Fort Pillow

by Harry Turtledove

  As soon as Leaming heard that, he knew it had to be so. “I love gunboat sailors,” he said bitterly. “They sail away when we need 'em the most, but then they come back again after the fighting's done. They're heroes, all right, every darnn one of 'em.”

  That touched off some vigorous and profane swearing from his fellow sufferers. The guns on the river boomed again. Yes, they were definitely closer this time. “You reckon that's the New Era comin' back?” somebody asked. “Even though I got me a hole in my leg, there's a few things I'd like to say to the high and mighty skipper who sailed off and left us in the lurch.”

  More obscenities fouled the early morning air. By all the signs, quite a few men had some things they wanted to tell Captain Marshall if they ever made his acquaintance. Lieutenant Leaming had several thoughts of his own he wanted to share with the New Era's commanding officer.

  But another man said, “This here boat sounds like it's coming up from Memphis. The New Era steamed north, off toward Cairo”-like anyone from those parts, he pronounced it Kayro-” and places like that.”

  A rifle musket near the Mississippi banged, and then another one. A minute later, the gunboat's cannon responded. “Can't be yesterday's gunboat,” a soldier said. “They're shooting at it, and it's got the gumption to shoot back.”

  Several wounded men swore again. Mack Leaming was not behindhand-far from it. Some of the shells the gunboat fired burst not far from the hut. “I hope they blow the damn Rebs to hell and gone,” Leaming said.

  As if in response, a Confederate outside yelled, “Come on, boys! Don't just stand there! If we have to pull back, to hell with me if I want the damnyankees to be able to get their hands on one single thing they can use. Burn these buildings, by God! We'll fix this place the way the Lord fixed Sodom and Gomorrah! “

  That roused the men inside the hut. “Hold on!” they shouted. “Hold on! There's wounded in here! Let us come out before you fire this place! “

  “Devil take your wounded!” the Reb answered. “We have to get rid of this here place right now. Lou! Daniel! Come on! Get moving!”

  Somebody with a torch applied it to the corner of the hut. Mack Leaming watched and listened with fearful fascination. He could hear flames crackle, and then he could see them. Terror sent ice along his spine. But ice was not what he would feel. Getting shot was bad enough. Getting roasted in the flames had to be ten, a hundred, a thousand times worse.

  Men who could limp or crawl made for the doorway as fast as they could go-which mostly wasn't very fast. The more badly wounded men cried out: “Take me with you!” “Don't leave me here to cook!” Leaming added his voice to the chorus. He shouted as loud as he could, and wished he were louder.

  “Here you go, sir. I'll give you a hand,” a wounded Federal said. He had one hand to give, for his wound was in the left arm. He grabbed Leaming by the collar of his tunic and yanked hard. Leaming groaned-any motion tore at the track the bullet had drilled through him. “Sorry,” the other soldier said.

  “It's all right,” Leaming got out through clenched teeth. It wasn't all right, or anything close to all right. But it was infinitely better than lying there while those vicious orange flames crept closer and closer. Anything, anything at all, was better than that.

  The other wounded man dragged him about ten feet out of the barracks hut, then let go of him. “Here you are, sir,” he panted.

  “God bless you,” Leaming said. The right side of his back was in torment, but it would ease. The fire would have given him no relief, no mercy. The man with the injured arm went back into the hut and brought out another wounded soldier who could not move on his own. The hut was burning hard by then, but Leaming didn't think anyone got left behind in it.

  Several Confederate soldiers and one officer stood around watching the Federals, but none of them did anything to help. The sun beat down on Leaming's head; it would be a warmer day than the one before. Some of the Confederates had canteens on their belts or slung over their shoulders. He didn't bother asking them for water, though-he knew how poor his chances of getting any were.

  A wounded Negro lay not far away. He must have spent the night in the open; as far as Leaming knew, all the men in the hut had been white. One of Forrest's troopers walked over to him and said, “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Suh, I wants to get on the gunboat if she stop,” the colored man answered. “Reckon they got a surgeon on bo'd kin cut this minnie out o' me.” He pointed to his crudely bandaged calf.

