Fort Pillow

V

Below the bluff on which the innermost line of Fort Pillow's works sat, a crescent-shaped ravine ran north into Coal Creek. Corporal Jack Jenkins crouched in that ravine, only a few feet away from General Forrest, when Forrest declared that he and his men had the Federals inside the fort.

Jenkins was glad General Forrest thought so. Forrest commonly knew what he was talking about. Jenkins hoped the general did this time. He hoped so, yes, but he was a hell of a long way from convinced.

If Coal Creek Ravine wasn't hell on earth, you could see it from there. Jenkins had ridden through the Hatchie bottoms to get to Fort Pillow. Coal Creek seemed a distillation of everything that was worst about the bottom country. The ground was muddy enough to suck the shoes right off a man's feet. Every sort of clinging vine and thorn bush seemed to grow there, all of them clutching at trouser legs and tunic sleeves when Jack and the other troopers in Colonel Barteau's regiment tried to push on toward the fort.

Poison ivy, poison oak, poison sumac… Jenkins tried not to think about any of those. If he broke out in welts later on, then he did, that was all. Now he just wanted to close with the enemy.

One thing worked in his favor, and in favor of the rest of the men in the Second Tennessee Cavalry (C.S.). Because Fort Pillow stood so high above Coal Creek Ravine, and because its earthen rampart was so thick, the soldiers inside the fort had to crawl out on top of the earthwork to shoot down into the ravine. When they did, Confederate sharpshooters farther back and higher up had clean shots at them. After a couple of Federals were wounded, or perhaps killed, the rest seemed less eager to expose themselves.

The cannon inside Fort Pillow would not bear on the ravine at all. Every so often, shrapnel rounds or solid shot would snarl by overhead, but they always came down far to the rear.

That didn't mean the troopers in Coal Creek Ravine went altogether free of bombardment. The Yankee gunboat out in the Mississippi lobbed an occasional shell into the ravine. Jenkins hated the gunboat. It could strike with impunity, for the Confederates weren't able to shoot back at it. But it was firing blind. Just as the bluff and the fort atop it shielded the gunboat from C.S. fire, so they also shielded the Confederates from the sailors who aimed the boat's cannon.

Some of the black men and Tennessee Tories inside Fort Pillow had nerve enough to keep exposing themselves to Confederate fire. One Negro soldier crawled out on top of the earthwork and had his pals within the fort pass him one loaded rifle musket after another, so he sent an almost continual stream of bullets down into the ravine.

Corporal Jenkins took a shot at him. So did a couple of other Confederate troopers not far away. The smoke that burst from their rifles announced where they were. In moments, the Negro sent minnies whistling through the undergrowth close to each of the three men.

As Jenkins reloaded, he said, “To hell with me if that nigger's not too dumb to realize how much trouble he's in.”

“I wouldn't be crazy enough to stick myself out there, that's for damn sure,” one of the nearby Confederates agreed.

More bullets whipped past the colored man. Had he been white-even if he were only a homemade Yankee-Jenkins would have respected his courage. But the corporal didn't want to admit, even to himself, that a Negro had courage. If a black man could be brave, wasn't he much the same sort of man as a white? And if he was much the same as a white, how could he also naturally be a slave?

Those two things didn't fit together. Jenkins could see that as plainly as Abe Lincoln could. Where it forced the President of the United States to conclude that all men should be free, it forced the Southerner and most of his comrades to deny the possibility that Negroes could show the same sort of courage as white men.

If Jenkins saw a black man exposing himself to enemy fire, then, the blue-uniformed Negro couldn't be brave. He had to be stupid instead.

Another Minie ball clipped leaves and twigs a few feet away from Jenkins. “This here's warmer work than I reckoned it would be,” he said.

“We'll get 'em,” another trooper said. “Long as they don't get reinforced from down the river, we'll get' em. And even if they do, we've still got most of the high ground. We'll make' em sorry they holed up in there.”

Squelching through the mire at the bottom of Coal Creek Ravine, Jenkins thought of high ground as little more than a rumor. Something slithered over his boot and vanished in the bushes. Maybe it was just a water snake, not a copperhead or a cottonmouth. He hoped so, because he didn't know how far away it had slithered.

