Answer. They were Alabamians and Texans. Question. Did you see any thing of a flag of truce? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. State what was done while the flag of truce was in? Answer. When the flag of truce came up our officers went out and held a consultation, and it went back. They came in again with a flag of truce; and while they were consulting the second time their troops were coming up a gap or hollow, where we could have them cut them to pieces. They tried it before, but could not do it. I saw them come up there while the flag of truce was in the second time. Question. That gave them an advantage? Question. Were you wounded there? Answer. It was afterward. Question. Did you have any arms in your hand at the time they shot you? Answer. No, sir; I threw my gun away, and started down the hill, and got about twenty yards, when I was shot through the calf of the leg. Question. Did they shoot you more than once? Answer. No, sir; they shot at me, but did not hit me more than once. Question. Did they say why they shot you after you had surrendered? Answer. They said afterward they intended to kill us all for being there with their niggers. Question. Were any rebel officers there at the time this shooting was going on? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. Did they try to stop it? Question. What did the rest of them do? Answer. They kept shouting and hallooing at the men to give no quarter. I heard that cry very frequent. Question. Was it the officers that said that? Answer. I think it was. I think it was them, the way they were going on. When our boys were taken prisoners, if any body came up who knew them, they shot them down. As soon as ever they recognized them, wherever it was, they shot them. Question. After they had taken them prisoners? Question. Did you know any thing about their shooting men in the hospitals? Answer. I know of their shooting negroes in there. I don't know about white men. Question. Wounded negro men? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. Who did that? Answer. Some of their troops. I don't know which of them. The next morning I saw several black people shot that were wounded, and some that were not wounded. One was going down the hill before me, and the officer made him come back up the hill; and after I got in the boat I heard them shooting them. Question. You say you saw them shoot negroes in the hospital the next morning? Answer. Yes, sir; wounded negroes who could not get along; one with his leg broke. They came there the next day and shot him. Question. Do you know any thing about thei burning buildings and the hospital? Answer. I expect they burned the hospital after we got out. They said they would not while we wounded ones were in there. The hospital we were in was standing when I went down the hill on the boat. Question. You don't know what happened to it afterward? Answer. Yes, sir; I saw them shoot one white man close beside me. Question. Did they shoot you after you were down? Answer. Yes, sir; through the leg with a musket. Question. Did you see any negroes shot?、 Answer. No, sir; I did not see any. I fell after they shot me, and did not see much. Question. Were you there the next day after the fight? Answer. Yes, sir; they took me on board the boat the next day about ten o'clock. Question. Do you know whether they killed any persons in the hospital? Answer. I know they killed one of our company in the hospital. They said they fired into the hospital. Question. Do you know any thing about their burying any body alive? Answer. No, sir. Daniel Stamps, sworn and examined. Question. To what company and regiment do you belong? Answer. Company E, Thirteenth Tennessee cavalry. Question. What was your position? Answer. I was the company commissary sergeant. Question. Where do you reside? Answer. In Lauderdale County, Tennessee. Question. What was your occupation? Answer. I was a farmer. Question. Were you at Fort Pillow when the fight was there? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. State what happened there. Answer. The first thing, I went out sharpshooting, and was out about two hours, and then was ordered in the Fort. I staid there, I reckon, about an hour. Then I was called out by Lieutenant Akerstrom, to go down alongside the bluff sharp-shooting again, because the rebels were coming down Cold Creek. We staid there all the time until they charged into the Fort. Then they all ran down under the hill, and we went down under the hill too. I reckon we staid there close on to an hour. They were shooting continually. I saw them shooting the white men there, who were on their knees, holding up their hands to them. I saw them make another man get down on his knees and beg of them, and they did not shoot him. I started out to go up the hill, and just as I started I was shot in the thigh. Pretty well toward the last of it, before I got shot, while I was down under the hill, a rebel officer came down right on top of the bluff, and hallooed out to them to shoot and kill the last damned one of us. Question. Do you know the rank of that officer? Answer. I do not. I can't tell them as I can our officers. Their uniform is