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Fort Pillow

Fort Pillow Historic State Park
Fort Pillow cannons 2006.jpg
Type Tennessee State Park
Location Henning, Tennessee
Area 1,642 acres (6.64 km2)
Created 1971
Open

Year round

Fort Pillow
Fort Pillow State Park is located in Tennessee
Fort Pillow State Park
Fort Pillow State Park is located in the US
Fort Pillow State Park
Location TN State Route 87, Lauderdale County, Tennessee
Nearest city Osceola, Arkansas
Coordinates 35°38′10″N 89°50′32″W / 35.63611°N 89.84222°W / 35.63611; -89.84222Coordinates: 35°38′10″N 89°50′32″W / 35.63611°N 89.84222°W / 35.63611; -89.84222
Built 1861
NRHP Reference # 73001806
Significant dates
Added to NRHP April 11, 1973
Designated NHL May 30, 1974

Year round

Fort Pillow State Park is a state park in western Tennessee that preserves the American Civil War site of the Battle of Fort Pillow. The 1,642 acre (6.6 km²) Fort Pillow, located in Lauderdale County on the Chickasaw Bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River, is rich in both historic and archaeological significance.

In 1861, the Confederate army built extensive fortifications here and named the site for General Gideon Johnson Pillow of Maury County.

Because of its strategic location controlling traffic on the Mississippi River, the fort was attacked and captured by the Union Army, which controlled it during most of the war. On June 4, 1862, Confederate troops evacuated Fort Pillow, enabling Union troops to take Memphis, Tennessee. An exception to Union control of this site took place for less than one day immediately after the Confederate victory in the Battle of Fort Pillow in 1864.

The Confederate defeated the Union troops at the Battle of Fort Pillow (April 1864), resulted in the deaths of 229 of the 262 black Union soldiers engaged in the battle. The white Union soldiers numbered 285. An examination of regimental records showed that "less than 36 percent of the men from white units died in battle or of wounds, while the death toll for black units was 66 percent."

A Confederate wrote in a letter home that "Forrest ordered them [negroes] shot down like dogs, and the carnage continued." In addition to regimental records, contemporary accounts by troops on both sides, as well as journalists, describe it as appalling slaughter. Within about three weeks, as political controversy grew, Confederates began to dispute accounts of a massacre. This slaughter by the Confederate troops under Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest has been classified by historians as a . Confederate apologists debate the fatality numbers.


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