Krista Castillo, the Museum Coordinator of the Fort Negley Visitor Center, talks about life, challenges, and yes, the circus, all during the Battle of Nashville during the Civil War.
Today's Guest - Krista Castillo | Museum Coordinator of the Fort Negley Visitor Center
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Happy Saturday, everybody. I know that you have been dying for some sunshine. I'm so glad that Friday Nashville is able to get some sunshine for the first time in a very long time. I hope your Saturday is also going well and that you have a great rest of your weekend. We thought this would be a great time to dive back into some fantastic Nashville history. Stuart and I, N D Sember met with Krista Castillo and she is over at the Fort Negley center and we sat down and talked with her about the history of Nashville during the civil war and what times were like during that era. And let me tell you, that was one of the best interviews. I think it's, it's Stuart and mind's favorite. Out of all of our interviews, most likely there's, there's so many good interviews that we've had here, but this one's just so fun to listen to because you learn so much about Nashville and the time period that it was in. But back in December we split that episode into two parts. And now we're going to give you both parts of that interview into one cohesive podcast. As part of our new series, the Nashville story, talking about all things Nashville from an extremely local perspective to see how Nashville has been shaped over time and what better way to continue this series than with a history segment about Nashville during the civil war. So here's that full interview with Krista Castillo. I hope you guys enjoy it and we'll see you back on Monday.
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All right, our guest today is Kristen Castillo. She is the museum coordinator at Fort Negley. And so Krista, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. We are excited. We love Fort Negley so we're excited to have you here. Well, thank you for the invitation. Yes. Okay. So we're at Fort Negley and you know, we're just going to pretend like, you know, we don't know if Fort Negley is, we're, we, you know, there's this giant lump of, of, of grass, dirt and grass and you know, in this downtown area and you know, you drive past a skyscraper there. Yeah. You drive down the interstate and you're like, there's just a big giant Hill in downtown, and there's probably a lot of people who are not familiar with his area. So what exactly is Fort Negley? All right. Well, I'll take you way back to pre history. Okay. Back to when Tennessee was a tropical shallow sea. All right. How about hundred million years ago?
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So we had all of these little sea creatures dying, falling to the bottom condensing over time due to pressures. We have, so it created all of this limestone. Oh wow. When the national basin eroded away, the really hard stuff, like the limestone didn't erode. So we're left with these basically solid limestone knobs. And one of those is st cloud Hill, which, which is what Fort Negley is today. So Fort Negley park is about 60 acres. We have very little surface soil here because it is really solid limestone. And the, so it's a, it's a, you know, a public green space in a rapidly developing urban area. And then right in the, in the, the center point of the park is the remains of a federal Fort built during the civil war. Okay. Yeah, that's perfect. That's really cool to learn about its history even before the civil war. And people said national never had a beach.
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Was this private land before the civil war? It was. Okay. It was a, so you're probably familiar with traveler trust. Yep. So judge John Overton began buying up property in Nashville in the early 18 hundreds. And st. Cloud Hill was one of those properties that he purchased. We really have no idea where the name st cloud Hill came from. That's one of the big mysteries, but but no one lived here. So it was basically prior to the civil war, a popular picnic area. Okay. so even though it is so close to downtown, it offered people living in the city and escape from all the disease and filth. So it was a nice little day trip for people. Yeah. What's the elevation of st? Cloud Hill? It's about 260 feet above the Cumberland river. So it is not National's highest Hill, but it is, one of them was about to say it's probably pretty close.
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I mean you can, you can see a lot from Fort Negley but there's also a lot of points that you can seek close to Fort Negley that are, that are pretty high in Nashville. What made Fort Negley the spot that was chosen in a to build a federal Fort on well it is low key. It was located very close to to railroad lines. The railroad lines are, are just at the base of the Hill separating us from Nashville city cemetery. And then you have all of these Southern Pikes also converging. So you have Franklin pike, Murfreesboro pike, Nolensville pike, all within sight range of Fort Negley. And the Southern approaches to the city is what was really important to protect because there were so many federal gun boats on the river and attack from the North was really would, it would have been pretty unlikely. So they were really concerned with watching those Southern approaches.