After what seemed like forever and was probably fifteen minutes or so, the Negro soldier let out a holler and scrambled back into the fort. “Somebody nailed the son of a bitch!” Jenkins exclaimed. “About time!”

“You see where he got it?” one of his friends asked gleefully.

“Not me.” Jenkins shook his head. “I was ramming a cartridge home.” That was true, but he wasn't sorry to have been screened off by the undergrowth. The damn coon had come too close to hitting him a couple of times. “So where?”

“They shot him right in the ass,” the other C.S. trooper said. “Probably give him a brain concussion,” Jenkins said. “Remember that Yankee general who said he was going to make his headquarters in the saddle?”

“That was General Pope. He had his headquarters in his hindquarters, just like that nigger,” the other man said. “Once he ran up against Bobby Lee, it didn't matter where his headquarters were at anyways.”

“You're sure right there,” Jenkins said. Every Federal general who'd operated against Robert E. Lee had come to grief. The Confederates' luck wasn't so good out here in the West. But they were still in the fight, and the Union troops holed up in Fort Pillow would pay for forgetting it.

A bullet cracked past Bill Bradford, close enough to make him duck. He imagined he felt the minnie tug at the brim of his slouch hat, but the hat seemed untouched when he took it off and looked at it. He set it back on his head, pulling it down low as if to make himself a smaller target.

Another Confederate fired at him. Again, the bullet made him flex his knees. This time, though, he felt no phantom tugs. He scowled at the cloud of black-powder smoke rising from one of the barracks in front of the fort. The Confederates seemed to infest both rows of wooden buildings.

“Captain Carron!” he called.

“Yes, sir?” the artilleryman answered, standing by his twelve-pounder.

“Will that piece of yours reach those barracks halls? The Rebs have got men in them, and they're close enough to make the fire annoying.” That was a polite way to put it. When the Rebs almost parted his hair with a Minie ball, Major Bradford wasn't just annoyed. He was scared green.

Captain Carron shook his head. “Sorry, Major, but I can't do it.

The gun won't depress far enough to hit those huts. “

“Damnation,” Bradford said. “How am I supposed to shift the devils sheltering in them, then?”

“You could burn them out,” Carron suggested.

Bradford hadn't thought of that. Now that the artillery officer planted the idea in his mind, though, he found that he liked it. “Lieutenant Leaming!” he said. “Where the-? Oh, there you are.”

“Yes, sir. Here I am,” his adjutant agreed. “What do you need from me, sir?”

“I want you to gather a-a storming party, I guess you'd call it,” Bradford answered. “The Rebs are shooting at us from those barracks.” He pointed. “I want the men to take torches along with their Springfields. They are to burn down the buildings and then return to the fort. Is that clear?”

“Yes, sir,” Leaming said. “Do you think fifty men will be enough? Shall I send some niggers along with our Tennessee troopers?”

“If fifty can't do the job, no larger number can,” Bradford said. “And no, leave the niggers here inside the fort. I don't know how well they'd fight out in the open, and they shouldn't go out where they can be captured, anyway. Forrest's men don't love colored soldiers.”

“All right, sir,” Leaming replied. “I'll tend to it.”

There was some small delay assembling the storming party. There was a larger delay equipping the troopers with torches. But they swarmed out of the fort bravely enough. “Hurrah!” they shouted as they went forward. “Hurrah!” The U.S. war cry wasn't so impressive as the Rebel yell, but they showed good spirit.

The Confederates didn't have many men in those barracks buildings. H they had, they could have slaughtered the onrushing men from the Thirteenth Tennessee Cavalry. They did knock down a couple of soldiers, but only a couple. Then the men in blue reached the first row of barracks.

Major Bradford whooped when smoke began to rise. The rains of the past few days had soaked the wood; he'd feared it wouldn't catch. But two or three of the buildings started burning. His men also fired at the Confederates lurking there. And they'd gone out with fixed bayonets. They could skewer any Reb who got too close.