different. I went round on the hill then. I heard several of them say it was General Forrest's orders to them to shoot us, and give us no quarter at all. I don't know whether they were officers who said so or not. I don't recollect any thing else particularly that I saw that night. The next morning they came round there again, shooting the negroes that were wounded. I saw them shoot some twenty or twenty-five negroes the next morning, who had been wounded, and had been able to get up on the hill during the night. They did not attempt to hurt us white men the next morning. Question. Were any of their officers with the men who were round shooting the negroes the next morning? Answer. One passed along on horseback, the only one I saw. He rode along while they were shooting the negroes, and said nothing to them. I said: "Captain, what are you going to do with us wounded fellows?" He said they were going to put us on the gunboats, or leave us with the gunboats. He had a feather in his cap, and looked like he might have been a captain. I don't know what he was. He was the only man I saw pass that looked like an officer while they were shooting the negroes. Question. Where were you when the flags of truce were sent in? Answer. I was down under the bluff sharpshooting. Question. Is there any thing else that you think of important to state? Answer. I don't know that there is. Question. When? Answer. Once before I surrendered and once afterward. Question. Did you see any body shot besides yourself after he surrendered? Answer. Yes, sir; I saw lots of negroes shot, and some few white men, and I heard them shoot a great many. I was lying down under the bank. Question. What were our men doing when they were shot? Answer. They were begging for quarter when they shot them. Question. Did you see any of them shot while begging for quarter? Answer. Yes, sir; I heard an officer say: "Don't show the white men any more quarter than the negroes, because they are no better, and not so good, or they would not fight with the negroes." I saw them make one of our company sergeants kneel down and ask for quarter, and another secesh soldier came up and snapped his pistol at him twice; but they told him not to shoot him. I saw them shoot others when they were kneeling down. W. J. Mays, sworn and examined: Q. To what company and regiment do you belong? Answer. Company B, Thirteenth Tennessee cavalry. Question. Were you in Fort Pillow when it was attacked? Answer. Yes, sir Question. State what happened there? Answer. They attacked us about six o'clock in the morning. Sharp-shooting commenced early afterward, and kept coming closer and closer until the skirmishers were drawn in about ten o'clock. After that they made several efforts to gain the Fort, and could not get the position. | Under this last flag of truce they gained the position they had been trying to get all day. Question. Did you see them moving their troops when the flag of truce was in? Answer. Yes, sir; I showed it to the boys. Question. What was the movement? Answer. The place was pretty well surrounded, but they were not on the ground they had been trying to get all day. Under that flag of truce they gained the place, some seventy-five yards from the Fort, and placed themselves under logs, with a better position. Question. Are you sure this movement was made while the flag of truce was in? Answer. I know it. Question. Did others see it? Answer. Yes, sir; two boys near me, who were both taken prisoners. Question. Was any thing said about it at the time? Answer. We spoke of it among ourselves at the time. We remarked that under the flag of truce they were only gaining the position they had been trying for all day. I was shot in the charge on the Fort. The place was then taken. I would not have fallen then, but our men after surrendering found no quarter shown them, and they flew down the bluff, and ran over me and kept me down for some time, until I bled so that I could not get up. I saw them shoot a great many after they surrendered. I saw them shoot four white men, and at least twenty-five blacks, some of them within twenty feet of me, while they were begging for quarter. They pulled one out of a hollow log by the foot and held him, when another shot him close by me. There were two negro women, and three little boys, some eight, nine, or twelve years old, about twentyfive steps from me. The secesh ran upon them and cursed them, and said, "Damn them;" they thought they were free to shoot them. All fell but one, a little fellow, and they took the breech of a gun and knocked him down. Then they followed up the men that were trying to get away down the bluff, and some hours afterward they came back searching their pockets. They came on back then, looking over them, and I saw one man with a canteen, and asked him for a drink of water. His reply was to turn on me with his pistol presented, and shoot at me three times, saying: "God damn you; I will give you water." But he didn't hit me, though he threw the dirt over my face. I concluded it was best to lie still, and didn't move any more until after dark, and then I crawled in with some of the dead and laid there until about nine o'clock