  “You want to fight us again, do you?” the Secesh soldier said. “Damn you, I'll teach you!” He brought up his rifle musket and shot the Negro in the chest from a range of no more than a couple of feet. The black man groaned and died inside of a minute or two.

  Another black man-he didn't seem badly hurt-stood not far away. Were Mack Leaming in his shoes (not that he was wearing any), he would have got out of there as fast as he could. The Confederates were still shooting wounded Negroes-and the occasional wounded white, too. Maybe this colored artilleryman didn't think they would do anything like that while the gunboat-it was number twenty-eight, the Silver Cloud-drew near.

  If he didn't, he made a dreadful mistake. The Reb who'd shot the Negro on the ground by Leaming reloaded his rifle musket with a veteran's practiced haste. He hardly even needed to watch what he was doing; his hands knew with no help from his eyes.

  Only after the man set a percussion cap on the nipple did the colored soldier seem to awaken to his danger. By then, it was too late for the black to run off. Forrest's trooper would have had no trouble hitting him before he got out of range. Instead of running, he begged for his life: “Please don't shoot me, suh! I ain't done nothin' to you. Honest to God I ain't!”

  “You were up in the damn fort, weren't you?” the Confederate replied, taking deliberate aim at the black man's head. “You were shooting one of them goddamn cannon, weren't you?”

  “No, suh, not me! Do Jesus, not me!” the Negro said, voice high and shrill, his eyes showing white all around the iris. “I never had nothin' to do with no cannon! Never!”

  “You lying sack of shit,” the Reb said. “Hell, even if you didn't, you still had a gun in your hands. For all I know, one of my pals is dead on account of you. So you can go to hell along with this other coon here.”

  He pulled the trigger. The hammer fell-with a loud click and nothing more. The colored artilleryman, who'd seemed on the point of fainting from terror, let out a joyous cry. “You see? You see? God don't mean fo' you to take my life. God don't want you to take my life!”

  “Fuck you, boy,” Forrest's trooper said. He thumbed up the hammer and reseated the cap on the nipple. “Didn't have it quite square there.” He raised the rifle musket again. “Now I reckon we'll find out what God wants and what He don't.”

  He fired again. The Mini? ball hit the Negro just above the left eye. The man couldn't even scream. The only good thing was, he didn't suffer, not with the back of his head blown out. He hardly even twitched after he fell.

  The Confederate spat. “Don't look like God cared much about one worthless nigger after all, does it?”

  Leaming had seen too many horrors over the past day. He was numb to them, if not to the pain of his own wound. Fear of retaliation wasn't what kept him from saying anything to Forrest's trooper. What were two more killings among so many? And the officer who stood there and watched his man shoot a pair of wounded, defenseless men? He said not a word, either.

  Bedford Forrest hadn't ridden far from Fort Pillow after despoiling the place. The fall he'd taken left him stiff and sore. He camped about five miles from the fort, and passed an uncomfortable, restless night. When he woke before sunup the next morning, he pulled up his shirt and got a good look at himself by the light of a guttering lamp.

  “By God!” he muttered. “I'm all over black and blue. Lucky I didn't break anything-mighty lucky.”

  As long as he was up, he didn't see any reason why his aides shouldn't be up as well. He lim
ped over to Captain Anderson's tent and shook him awake. “What the-?” Anderson said, and then, recognizing Forrest, “Oh. Good morning, sir.”

  “I've got a job for you, Captain,” Forrest said.

  “At your service.” Yawning, Anderson emerged from the blanket in which he'd wrapped himself like a gray-uniformed butterfly coming out of its cocoon. He started pulling on his boots; like Forrest, he'd slept in the rest of his uniform. “What can I do for you?”

  “I want you to ride back to Fort Pillow,” Forrest said. “Chances are there'll be Yankee gunboats nosing around. Show a flag of truce and tell' em they're welcome to take on all the wounded Federals they can hold.” He chuckled. “Long as they're doing it, we don't have to.”

  “I understand, sir.” Captain Anderson took a hardtack from his haversack and started gnawing on it. If he went back to the fort, he wouldn't have much chance for any better breakfast. With his mouth full, he asked, “Do you want me to go by my lonesome, or shall I bring a couple of other officers along?”