Most of the time, a bayonet made a good knife and a good candle holder, but not much else. In close combat where a foe might jump out any time, though…

The Federal assault naturally drew the enemy's notice. Confederates ran toward the two rows of barracks buildings, too. The Rebs rushing up had no kind of order, but they outnumbered the men from the U.S. storming party.

“Come on!” Bradford shouted to the Tennessee troopers inside Fort Pillow and to the colored artillerymen now fighting as infantry. “Shoot those Rebel bastards! Don't let them gain a lodgment there!” He wondered if the Negroes knew what a lodgment was. It didn't matter. They could see that letting the Confederates shoot at them from cover at close range wasn't a good idea.

As he ordered the black men to shift position behind the earthwork so more of them could fire at the wooden buildings, he paid them the highest compliment any officer from Tennessee could give: he forgot what color they were. He treated them the same way as he treated the troopers from his own regiment. In time of danger, they were all just.. soldiers.

Maybe some of the Negroes had dipped up a little too much Dutch courage. They capered and gestured to show their scorn for the enemy. Along with obscene taunts, they thumbed their noses and stuck their thumbs in their ears and waggled their fingers. They made ridiculous faces, their expressions all the more absurd because their teeth and tongues and eyeballs showed up so well against their dark hides.

And Major Bradford laughed and slapped his thigh and urged them on. Let the Rebs see his men weren't afraid (even if he was). Let them see Negroes could fight, too. He wouldn't have believed it himself, but he had no more doubts. They could. They really could.

A minnie kicked up dirt between Matt Ward's feet as he ran toward the two rows of wooden huts in front of Fort Pillow. Another snapped past at about breast height. A couple of feet to the right and it would have torn his heart out.

He didn't have time to be afraid-or maybe he was already as afraid as he could be, and one more near miss made no difference. He dashed past somebody who lay on the ground writhing. Poor bastard, he thought, and tried not to remember that that could still happen to him. With luck, it was only a flesh wound, and the other man would get better if it didn't fester. Without luck… Well, that was one more thing you didn't want to think about.

Then he got in back of the second row of wooden shacks. Bullets stopped flying all around him. His relief lasted perhaps half a minute. After that, he realized the fight went on, and at close quarters. This was different from shooting at the enemy from long range. You had to think about when you pulled the trigger here, because you were hideously vulnerable if you fired and missed and had to reload. Ward wished for a six-shooter instead of his single-shot Enfield.

Wishing didn't make a revolver fall out of the sky. He edged up to the space between two buildings. Ever so cautiously, he stuck out a hand, as if to feel if the enemy was there.

When no one shot at him, he looked into the space. No Yankee rushed toward him or, worse, waited with aimed rifle musket for a target more deadly than a hand. Carrying his own weapon at the ready, he moved up toward the first row of buildings.

Smoke made him cough. The homemade Yankees had already fired some of the barracks. He saw a running shape through the smoke. Friend or foe? The other soldier saw him, too, and started to bring his musket up to his shoulder.

That decided Matt. Anyone who aimed a weapon at him was an enemy, no matter which uniform he had on. Ward shot first. The other soldier screamed and staggered and fell. He fired, too, but wildly, into the air.

He wasn't dead. He feebly tried to crawl back toward Fort Pillow. That told Ward he really was a damnyankee. Rushing forward, the Missourian drove his bayonet home again and again. He'd never used it before, but he'd never been in a mad, cramped fight like this before, either.

He was amazed and more than a little appalled at how many times he had to stab before the other man stopped moving. Sometimes people were harder to kill than anyone who hadn't fought in war could imagine.

Just then, with the Enfield unloaded, Ward felt all too easy to kill. He reloaded as fast as he could, trying his best not to drop the cartridge or fumble with the ramrod or do any of the other stupid things that would waste time. He'd heard of men who, in the heat of battle, rammed home cartridge after cartridge without ever putting a cap on the nipple. With the roar of gunfire all around, they got too excited to notice that their piece wasn't roaring or belching smoke or kicking. Sometimes they would cap it with several rounds in the barrel. Then the rifle musket commonly blew up in their face.