the next morning, when the gunboat came up, and I crawled down on the gunboat with a piece of white paper in my left hand, and made signs, and the boat came ashore, and I got on the boat. The general cry from the time they charged the Fort until an hour afterward was: "Kill 'em, kill 'em ; God damn 'em; that's Forrest's orders, not to leave one alive." They were burning the buildings. They came with a chunk of fire to burn the building where I was in with the dead. They looked in and said, "These damned sons of bitches are all dead," and went off. I heard guns the next morning, but I was in there with the dead, and didn't see them shoot any body. Question. Did you see any of the men in the Fort shot after they had surrendered? Answer. Yes, sir; I saw four white men and twenty-five negroes that I spoke of that were shot in the Fort. The white men didn't commence flying from the Fort, though they threw their guns down, until they saw there was no quarter shown them. James McCoy, sworn and examined. Question. Where do you reside? Answer. When I am suffered to live at home, I live in Tennessee. Question. You don't belong to the army? Answer. No, sir; but I have been with the regiment six months. The head officers were old acquaintances of mine. I once lived with Major Bradford. Question. Were you at Fort Pillow at the time the attack was made? Answer. Yes, sir; I was in Fort Pillow at headquarters. Question. Will you tell us what you observed there? Answer. About daylight in the morning part of the pickets came in, and said the rebels had captured some of the pickets and were coming. I had not got out of bed then. Major Bradford was up immediately the alarm was given. I had had my hands mashed a few days before. Major Bradford told me I had better go on the gunboat, as I would be in the way, because I could not hold a gun. I went on board the gunboat, and about sunrise the firing commenced. The gunboat immediately played up and down the river, where I could see every thing going on at the Fort. I could not see over the bluff. Major Bradford had a flag, and stood on the edge of the bluff, and motioned to the gunboats where to throw their shells. We had a great many guns on the boat, and about twenty used their guns all the time. The rebel sharp-shooters would come over the hill and shoot at the boat and every body that passed. Question. Where were you when the flag of truce came in? Answer. I was on the boat. Answer. No, sir. Question. What did you hear about it. Answer. I heard one of them say that he saw where a negro was buried, and saw a large mass of foam and dirt where somebody had been breathing through the earth. He brushed it off, and saw a negro there still breathing. I saw one or two who looked as if they had been buried when they came on board. I heard one ask them if they had been buried, and they said: "Very near it." I don't think they were wounded. One of them had been in the dirt. I don't know whether he played dead and was buried or not. Question. Do you know any thing of their Answer. As soon as the flag of truce came in the gunboat stopped firing. It was about three o'clock when it came in, and while it was in, the enemy were creeping up constantly, sharpshooters and all, nearer and nearer. I saw a great many creeping on their hands and feet, get-killing the men in the hospital? ting up to the hill close to the Fort. I don't know Answer. Not of my own seeing. Mr. Akerwhat was back of that. Some men in the Fort strom was in his office down under the hill after told me that they had advanced and got close to the flag of truce was in, and made some signs the Fort before the flag of truce was taken out. for us to come to him. Since that time I have I saw them gathering around there all the time, been told that they wounded him, and then and all that time they were stealing from the nailed him to a door, and burned him up, but I commissary's stores, blankets and every thing didn't see that myself. else they could get at. I reckon I saw two hundred men climbing the hill with as much as they could carry on their backs, shoes, etc. Question. Why did our officers permit that without firing on them? Answer. The gunboat, I think, was almost out of ammunition, and had nothing to shoot; and none of them supposed the gunboat would stop shooting, but she ran out of ammunition. Question. Were you there until the place was taken? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. What happened after that? Answer. About the time the rebels got over the Fort there was just a cloud of them, our men in the Fort running out. About five hundred secesh cavalry, as well as I could see, came up, and turned in to shooting them down just as fast as they could. I heard a great deal of screaming and praying for mercy. The negroes took a scare from that, and ran down the hill and into the river, but they kept shooting them. I was not more than four hundred yards off, on the gunboat. I don't suppose one of them got more than thirty yards into the river before they were shot. The bullets rained as thick in the water as you ever saw a hail-storm. Question. Were those men armed who were shot? Answer. No, sir; they threw down their