Today, LSU Press is publishing my second book, Reckoning with the Devil: Nathan Bedford Forrest in Myth and Memory. I have worked on this project for a long time and am excited that it is finally out in the world.
Nathan Bedford Forrest cast a long shadow across the South. Before the Civil War, Forrest traded enslaved individuals and families. During the Civil War, he commanded various sizes of Confederate forces and was the commander at the massacre of Black Union soldiers at Fort Pillow in 1864. After the Civil War, Forrest led the first incarnation of the Ku Klux Klan. He covers a lot of ground, much of it rutted and damaged by racism and violence.
Forrest’s public memory is shaped by two statues (one in Memphis erected in 1905, one outside of Nashville built in the 1990s) and by novels, biographies, films, advertisements, and countless allusions across the twentieth century. (In)famous in Tennessee, Forrest emerged as a national talking point in the 1990s through Shelby Foote’s starring role in Ken Burns’s massively popular documentary on the Civil War. Foote, with his anecdotes of bloody sabers and improbable feats of strength. In the 2010s, everything began to shift, and the Memphis statue came down in 2017. The Nashville statue followed a couple of years later. The book tells these stories.
As I write in the book—and discuss in the interview posted below—I have lived with Forrest for a long time. I first wrote a research paper on Fort Pillow in college, way back in the 1990s. A footnote at the end of that essay led to my Master’s Thesis. In the early 2000s, I published much of this research in an article in the Journal of Southern History. I knew there was a larger story there, but in the meantime, I wrote my dissertation on jazz in the 1920s and worked to find academic employment. Forrest rarely strayed from my mind, however, and I committed to writing the book during the pandemic. By then, the statues had come down, and a stronger narrative arc for the book emerged.
I am proud of this book, of the research that went into it, and of the writing. A whole other story could be told here of research and writing and the mechanics of academia, but for now, I will say this stands as a testament to tenacity and proving the doubters (me included) wrong.
This Thursday, I will be part of a virtual book release hosted by LSU Press, where I will discuss the book in greater detail, and the audience can ask questions. The Press will be offering a nice discount on the book for those who particpate. Hopefully, much of the discussion will center on the weird history of Forrest and Tom Hanks. The link for the book release is here.
Also, a few weeks ago, I got to sit down with my dear friend and colleague, Erin C. Callahan, for a lengthy interview about the book and how we write about identity and memory. That interview (as well as her inventive series on Bob Dylan, broadly defined) can be found here.
As always, I am available for classroom talks (in person or via Zoom) on my research and historical methods. Please email me at carneycp@sfasu.edu.
The LSU Press page is here.
Finally, here is the link to purchase the book.
Congratulations, Court! This is a big accomplishment, and all of us in your Dylan family are very proud of your achievement. You've officially graduated to two-trick pony. Giddy up!
Congratulations. We need to know about the men who fought the Civil War as they really were.