Cartridge bitten open and rammed home. Copper cap on the nipple. Enfield half cocked. Ward nodded to himself. He was ready to shoot again. The smoke got thicker. He coughed and rubbed at his streaming eyes. Between the smoke and the black powder he got on his face whenever he reloaded, he hoped his fellow troopers wouldn't shoot him for a nigger.

The row of buildings closest to the fort was on fire. The damned Tennessee Tories had done that much, and Ward didn't see what he and his comrades could do but let those huts burn. The second row remained intact. The barracks there could still give the Confederates good cover… if the Federals didn't fire them.

Another indistinct shape came through the smoke. No, this fellow had a torch in his hand, which left no doubt whose side he was on. “Forrest!” Ward shouted, and fired at him.

To his disgust, he missed. Before, he'd sniped at men inside Fort Pillow from several hundred yards, and was pretty sure he'd scored hits. Here he could damn near spit on this bluebelly, but he missed him. It was embarrassing. It happened all the time, but it was still embarrassing.

“Jesus God!” the enemy trooper screeched when the rifle musket roared not thirty feet away and the minnie cracked past him. He dropped the torch and dashed back toward Fort Pillow in great terrified bounds, his feet hardly seeming to touch the ground. Ward didn't think a catamount could have caught him, let alone a mere man.

Missing him hadn't been so bad, then. He was out of the fight here, anyway. Matt Ward tried to console himself as he reloaded again. You could talk yourself into believing almost anything if you tried hard enough.

More and more men in blue uniforms ran back to the earthwork on the bluff. Unless the wind suddenly swung, it didn't look as if the second row of wooden buildings would catch. And if they stayed intact, Ward and the other Confederates who'd saved them would be able to go on peppering Fort Pillow from the cover they gave. That was the point of the clash.

For a little while, the smoke and flames rising from the nearer row of barracks buildings let Lieutenant Mack Leaming believe both rows were on fire. But the bullets still coming from the wooden structures soon disabused him of that notion. The men he'd sent out to burn both rows of buildings at Major Bradford's orders had torched the first row, but not the second. They wouldn't have the chance to do it now. They were falling back toward Fort Pillow. Some of them were running, scrambling up the forward face of the bluff as far as they could go. Others moved more slowly-those were men who would pause to shoot at the Rebs when they got the chance. Still others helped wounded comrades toward what they hoped would be safety.

A bullet whistled over Leaming's head. He didn't worry about bullets that whistled. They were too far away to be dangerous. Bullets that cracked by-those were the near misses, the scary rounds. People said you never heard the one that got you. Leaming didn't know if that was true, and didn't want to find out, either.

“Lieutenant, why are those men retreating?” Major Bradford demanded.

“Sir, there are probably too many Secesh troopers to hold off,” Leaming answered. “If they don't come back, they'll all get killed.”

“But they didn't do what I sent them out there to do,” Bradford said.

“No, sir,” Leaming said. Sometimes-often-the least answer you could give was the best one.

“But they needed to burn those buildings,” Bradford said. “We are in danger as long as Forrest's men can fire from them.”

“Yes, sir,” Lieutenant Leaming said. It wasn't as if Bradford were wrong. They were in danger from the Confederates in the barracks buildings. As if to prove as much, a minnie snapped past over the major's head. Bradford automatically ducked. So did Leaming.

“What are we going to do? We can't let them establish themselves there,” the commandant said.

We can't stop them from establishing themselves there, Leaming thought. We tried. It didn't work. Major Bradford had to know that as well as he did. Since Bradford had to know it, Leaming couldn't think of any answer for him. Then he had a happy thought. “Maybe the New Era can shell them out. “

“Maybe.” Major Bradford brightened. He had great faith in the gunboat in the Mississippi-more faith than its performance so far justified, as far as Leaming was concerned. “Go tell my brother to direct the gunboat's fire against those buildings.”

“Yes, sir.” Lieutenant Leaming tried to sound cooperative, not resigned. He'd given the major the idea, after all. He trotted over to Captain Theodorick Bradford at the edge of the steep bluff leading down to the river. “Your brother's compliments, sir, and he says for you to tell the New Era to pound the stuffing out of the barracks halls and drive the Rebs out of ' em.”

