empire officially referred to by contemporaries throughout the 1st to 6th centuries AD?
- 📝 Why, in the Bill of Rights, is the right to a speedy trial a separate amendment from the right to a trial by jury?
- 📝 What happened to rural gas stations in the US?
- 📝 What courses would have been required to get a B.A. in America in the 1930s?
- 📝 Are there any details available on 1954 Afghan proposal for a merger with Pakistan?
- 📝 How did Turkey achieve such a quick military rebound after World War I?
- 📝 Who was the Gold Rush memoirist James G. Ward?
- 📝 Did native Mexicans prefer Spanish rulers to the Aztecs?
- 📝 Did Romans create dictionaries?
- 📝 Where can I find information about Johannes Pohl?
- 📝 When were the "War Relief Toy Works" set up and by whom?
- 📝 To what extent is a coincidence that the Dec. of the Rights of Man and the Citizen and the USA Dec. of Independence were approved so close in time?
- 📝 Can anyone help me identify this coin? Basiliea Selvykou. Rev: ICA
- 📝 Why is a pocket-battleship large in size ?
- 📝 Was slaughtering cows in Kamchatka prohibited in the 1820s?
- 📝 what is the history of naming newborn in different community?
- 📝 Was there a European country that held a referendum about adopting English in universities?
- 📝 What do we know about Archimedes text "On Sphere-Making"?
- 📝 Why did Jefferson have to 'Stretch the Constitutional Breaking Point' for the Louisiana Purchase?
- 📝 Racism, or Nationalism, represented in 19th century English Wills?
- 📝 Why did certain swords have the weird curves that they did?
- 📝 When did Germans begin to call themselves "Deutsche"?
- 📝 More Scientific Discoveries Outside Academia Past 50 Years?
- 📝 In France, 1916, would a soldier who was invalided out of the army, e.g. as an amputee, still get his army pay?
- 📝 Who actually paid for the American State Visit Brooch?
- 📝 How did the Nazis justify the differences in the way they treated Jews v. POWs?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 What were the circumstances surrounding Forrest's injury at Shiloh?
- 📝 What drugs were used in England during the High Middle Ages?
- 📝 What were the reasons for the Renaissance / scientific revolution in Europe?
- 📝 What were the acceptance criteria in universities of medieval Europe?
- 📝 What language(s) were spoken within the Holy Roman Empire?
- 📝 What were the reasons for making Prohibition a constitutional amendment?
- 📝 What were the main causes of successful take over of India by Britain?
- 📝 What disruptions were brought about by Islam that the Arabians saw so many victories?
- 📝 Were there any Germans in Japan after the surrender of Germany in May, 1945 and if so, what happened to them?
- 📝 Are there any documented examples of wooden ships which were in active service for 100 years or more? If not, what is the longest?
- 📝 What were the logistics of whaling in the 1800s?
- 📝 What were the reasons that the British colonies in North America rebelled but not others?
- 📝 In WWII, what were the major differences in tank combat on the eastern and western fronts?
- 📝 Third Reich? What were the other two?
- 📝 What were the Allies' plans if they caught Hitler alive?
- 📝 What were the EMP effects, if any, of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
- 📝 What made the Russian Navy suspect Japanese torpedo boats were in North Sea in 1904?
- 📝 What were the post World War 2 effects on Germany?
- 📝 What East German laws and regulations were extended to the West after unification?
- 📝 What were the 52 kinds of victims persecuted by the Nazis?
- 📝 What were the effects of the Black Death in the Muslim world?
- 📝 What were the criteria for class ranking at West Point prior to the Civil War?
- 📝 What were the first local currency systems in history?
- 📝 What were the demographics and economics of South-East Asian islands around year 1400?
- 📝 What were the Nazi racial views on Hungarians and the Japanese?
- 📝 What were the key factors to the fall of domestic socialism in the USA?
- 📝 What were the “passports” that diplomats requested when declaring war?
- 📝 What crops were part of the medieval spring harvest?
- 📝 At what point were the most current and former US Presidents alive?
- 📝 What were the indigenous populations of California before American settlement began to peak?