Thread by @ClintSmithIII

On this day in 1864, Confederate troops slaughtered black Union soldiers, most of whom were former slaves, in Fort Pillow, Tennessee. What made the attack so horrific is that the majority of the black soldiers were killed as they put down their weapons & attempted to surrender.

There’s little doubt as to what motivated the massacre. Southerners were furious that the union had begun using former slaves as soliders. Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forest's field commander later bragged that his men had taught "the mongrel garrison of blacks" a lesson.

The Fort Pillow massacre is considered to have been one of the worst atrocities of the Civil War.

After the war Nathan Bedford Forest, who led the assault, went on to become the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.

I’m writing a book right now about place & public history & how certain places go about telling the story of our past & whenever I come across stories like this I become increasingly infuriated that there are statues honoring Nathan Bedford Forest erected all across the country.

Dude fought a war to maintain the institution of slavery, slaughtered as many black ppl as he could, lost the war, then became leader of the organization predicated on white supremacist terrorism *and still* a statue of him stood in the middle of Memphis, TN until 2017.

The fact that any Confederate statue is still standing is an abomination. Period.