“Well, I'll try,” Theo Bradford said dubiously. He held up the pair of large wigwag flags and semaphored with great vigor. Leaming peered down, down, down to the New Era. From this distance, the gunboat seemed hardly bigger than a toy.

An officer-or maybe a sailor-on her deck signaled back.

“What's he say?” Leaming asked.

“Says they'll try-I think.” Captain Bradford sounded harried. “I wish to God I had a spyglass so I could make out his flags better. I can't be sure what he's telling me half the time.”

“Can he read you?” Leaming asked anxiously.

“I sure hope so,” Theodorick Bradford said-not the most encouraging response he could have given.

But the New Era had the request. The gunboat did its best to comply. Its guns swung in the direction of the twin rows of barracks halls. Leaming admired that-the sailors far below couldn't see what they were aiming at. One after another, the cannon went off. Fire and smoke belched from their muzzles. He watched the shells rise into the cloudy air, then descend toward their targets. Booms said they'd hit-somewhere.

“Were those on the mark?” Leaming asked.

Captain Bradford shrugged. “Damned if I know. I can see the gunboat, or else I can see what it's shooting at. I can't do both at once.” He waved the wigwag flags again. “The more shell the boat puts down, the better the chance that some of them will come down where we want them to.”

“I see,” Leaming said. He didn't say what he saw, which was bound to be just as well. Since he couldn't change anything, complaining wouldn't do him any good. But Major William Bradford plainly thought the New Era was a vital part of Fort Pillow's defenses against Forrest's men. And so the gunboat might have been-if only it could hit its targets with something resembling accuracy. As things were… Mack Leaming grimaced. As things were, the New Era was doing the best it could, and he had to hope that would be enough.

Not long after Nathan Bedford Forrest finished his reconnaissance of the ground in front of Fort Pillow, a soldier in a butternut tunic and blue trousers trotted up to him. He'd issued orders that shirts captured from the Yankees had to go into the dye pots right away so his men wouldn't shoot at one another by mistake. Trousers were supposed to be dyed, too, but that was less urgent.

“What's up, Red?” he asked.

About half a dozen men in his command answered to that nickname. This lanky Mississippian had hair the color of a newly minted copper penny and ears that stuck out a good four inches. He said, “Ammunition wagons just came up, General.”

“Did they, by heaven?” Forrest said. “About time!”

“Yes, sir,” Red said. He probably didn't worry about the struggle they'd had moving those wagons along the narrow, rutted, muddy roads that went through the Hatchie bottoms, especially the troubles they'd had moving them along in pitch darkness. He did have sense enough to ask, “Any special orders for 'em?”

“Just make goddamn sure you get those cartridges up to the men who need 'em the most,” Forrest answered.

Red sketched a salute and went back the way he'd come. Bedford Forrest slowly nodded to himself. Up till now, his men had had only the cartridges they carried with them. They were supposed to bring enough to fight with-a rifle musket and cartridges were all a soldier really needed. But some would have more ammunition, some less, and some none at all. Forrest knew only too well that plenty of soldiers were natural-born knuckleheads.

With the wagons here at last, though, he didn't have to worry about that any more. He wished he would have been able to bring field guns forward, too, but that just wasn't in the cards. One of the Federals' cannon roared. The guns in the fort and the ones on the boat in the river were nuisances, but they weren't anything worse than nuisances. If he could have dropped shells into that cramped space inside the U.S. earthwork, though…

He shrugged. Worrying about might-have-beens wasn't his style. Another cannon inside Fort Pillow fired at his men. Those really were niggers manning the guns in there. Easy enough to seem brave when they were shooting from inside an earthwork. They wouldn't act like such big men when they met his troopers face-to-face. His hands folded into fists. He was sure of that. Oh, yes.

For now, though, the coons were having a high old time, skylarking and fooling around and mocking Forrest's men as if the Confederate soldiers would never have the chance to pay them back. They gave the troopers obscene gestures. One Negro even turned around and dropped his pants to show them his bare brown backside.

