Nathan Bedford Forrest Quotes
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Preserve untarnished the reputation you have so nobly won.
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I ended the war a horse ahead.
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I've got no respect for any young man who won't join the colors.
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Get there first with the most.
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I am opposed to it under any and all circumstances, and in our convention urged our party not to commit themselves at all upon the subject.
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I am not an enemy of the Negro. We want him here among us; he is the only laboring class we have.
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Men, you may all do as you damn please, but I'm a-goin' home.
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No damn man kills me and lives.
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This day is a day that is proud to me, having occupied the position that I did for the past twelve years, and been misunderstood by your race. This is the first opportunity I have had during that time to say that I am your friend. I am here a representative of the southern people, one more slandered and maligned than any man in the nation.
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I'll officer you.
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We have but one flag, one country; let us stand together. We may differ in color, but not in sentiment. Many things have been said about me which are wrong, and which white and black persons here, who stood by me through the war, can contradict.
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I have never, on the field of battle, sent you where I was unwilling to go myself; nor would I now advise you to a course which I felt myself unwilling to pursue. You have been good soldiers, you can be good citizens. Obey the laws, preserve your honor, and the Government to which you have surrendered can afford to be, and will be, magnanimous.
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Does the damned fool want to be blown up? Well, blow him up then. Give him hell, Captain Morton- as hot as you've got it, too.
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Never stand and take a charge... charge them too.
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War means fighting, and fighting means killing.
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Ladies and gentlemen, I accept the flowers as a memento of reconciliation between the white and colored races of the southern states. I accept it more particularly as it comes from a colored lady, for if there is any one on God's earth who loves the ladies I believe it is myself.
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Boys, do you hear that musketry and that artillery? It means that our friends are falling by the hundreds at the hands of the enemy, and here we are guarding a damned creek! Let's go and help them. What do you say?
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I want to elevate you to take positions in law offices, in stores, on farms, and wherever you are capable of going.
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If you surrender, you shall be treated as prisoners of war, but if I have to storm your works, you may expect no quarter.
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Every moment lost is worth the life of a thousand men.
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The river was dyed with the blood of the slaughtered for two hundred yards. The approximate loss was upward of five hundred killed, but few of the officers escaping. My loss was about twenty killed. It is hoped that these facts will demonstrate to the Northern people that Negro soldiers cannot cope with Southerners.
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There is no doubt we could soon wipe old Sherman off the face of the earth, John, if they'd give me enough men and you enough guns.
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This fight is against slavery; if we lose it, you will be made free.
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That we are beaten is a self-evident fact, and any further resistance on our part would be justly regarded as the very height of folly and rashness.