  “Oh, fetch your sideboys, by all means,” Forrest said indulgently. “Don't want the Federals to reckon we can't afford to send but the one man… Will you do one more thing for me?”

  “Whatever you need, General.” Charles Anderson knew the only right answer an aide-de-camp could give to that question.

  “General Chalmers is camped a couple-three miles in back of us. Would you be kind enough to stop at his tent and tell him I reckon he did a might fine job yesterday?” Nathan Bedford Forrest sighed. If he was going to bury the hatchet with his division commander, he had to show he appreciated Chalmers's work. He wouldn't lie to do it, but, fortunately, he didn't have to here.

  “I'd be happy to, sir,” Charles Anderson said. “Isn't Captain Young back at General Chalmers's encampment?”

  “Who?” For a moment, the name meant nothing to Forrest, who was thinking of his own officers. Then he remembered the parley of the day before. “Oh, the Federal from Missouri who knew me. Yes, I do believe he is. You want to take him along to Fort Pillow with you?”

  “If you don't mind, sir. He seemed to be a pretty sharp fellow, and having somebody like that along may help me dicker with the Yankees in the gunboat.”

  “It's all right by me, Captain. If he gives his parole not to fight us till he's exchanged, you can let him go, too. I reckon he'll keep his word-not like that Bradford son of a bitch.” Forrest's mouth twisted. The way the enemy officer had escaped left him steaming.

  “I'll see to it, then.” Anderson stuffed the rest of the hardtack into his mouth and left his tent chewing with determination.

  Having a little more time on his own hands, Forrest breakfasted on skillygallee: hardtack pounded to crumbs, softened in water, and fried in bacon grease. Washed down with coffee brewed from beans captured at Fort Pillow, it made a tolerable meal. His belly was in no doubt that he'd eaten something, anyhow.

  Inside of fifteen minutes, Captain Anderson and three junior officers rode off toward the northwest. Not long after that, Forrest heard the distant thud of a cannon's discharge. He nodded to himself. “Might have known,” he said; as usual, the first word came out mought. Of course the Federals would be shelling Fort Pillow. It was too late to do them any good, but not too late to salve their pride.

  He shrugged. They could have all the pride they wanted. He'd taken the fort. The Thirteenth Tennessee Cavalry (U.S.) wouldn't harry west Tennessee any more. It would be a while before the Sixth Tennessee Cavalry (U.S.) stuck its head out of Memphis, too. As usual, he'd done what needed doing.

  XVI

  Sergeant Ben Robinson lay on the ground watching the gunboat steam up the Mississippi toward Fort Pillow. Every so often, the gunboat's cannon would boom, and a shell would come down somewhere near the Confederates posted in and near the fort. Some of the Rebs fired back at the ship. It ignored them and kept on thundering away. Robinson's mouth twisted with a pain that had nothing to do with his wounded leg. If only the New Era showed that kind of spirit the day before!

  Of course, far fewer Confederate soldiers were firing at this ship than had aimed at the New Era. That made a difference. But the New Era really could have done the garrison in Fort Pillow some good. This gunboat could cannonade from now till doomsday without retaking the place. Too late for that now.

  Too late for most of the garrison, too. Not sated by the slaughter the afternoon before, the Confederate pickets were still killing wounded Federals, mostly Negroes. Whenever Rebs came close, Robinson played dead and prayed as hard as he could. He didn't know which worked better, but they hadn't murdered him yet.

  The bombardment and the occasional return fire from the river bank had gone on for a couple of hours when one of the Confederates said, “Here comes an officer with a flag of truce!”

  Hearing that, Robinson turned his head. Sure enough, a Confederate officer waving a white flag rode toward the Mississippi at a trot. Ben didn't believe he was one of the Rebs who'd parleyed the day before. With him came three other C.S. officers-and Captain Young, the provost marshal at Fort Pillow.

  “Ahoy, the gunboat!” the Confederate shouted, reining in not far from where Ben Robinson lay. The Reb cupped his hands to his mouth to make his voice carry farther. “Ahoy, the Silver Cloud!” That was how Robinson learned the ship's name. He'd seen it painted on her, but seeing letters wasn't the same as reading them, as he knew too well. “Will you parley?” the officer yelled.