Forrest hoped that Negro would take a bullet where it did him the most good. No doubt all the Confederates who saw him did their best to give him what he deserved. But he pulled his trousers up again, waggled his bottom at the attackers one last time, and jumped down behind the rampart again.

In spite of himself, Forrest laughed. Say what you would, that Negro had nerve-which only made him need killing more. Ordinary blacks were no great trouble. They did what they were told, the same way ordinary whites did.

An uppity nigger, though… An uppity nigger was trouble. He might as well have smallpox or measles or some other deadly, contagious disease. He could infect others with what he carried. And if he did, he made them dangerous to white men, too.

“We got here just in time, sir,” Captain Anderson said, coming up beside Forrest. Quiet fury filled the aide-de-camp's voice.

“How's that?” Forrest asked.

“Well, sir, the longer we let these niggers think they're soldiers, the longer they have the chance to believe it, the more trouble they'll be in the long run-not just facing us but spreading their nonsense to other coons,” Anderson said. “Better-much better-to nip all that in the bud.”

“I was thinking pretty much the same thing,” Forrest said.

“If we teach those sons of bitches a good lesson, every smoke who puts on a Federal uniform will remember it from here on out,” Anderson said.

“Don't know much about lessons. Don't care much about lessons, neither.” Forrest grimaced, remembering his own brief, irregular schooling. “I just want to get in there, clean this place out, and then go give the damn yankees another boot in the behind somewheres else.”

“A boot in the behind isn't what that one damnfool nigger deserved.” Captain Anderson still seethed. “A minnie up the cornholethat's more like it.”

“He'll get his,” Forrest said. “We can find out who he is and damn well make sure he gets his.”

“Yes, sir.” But Captain Anderson remained discontented. “He's not the only nigger acting that way-he's just the worst.”

“I know, I know.” A shell from the gunboat in the Mississippi crashed down not far from the row of wooden huts the Confederates had captured. The cannon in the fort wouldn't bear on those barracks buildings, but the gunboat kept pestering them. Another shell burst over there. Somebody screamed-a sliver of iron must have struck home. Forrest pointed that way. “Here's something for you to do, Captain. “

“What is it, sir?”

“Find yourself some men who don't look like they're busy doing anything else.” Bedford Forrest's mouth quirked in a wry grin-you could always find plenty of men like that on a battlefield. He pointed west, toward the great river. “Take' em over there. If we have to storm the fort, we'll want to grab the riverbank just as quick as we can. We'll be able to shoot back at that damn gunboat then, and we'll make sure the damnyankees can't land any reinforcements, too.”

“I'll do it,” Anderson said. “Reinforcements are about the only thing that can save that place, aren't they?”

“Nothing's going to save Fort Pillow,” Nathan Bedford Forrest said. “You hear me? Nothing.”

“Here they come again!” Captain Carron shouted. Sure enough, a couple of hours after their first headlong assault on Fort Pillow was beaten back, the Confederates made another push. Sergeant Ben Robinson and his crew served their twelve-pounder like steam-driven mechanical men. They sent one round of shrapnel after another at Bedford Forrest's troopers.

But the Rebs were able to get under the range of the gun, the way Robinson had feared they would. Because of the thick earthwork, the crew couldn't depress the cannon enough to bear on them when they drew near. It was up to the soldiers with Springfields then: the colored artillerymen who didn't have a big gun to serve and the dismounted troopers of the Thirteenth Tennessee Cavalry.

They had the same trouble the gunners did, though to a lesser degree. Because of the thick parapet protecting Fort Pillow, they couldn't easily fire down on the enemy soldiers coming up the steep ground toward them. If they tried, they exposed themselves to Secesh sharpshooters. The Rebs were good marksmen; they wounded several Federals who tried to pick off their friends.

All the same, Forrest's men had to run a gauntlet to get too far forward for V.S. gunfire to bear on them. Enough of them got hit to make the rest lose heart. Most of them fell back out of easy range, with only a few hanging on down below where the men in the fort had trouble shooting at them.

