Yet still no other action comparable to Ft Pillow... so much for context.
Allow me to make something pointedly clear. I do not believe a majority of men under Forrest nor Forrest himself did the actions I consider so despicable; a minority did. That any black man survived at all is testement that Forrest did something to stop it and that not all of his command participated. Those men are long dead, some made up for their crimes, some were killed in battle later some were never punished except by God. War is an ugly thing and nasty things happen; justice has been done.
Denying that there was any kind of murder at Ft Pillow... flies in the face of everything I have ever read upon the subject. Upon reading numerous period accounts and letters referencing the effect Ft Pillow had upon the Union Cause... Ft Pillow galvanized the USCT into an attitude that cost the CS and it villianized a man that bears responsability only in that he was in command.
Was Forrest a good man? I don't know I won't judge him, what I do know is that he was one hell of a fighting man, one of the best of his age. For that if for nothing else I respect him, his accomplishments and his actions as a soldeir hold few equals. His men, well most of them, were MEN; fighting men who accomplished much and made their commander immortal.
In a simple erturning to the original premise of this thread that Cash put forward. No, Forrest was not responsible for the murders at Ft Pillow.
The idea that nothing out of the ordinary happened there is so ridiculous that it might be comical if there was not the overriding feel that those who put forward such a premise downplay any negative of the CS and scream out attention to any perceived wrong, real or imagined, toward the south. The society of the professional Victim. Victim, not something I would call the south of the CS they fought too well to be called victims.