http://www.tennessee-scv.org/ForrestHistSociety/forrest_speech.html
You ever saw or read this?
Sherman had doubts a massacre happened!
Sherman had no doubt a massacre happened.
"Four days after the massacre, Stanton ordered Sherman to 'direct a competent officer to investigate and report minutely, and as early as possible, the facts in relation to the alleged butchery of our troops at Fort Pillow.' Sherman promptly passed the task on to Brayman, who began collecting affidavits from the patients at Mound City. But no doubt to Grant and Sherman's enormous relief, the investigation was soon turned over to the Joint Subcommittee on the Conduct of the War, whose recommendations they would not be obliged to follow.
"One of the arguments Forrest's defenders would make to prove that even the Union command did not believe the reports of a massacre at Fort Pillow was the fact that even such harsh and remorseless generals as Grant and Sherman never ordered reprisals. But by April 23, Sherman had concluded that Northern threats and condemnations would prove entirely useless and so proposed that the question of reprisals be quietly left up to 'the negroes themselves.' The Confederate army 'cares no more for our clamor than the idle wind,' he wrote Stanton, 'but they will heed the slaughter that will follow as the natural consequence of their own inhuman acts.' The truth, he said, was that the rebels' savage hatred of black troops 'cannot be restrained.' Thus far black troops had been 'comparatively well behaved, and have not committeed the horrid excesses and barbarities which the Southern papers so much dreaded.' But eventually 'the effect will be of course to make the negroes desperate, and when in turn they commit horrid acts of retaliation,' he wrote with characteristically brutal pragmatism, 'we will be relieved of the responsibility.' He doubted the wisdom 'of any fixed rule by our Government, but let soldiers affected make their rules as we progress. We will use their own logic against them, as we have from the beginning of the war.'" [Andrew Ward,
River Run Red: The Fort Pillow Massacre in the American Civil War, pp. 311-312]
HDQRS. MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
Nashville, Tenn., April 23, 1864.
Honorable E. M. STANTON,
Secretary of War, Washington:
SIR: Pursuant to your orders two officers are now engaged in taking affidavits and collecting testimony as to the Fort Pillow affair. They are ordered to send you direct a copy of their report and one to me.
I know well the animus of the Southern soldiery, and the truth is they cannot be restrained. The effect will be of course to make the negroes desperate, and when in turn they commit horrid acts of relation we will be relieved of the responsibility. Thus far negroes have been comparatively well behaved, and have not committed the horrid excesses and barbarities which the Southern papers so much dreaded.
I send you herewith my latest newspapers from Atlanta, of the 18th and 19th instant. In them you will find articles of interest and their own accounts of the Fort Pillow affair.
The enemy will contend that a place taken by assault is not entitled to quarter, but this rule would have justified us in an indiscriminate slaughter at Arkansas Post, Fort De Russy, and other places taken by assault. I doubt the wisdom of any fixed rule by our Government, but let soldiers affected make their rules as we progress. We will use own logic against them, as we have from the beginning of the war.
The Southern army, which is the Southern people, cares no more for our clamor than the idle wind, but they will heed the slaughter that will follow as
the natural consequence of their own inhuman acts.
I am, &c.,
W. T. SHERMAN,
Major-General, Commanding.
[OR Series I, Vol 32, Part 3, p. 464]
"On May 3 Lincoln informed his cabinet that the fact of a massacre 'is now quite certain' and asked for their recommendations as to an appropriate response; the one ultimately adopted recommended that no 'extreme' action be taken until the result of Grant's Wilderness offensive in Virginia became evident. Some observers have assumed that the fact that no Union reprisal was ever ordered by Lincoln or taken by Sherman is proof that neither was convinced a massacre really had taken place; the reality, however, probably was that Sherman was one of the least sensitive toward blacks of all the supreme Federal commanders, and Lincoln was facing a tough November election in which many voters seemed to feel as much as Sherman did." [Jack Hurst,
Nathan Bedford Forrest: A Biography, p. 180]