Seeing Forrest's fierce fighters move away from Fort Pillow made Charlie Key and Sandy Cole and the rest of the blacks in the gun crew jump in the air and click their heels together. “Look at 'em run!” Charlie shouted. “Just look at 'em run! They ain't so god damn tough! “

Confederate minnies still cracked past the gunners. “They ain't quit yet, neither,” Robinson pointed out. If you forgot that-or maybe even if you didn't-you'd stop a bullet with your face.

Charlie was too excited to care. So was Sandy Cole. “So what if they ain't, Ben-uh, Sergeant Ben?” he said. “So what? You ever reckon you'd live to see the day when we had guns an' the buckra was runnin' from us? Feel so good watchin' 'em go, I reckon I done gone to heaven.”

“You keep carryin' on like a damn fool, a minnie send you straight to heaven,” Ben said gruffly. He knew what a sergeant was supposed to sound like. He'd had several fine white examples. And his own manner proved him an excellent scholar.

All the same, he knew just what Sandy was driving at. One of the reasons slavery persisted in the South was that whites intimidated blacks. Blacks had always been sure that if they got out of line, if they tried to rise up, whites would fall on them like an avalanche. Whites would be bold, whites would be fierce, whites would be fearless.

Negroes believed it, anyhow. How could they help but believe it when every sign of unrest was ruthlessly put down? Ben Robinson had believed it himself, back before the war started. Whites were so sure of their own superiority, they convinced Negroes of it, too. Didn't most colored men prefer light-skinned women to their duskier cousins? Weren't very black men, men with broad, flat noses and wide lips, reckoned uglier than those formed more in the image of their masters?

But how could you go on thinking somebody was better than you by nature when he ran away for fear that you would blow him a new asshole with your Springfield? Wasn't he a man, just like you? Wasn't he a frightened man, just like you?

It sure looked that way to Ben. Sandy Cole and Charlie Key weren't the only Negroes jeering at the Confederates as they fell back-far from it. The gun crews were fairly restrained; their officers seemed to have them well in hand. But the colored artillerymen serving as foot soldiers alongside the whites of the Thirteenth Tennessee Cavalry were lapping up the sutlers' whiskey as if someone would outlaw it tomorrow. Robinson didn't know if that meant they weren't shooting straight. He didn't need to be Grant or Sherman to see that they weren't thinking straight.

“'Scuse me, Cap'n, suh,” he said.

“Yes, Sergeant Robinson? What is it?” Captain Carron gave his three stripes their due.

“Suh, kin we git the sutlers to put up them whiskey barrels now?” Robinson asked. “Reckon the men done plenty 0' drinkin'. Reckon mebbe some of 'em done too much drinkin'.”

“I don't think it's harming them any, Sergeant,” the white officer answered. “It keeps their spirits up, you might say.” He smiled at his own joke. Ben Robinson didn't. Carron's head swung this way and that as he looked along the line. “The Tennesseans are drinking, too, you know.”

“Yes, suh.” Robinson's agreement was thick with disapproval. If anything, the troopers made rowdier drunks than the colored artillerymen. One of the white men yelled something at the Confederates that would have made Robinson want to kill him were it aimed his way. “They is actin' like fools their ownselves.”

Captain Carron frowned. Ben knew why: he'd called white men fools. Even in the V.S. Army, even when it was an obvious truth, a Negro wasn't supposed to do that. Ben Robinson might not have been a slave any more, but he wasn't exactly a free man, either, not even in the eyes of the power that had put a uniform on his back.

Two colored soldiers, both laughing like idiots, shouted things at the Confederates that made what the Tennessee trooper had said sound like an endearment. That was so funny, they had to hold each other up. Then they shouted something viler yet.

But they might not have said anything at all if the drunken white man didn't give them the idea. Even through the din of cannon fire and musketry, those insults carried. Out there beyond rifle range, some of Bedford Forrest's hard-bitten troopers were shaking their fists at Fort Pillow.

Ben didn't want to make Forrest's men any angrier at him than they already were. Why couldn't anybody else see the plain sense in that?