Question. When did you hear about this nailing to a building and burning him up? Answer. Since we came up here. Question. Were you on board the gunboat the next day when some of the rebel officers came on board? Answer. I was on board the Platte Valley. Question. Did they come with a flag of truce? Answer. A flag of truce was hoisted, and when we got in to the shore some of the rebel officers came on board the Platte Valley. Question. How were they received by our officers? Answer. Just as though there had been no fight. Some of the officers on the Platte Valley took one of the rebel officers up to the bar and treated him, and some would ask the rebel officers what made them treat our men as they did. He said they intended to treat all home-made Yankees just as they did the negroes. I went to Captain Marshall and asked him to let me shoot him. He said that the flag of truce was up, and it would be against the rules of war to shoot him. Question. Do you know what officers treated him? Answer. I don't know; they were all strangers to me. The gunboat first landed, and then the transport Platte Valley came up and took the prisoners, and then another boat came up and laid alongside of her. The three lay there together. Question. Do you know of any thing further on the subject that is important? Answer. I don't think of any thing now. William E. Johnson, sworn and examined. Question. To what regiment do you belong? Question. Were you at Fort Pillow at the time of the attack there? Answer. No, sir; I was at Memphis. I came up to Fort Pillow the morning after the fight, on the Platte Valley, within some six or eight miles below Fort Pillow, and then got on the gunboat Twenty-eight. Question. Did you go on shore at Fort Pillow? Answer. No, sir; I saw some of the rebel officers come down and go on board the Platte Valley; and some of our officers were drinking with them, and making very free with them. I did not particularly notice what rank, but I took them to be captains and lieutenants. Question. Did you hear the conversation between them? Answer. They were making very free with one another, joking, talking, and running on. I did not feel right to see such going on, and did not go about them. John W. Shelton, sworn and examined. Question. Where were you raised? Answer. I was born in Arkansas, but raised principally in Tennessee. Question. To what company and regiment do you belong? Answer. Company E, Thirteenth Tennessee cavalry. Question. Were you at Fort Pillow when the attack was made there? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. Were you wounded there? Question. Before or after the surrender? Answer. I was under the hill, going up the hill. Question. What did they say when they shot you? Answer. I asked them if they did not respect prisoners of war; they said "No, they did not," and kept on shooting; and they popped three or four caps in my face with a revolver after they had wounded me. Question. Did you see them shoot any others after they had surrendered? Answer. Yes, sir, lots of them; negroes and white men both. They shot them down wherever they came to them. Question. Were you there the next day after the battle? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. Did you see them shoot any body the next day? Answer. I saw them shoot negroes, not white men. Question. How many did you see them shoot that day? Answer. I saw them shoot five or six on the hill where I was; they said they shot all they could find. Question. Were you in the hospital there? Answer. I was in a house there with the wounded. Question. Did you see them kill any body there that was wounded? Answer. They took two negroes out and shot them. Question. Did you see them burn any buildings the wounded were in? Answer. Not the one we were in. I was told they fired some buildings that wounded negroes were in. Question. Were you where they buried any of the killed? Answer. I saw them bury some in a ditch in the evening. Question. Did they separate the whites from the blacks? Answer. I cannot tell; I was not close enough. I saw them carry them there and throw them in the ditch. Question. Did you hear any thing about their nailing a man to a building and then setting it on fire? Answer. I heard of it, but did not see it. John F. Ray, sworn and examined. Question. To what company and regiment do you belong? Answer. Company B, Thirteenth Tennessee cavalry. Question. Were you at Fort Pillow when it was attacked? Answer. Yes, sir. Question. At what time were you wounded? Answer. I was wounded about two o'clock, after the rebels got in the breastworks. Question. Was it before or after you had surrendered? Answer. It was after I threw down my gun, as they all started to run. Question. Will you state what you saw there? Answer. After I surrendered they shot down a great many white fellows right close to me ten or twelve, I suppose-and a great many negroes, too. Question. How long did they keep shooting our men after they surrendered ? Answer. I heard guns away after dark shooting all that evening, somewhere; they kept up a regular fire for a long time, and then I heard the guns once in a while. Question. Did you see any one shot the next |