  After a couple of minutes, the answer came back, thin over the water: “What have you got to say, Reb?”

  “I am Captain Anderson, General Forrest's assistant adjutant general,” the Confederate shouted. “I offer you a truce to take off the wounded. I tried to do the same with the New Era yesterday afternoon, but Captain Marshall would not hear me. He sailed away.”

  One more reason to damn Captain Marshall to the hottest pits in hell, Ben Robinson thought savagely. What was Marshall afraid of? That the Rebs would swarm onto his ship while he was loading casualties? That was a coward's way of thinking, nothing else but.

  Again, Captain Anderson had to wait a little while for a response. This time, the men on the Silver Cloud said, “I'll come to you in a boat. That way, we don't have to keep screaming our heads off at each other. “

  Anderson bowed in the saddle. “I am at your service, sir!” he bawled politely.

  Four sailors rowed an officer toward the shore. The officer was a young man, and wore two gold stripes near the cuff of each sleeve. “I am Acting Master William Ferguson, Captain,” he said. “I'm skipper of the Silver Cloud. What do you propose?”

  “You came yourself?” Anderson said.

  “Here I am,” Ferguson replied.

  “Well, good for you. As I told you, Captain Marshall showed me only his heels yesterday,” the Confederate officer said. “We will give you a truce until, say, five this afternoon. General Forrest desires to place the wounded, white or black, aboard your boat. We have few men still close by, but they will give you what help they may.”

  Acting Master Ferguson frowned. “White or black, you say? We heard tell you went and killed every nigger you could.”

  “We killed a lot of 'em,” Anderson said matter-of-factly, “but some are left alive. Take a look at this here buck.” He pointed to Ben Robinson.

  “Oh, yeah?” Ferguson eyed Ben in surprise. The colored artilleryman swore at himself. When he played possum, he fooled the officer on his own side but not the Reb. Much good that would have done him. “You really alive?” Ferguson asked.

  What would he do if I said, “No, suh, I's dead”? Robinson wondered. But the whimsy died stillborn. This was not the time or place. “Yes, suh, I's here,” Robinson answered. “I got shot, but I's here.”

  “Well, all right,” Ferguson said. He turned back to Anderson.

  “Fair enough, Captain. You can have your truce-on one condition.”

  “What's that?” the Confederate asked.

  “Keep your armed men out of gunshot range of my
ship for as long as the truce lasts,” Ferguson said. “They were taking potshots at us, and I don't want any damn fool keeping it up while we're in no fit state to defend ourselves.”

  “Suppose I say that no armed men come within the outermost perimeter of Fort Pillow?” Captain Anderson suggested. “That's about half a mile. There's not a chance in church anyone could hit you from farther off, even if some hothead should try it. And I will issue orders against any such thing.”

  “Seems acceptable,” said Ferguson, nodding. “And you would want this truce to last till five o'clock, you said?”

  “Oh, yes, just for the day. That should be plenty.”

  “I agree.” Ferguson walked over to Anderson, who hadn't dismounted, and held out his hand. Anderson clasped it. The two white men got along well enough. Ben Robinson tried to imagine the Reb agreeing to a truce with a colored officer. The picture would not form. “How many wounded are we talking about?” Acting Master Ferguson inquired.

  “I don't know, not exactly, but it isn't a small number,” Anderson replied. “Perhaps Captain Young here can give you a better notion.”

  “I'm afraid not,” Young answered. “I don't know what happened in the fort after I managed to surrender, and the victors' blood was still running hot at the time.” He didn't want to come out and say the Confederates slaughtered the garrison, but he didn't want to lie, either. Ben Robinson granted him reluctant respect.

  “I… see.” Ferguson could add two and two. He went on, “Well, we have a steamer coming right behind us in the hope she would be useful-the Platte Valley. I will order her to land alongside us, and we'll do what we can for these poor devils.” He looked up and down the riverbank. A lot of bodies had been carried up to the ditch and thrown in, but quite a few still remained. “If you will excuse me, Captain…”

  Ferguson went back to the boat. The sailors who'd waited in it rowed him out to the Silver Cloud. Smoke poured from the gunboat's stacks as she neared the shore. Signal flags and then shouts ordered the Platte Valley up alongside her.