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Yeah. We recently in doing an episode of this podcast, one of our earlier episodes, we learned the design of the city and went through some of the, the plans and how people were designing the city. We learned a lot of the Pikes were built from Buffalo trails that have, so it's, it's pretty cool to see a lot of Nashville history kind of coming together and everything because it, it all connects. It's really cool to see. Okay. So let's talk about maybe Nashville just right before it's, it's time of actually occupation and everything. What was Nashville like right before either the civil war right before its occupation?
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That is a, that's a really fascinating question. Nashville was really unlike other Southern cities. It was very cosmopolitan a large emphasis on education and arts. And, and what made it so desirable to the military were all of those large buildings that went along with that. They can store stuff in the warehouse. Exactly. Source stuff and troops. Another so you ha so you have all of this focus on arts and education, but then at the same time you have this slave system that was also unique to Nashville in the way that you had a combination of enslaved people, free people, and then quasi free people. Okay. Which means there were slaves that were being rented out and they were essentially living on their own, but their wages were going back to their masters. And because you had this very strange combination of slaves and free people, there was a lot of concern from the founding of Nashville all the way up to the civil war that, you know, some of these enslaved people and quasi free people would start getting ideas from the other free people and they, they might want to start an insurrection.
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So everyone, everyone that was considered by the Nashville elites to be kind of undesirable were, were pushed out beyond the Capitol in the area of the old prison, Tennessee state prison. So, so I, it was a really interesting and complex society one that you read stories of visitors who came and there's a definite division between the very wealthy and the very poor and there doesn't seem to be like that in between. And I think one of the most, you know, startling images if is you have all these people living around this, this opulent Capitol in the 1850s, this opulent Capitol building. What was the population of around this time? So it in 1860, it was about 17,000. Okay. So you have, you have this, this opulence on the, on Capitol Hill and then surrounding Capitol Hill and all of this is in view of the people that are living in absolute poverty and the people that are, that are living in what quickly became known as hell's half acre are walking to [inaudible].
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That's that, that's a Hill that's down from the Tennessee state Capitol, correct? Yep.
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[Inaudible] Yeah. And you have them, you know, you have people walking to work in the mansions and the hotels and the restaurants and they're walking right past the slave dealers. And the slave jail because everything was congregated around that Capitol Hill. So it was a extremely interesting time. And shockingly hell's half acre existed well until the 1970s.
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Yeah, it's the photos. I've seen the historic photos. They are insane looking. Yeah, that's, yeah, it's extremely sad. So how did Nashville become a Confederate city then?
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So Nash or Tennessee is initially voted against the session but following the, the surrender Fort Sumpter and Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops the state had a re vote in June, 1861 and the state voted to secede. Nashville was a bit divided. There were, there were unionists, union of slave owners, secessionists obviously succession of slave owners. Once the state voted to secede a lot of, a lot of the unionists to Nashville. But there was still, there was still a lot of division. So it was obviously Nashville became the capital of of succeeded state. Yeah.
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[Inaudible]
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There was a lot of you know, there was a lot of tension. It was a very, very much decided city divided city. It literally was in Nashville, like another places, brother against brother, neighbor against neighbor, you know, people who had been best friends forever were suddenly against each other. You know, anyone displaying any kind of of patriotism toward the United States was, was immediately suspect. Unfortunately or fortunately, it depends on how you look at the outcome of the civil war. As an as important as Nashville was, the Confederacy did virtually nothing to secure the city or the S or really the state. Interesting. So they built forts Henry and Donaldson to the Northwest of Nashville. They really relied on Kentucky's neutrality to protect the South. The Confederate started establishing the supply base here right around the time of that succession vote. When the, when the fall of Fort Donaldson occurred, there were about 7,000 Confederate troops in Nashville. Oh, wow. And the fall of Fort Donaldson came as a complete shock to citizens and national. They went to bed the night before believing that it was in the bag. The Confederacy had won. They got up the next morning, they went to church. Church services are interrupted. They're told Fort Donaldson has fallen. The federal army is marching this way. The gunboats are coming and an panic broke out.
