San Juan Record | 1931-07-30 | Page 6 | The Man Who Might Have Saved the "Lost Cause"

71 WA 0 ve os V ra wit ad 1 1 P 0 s 2 av dismounted confederate ca balry N ay al T gen AI borrest por rest G i I 1 i 11 ity i 15 A wj I 1 forrest anat his critter itter co na forrest zefore the bror i gen cen BJ raxton ax t on 13 ra f from bedford ft F t and d hit his critter company 4 1 minton balch company kompany by ELMO SCOTT WATSON fa MOST americans americana the name of r 1 gen nathan bedford forrest aro fl confederate cavalry leader means I 1 the synonym for the author of a famous epigram on how to win battles ills method was to git fust with the montest men but what they do not realize Is that forrest was more than just the maker of a historic phrase a picturesque character personally and nn an unusually successful cavalry leader if the estimation of a recent biographer Is correct forrest takes his place among the greatest of all american military leaders a master strategist as well as a master tactician clan and the man who had it not been for the jealousy of a superior officer might easily have saved sai ed the lost cause the biographer Is andrew nelson lytle LI tie and his viewpoint Is presented in the book bedford forrest and ills critter company published recently by blinton Inton BI balch and company clr lytle has ample justification for his estimate of forrest gen robert E U lee had a great cavalry leader with his forces the dashing job jell stuart hut but at appomattox Appo mattos when somebody asked lee who was the greatest soldier in ills bis command lie he answered instantly A man I 1 have never seen sir ills name Is F orrest forrest A similar tribute was paid to forrest by jefferson davis twelve years later the former president of the confederacy and governor porter of tennessee were riding in the funeral procession which was carrying old bedford to ills his grave turning to davis porter said Illi history story has accorded to general forrest the first place as a cavalry leader in the war between the states and has named him as one of the half dozen great soldiers of the country to which davis graduate of west point and a professional soldier before ho he was called to head it a new american republic replied the trouble was that the generals commanding la in the southwest never appreciated farrest until it was too late their judgment wits was that lie was a bold and enterprising partisan raider and rider I 1 was misled by them and I 1 never knew anew how to measure him until I 1 read his reports of ills his campaign across tile alie tennessee river in this induced a study of his earlier reports and after that I 1 was waa prepared to adopt what you are pleased to name came as the judgment of history but to realize to the full the greatness of IF orrest forrest one should turn to the words not of his rl onda but of ills his enemies gen william tecumseh sherman who campaigned against him in the western campaigns never made the mistake of underestimating ills bis ability an and d slier sher man once exclaimed 1 I am going to get forrest if it costs lives find breaks the treasury I 1 I 1 there will never be peace in tennessee until forrest la is deada put but lie he never did get him and the wizard of the saddle as the adoring southerners called him went through four years of spectacular lea leadership derst alp ilp in war without a defeat a record almost unparalleled in history As for critter company it Is the me oceans earli name for forresta For rests cavalry early in tho the war while union troops were occupying I 1 tennessee forrest became overnight their particular ideal of what a soldier could be they could not understand strategic gains but they could understand his particular kind of fighting it was as plain and as heartening as 03 sowbelly sow belly and corn bread tile tho women now felt that they had bad a defender they began to threaten tyrannical union officers with forrest will get you for this and ill tell or forrest on you they eoon learned that he was a bogey man they all believed in the same adoration given him by the people was wag given by the men who followed him they referred to him as the old man just as jack jaca foot cavalry did to that leader jeader they mhd also called him old bedford in tho the same sense dense that thai jacksons men referred to old jack in return he be looked after them as a father MOW after his children nothing made forrest pora nora furious than a useless waste of lives in a battle especially if the lives were those of ills his boys bos lie he was the ideal cavalryman in his bis judgment of horseflesh and of how to take care of the mounts in his bis command nathan bedford forrest was born in bedford county tennessee in 1821 little Is known of his life as a boy but what Is known Is mainly a record of conflict of lights with wild animals with bullies of the neighborhood and other evidences to prove that nathan bedford was a born fighter in ills his early manhood he be started to texas to help fight tor for texan independence but arrived there only to find that there was no need for his services sen tees penniless young forrest split enough rails at fifty cents a hundred to pay his way back bach to tennessee then he became a horse trader and later moving to memphis became a broker in real estate and finally a save s are trader in all of which occupations he prospered ne ile next nest became an alderman in memphis after he had distinguished himself by daring as a private citizen to save the lives of two murderers when a mob threatened to storm the jail and when no one else dared to face the aou would id be lyn chers liers forrest planted himself in front of the jail holding a six sit shooter and calling out to the mob in a clear firm voice it if you come by ones or by tens or by hundreds ill kill any man who tries to get in this jail the result of this firm statement was wag that the mob of three thousand quickly melted away they knew that forrest meant exactly what he said after serving one year as an alderman forrest resigned in ISTO 1859 IS TO and became a cotton planter ile he was thus engaged when the civil war broke out and in june instead of using his influence to get a commission lie he enlisted as a private in whites tennessee mounted rifles but ills his friends did what lie he would not do for himself they decided that ill tho ranks were no place for forrest so they prevailed upon the confederate to give him a commission as lieutenant colonel find and the authority to raise a battalion of mounted rangers going up into kentucky both because he be could secure