My TakiMag Column: A Brilliant Civil War Commander And The War Against the Past
10/10/2013
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Nathan Bedford Forrest

My column at Taki’s Magazine is up.  This week I memorialize a Civil War commander who got my attention, partly for being a brilliant tactician, but mainly for being utterly fearless.

Enraged, the young man pulled out a pistol and shot the general.  “The ball entered the left hip, traveled in the vicinity of the intestines, and went out again.”

Before the lieutenant could fire again, the general reached out with his own left arm, grabbed the pistol hand, and forced it away from him.  With his right hand he had been carrying a closed pocket knife.  Using his teeth, he pulled out its biggest blade and stabbed his opponent in the belly, “ripping it open and perforating the bowels.”  Dropping his pistol, the lieutenant staggered out into the street and made it across into a tailor’s shop, where he collapsed.

The confrontation goes downhill from there.  Read the whole thing at Taki’s Magazine.

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