[The following takes place during the Battle of Fort Pillow, during the American Civil War. Context, courtesy of Wikipedia: “The Battle of Fort Pillow, which ended with the Fort Pillow massacre, was fought on April 12, 1864, at Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River in Henning, Tennessee, during the American Civil War. The battle ended with a massacre of African-American Union troops and their white officers attempting to surrender, by soldiers under the command of Confederate Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Military historian David J. Eicher concluded, "Fort Pillow marked one of the bleakest, saddest events of American military history."]
Several [Union] artillerists, too sick to join in the defense, had spent the battle on their backs in a row of hospital tents near the rim of the bluff, where, as the battle progressed, they had been joined by wounded men like the civilian John Penwell of Michigan.
Penwell had just fired his musket and was “feeling for a cartridge” when he “heard a shot behind me” and saw the rebels “come running right up to us.” When they were within ten feet of him, Penwell threw down his musket.
”Do you surrender?” a rebel asked.
Penwell hastily replied that he did.
”Die, then, you damned Yankee son of a bitch,” the rebel snapped back, and shot him.
”More passed by me,” Penwell testified, “and commenced hallooing.” Three or four “stopped where I was and jumped on me and stripped me, taking my boots and coat and hat, and $45 or $50 in greenbacks.”
One of them said, “He ain’t dead,” as he jerked Penwell up “and took off my coat. It hurt me pretty bad.”
Penwell begged them to “kill me, out and out.”
”Hit him a crack on the head,” said one of the rebels.
”Let the poor fellow be and get well, if he can,” another said. “He has nothing more left now.”
Source:
Ward, Andrew. “Bloody Work.” River Run Red: The Fort Pillow Massacre in the American Civil War. Viking, 2005. 199, 200. Print.
Original Source Listed:
Jordan and Pryor, The Campaigns of Nathan Bedford Forrest, pp. 327-328.
John Penwell in RJSCW.
Further Reading:
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