excellent ec ellent horses there and because every man which lie he brought out of 0 that state which was ivas neutral but was a recruiting ground tor for both governments would weaken the armies just that much he returned to memphis some eight weeks later having raised eight companies strong then began his amazing career caree as a cavalryman par excellence as a natural military genius whose exploits far out shown those of many trained soldiers and as a thorn in the side of one union general after another P orrest forrest knew nothing about military tactics and cared less in that regard lie he was an ideal leader for the independent spirited men under his command drills and guard mounts were obnoxious to them but their officers managed to get results from them even een without the formality of giving commands in the prescribed manner such expression as 11 men ien tangle into fours I 1 by turn around I 1 git I 1 I 1 would shock an army trained drillmaster speechless but when such commands were given elven to forresta For rests men they knew what was wanted and they obeyed forrest had a fine contempt for west point trained officers who fought according to rule of the thumb on one occasion after a battle which had been disastrous to the southern forces and which had been fought according to a plan to which forrest had been opp posed gen stephen D lee called a council of war lee asked forrest if he had any ideas yes tes sirl sir said bald the cavalry leader ive always got ideas and ill tell you iou one thing general lee it if I 1 knew as much ciuch about west point tactics as is you the yankees would whip hell bell out of me every day As for the thesis that forrest might have saved the confederacy from defeat it Is based upon the fact that as lytle says the government which first realized that the war would be decided ultimately on western battlefields would have a decided advantage and the premise that if For forresta rests genius had been recognized soon enough by the confederate government it if he had been given a sufficient force and had not been thwarted by a jealous superior he might have hold held the oe west indefinitely had find turned the scale in favor of the confederacy but dent davis and ills his cabinet their attention concentrated cent rated upon the eastern theater of war and upon holding richmond which was strategically relatively unimportant failed to see until it was wag too late that if they lost tho the west they lost the tha war and forrest even though he won victory after victory was forced to see his efforts re heatedly peat edly nullified by the inefficient gen brax ton bragg brag to whose weakness ess davis dails seems to have been strangely blind even though they were soon enough recognized by other confederate generals and by the people of the south the story of For forresta rests campaigns would take a volume for the telling Ild served brilliantly at fort donelson and led els own forces safely through the encircling union lines to nashville lie could have done as much for buckness buckners Duck Buck ners entire army had that general listened to him but buckner listen and the result was what lytle calls a tragedy of errors the loss not only of the 00 fort but of Buck Bucknor ners 3 entire army forrest captured a large union force at mur free and made it possible for bragg to take the initiative away from buell in the kentucky campaign ile he served gallantly at shiloh at nog 1109 mountain and at ChIc chickamauga kamau 9 a and in innumerable other actions where he was unhampered by the orders of his big super superiors Jors he proved repeatedly that here was one confederate leader who knew how to win battles but always there was the hand of braxton bragg to minimize or nullify his success finally one day he stamped into braggs tent and declared you may as well not issue any more orders to me for I 1 will not obea them and I 1 will hold you personally responsible for any further indignities you try to indict upon me you have threatened to arrest me for not obeying your orders promptly I 1 dare you to do it and I 1 say to you that tf if you ever again try to interfere with me or cross my path it will be at the peril of your life and bragg did not take the dare the closing days of the war found forrest a lieutenant general a recognition which had come too late and placed in charge of all tile the cavalry in the west the last organized confederate forces in that section but by this tim time e his efforts were futile so far as the outcome e of the war was concerned lee surrendered to grant and johnston to sherman and there was no further need for forrest to lead lila ills critter company on those swift dashes which had made him the nightmare of more than one commander in blue ills men begged him to lend lead them to mexico to avoid surrendering but lie he knew the game was up and surrendered to general canby after the war forrest went to mississippi to become a planter again taking as ills his partner a federal officer rl I 1 later lie he sold ills his plantation and moved to memphis ile he was a delegate to the first postwar post war democratic convention and when he went to new york he attracted so a much attention that ho he could not move about the streets without drawing a crowd such was the fame of the wizard of the saddle in the north when the dark days of tile the reconstruction st period came upon tile the south and the ku klux klan was organized to save it from the scala scalawag wa g carpetta carpetbagger ager regime I 1 forrest was offered the command of the new movement m 0 ement and accepted it it had previously bee been n offered to robert B E lee but although lie refused he approved of the idea saying that his approval must be invisible so the ku klux klan became the invisible empire and when the name for a commander avas as brought up some ono suggested gen nathan bedford forrest tile the wizard of the saddle so he became the tha grand wizard of the invisible empire by 1870 the work of the ku klux klan had bad saved the south and F orrest disbanded it there were only a few more years of life left for him lie ile died in memphis october 20 29 1877 and was burled in elmwood cemetery later ills his body was removed to a park set aside to his memory in Al memphis emphis and au an equestrian statue raised over it so bedford forrest radii rides in tho the 1 south in material form in tills this statue and la in spiritual form in the hearts of the people of tennessee who still tell their tales of old bedford Bedi ord the wizard of the saddle 0 by western 14 Naw dalo rau union U N 0