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Yeah. How many soldiers at the federal army have at Fort Donaldson was over 25,000. I think
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That's a good question. I don't have to look that up.
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No, that's okay. So how, when they use the Confederates had the city of occupied and most of those troops or soldiers were stationed near Capitol Hill, correct. At the time of when the Confederates were occupying Nashville. So when the union or the federal army came into Nashville, what did that look like?
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So it took, it took almost two weeks for them to arrive from right from that announcement. And so in the meantime, you have Confederate soldiers who had been at Fort Donaldson trickling in and you know, they're hungry, they're tired battle worn, and they're telling, they're telling the public all of these things like they're coming, they're gonna burn down the city, they're gonna bomb the city. And the Confederate army decides to live to fight another day and they start preparing to move out. So they are taking, you know, the S the stores, the rations, they're trying, they're confiscating every train car, every civilian cart, everything they can find to take their supplies further South. And the public rightly sows, starts panicking. It, it appears that they're taking all of the food out of the city. So they're not saying around a fight?
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No, no, no. There were only about 7,000 here. So they would not stand. They did. And at the same time the, the state legislature moves out, the governor leaves, they take the they take the archives with them. They decide that they're going to reconvene in Memphis. So the state government essentially abandons the civilians in Nashville. So you're left with the, with the city government to make a decision on what to do. And they have, people at this time have all of this knowledge about the, the Wars and the revolutions in Europe. And they certainly don't want to, you know, turn out to be a Moscow where their city is completely burned to the ground. Right. So they decide very early on that they are going to surrender when troops arrive. Wow. Gosh, that's that's interesting to see like an entire capital purchase.
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Pretty much abandoned. Yes. And the descriptions are pretty amazing. Just people fleeing as fast as they can. You know, men riding on top of train cars, women and children inside train cars. Many of the big supporters of the Confederacy the big plantation owners, the men fled South, leaving their wives and their children behind to take care of the, take care of everything at home and secure their property. All right, so you know, now the federal army is in Nashville. What's the, what's the date of this? During the civil war? This is February 25th and 26th. Okay. Gotcha. In 1860 to 1962 and so obviously now the federal army has to, you know, find some way to defend Nashville. Yes. And I'm guessing this is how Fort Negley came into existence. Yes. Okay. Yeah. So the federal army comes in, they completely locked down the city.
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So newspapers are shut down, mail is not getting in or out. People are not allowed to leave. It's, it's this effort to try to root out who is loyal to the federal government and who is not. Because Abraham Lincoln fully believed that the unionists in Nashville were being oppressed. They were in the majority, but they were being oppressed by the succession is okay. And all they needed was someone to come in and encourage them to stand up. And what they found was that there was definitely more secessionist Ferber than they imagined. So Andrew Johnson is appointed military governor of Tennessee because he was a Senator from Tennessee, the only Senator from a succeeding state that it did not resign his position. He was a slave owner, but he was also a unionist. So he was very much like an olive branch, you know, we're going to send you one of your own.
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Unfortunately, outside of East Tennessee, Johnson was not well liked. So Johnson was very much had a hand with the fortifying of an Asheville. So throughout the, the late winter, spring and summer there was a lot of Confederate irregular activity in the countryside. So people that, that weren't necessarily associated with the Confederate army, but operating in the, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then also you had, you had people like Nathan Bedford Forrest constantly threatening to recapture the city. But you have war heating up farther South, you need soldiers on in the field. So at the time, the best way to do, to protect a large amount of territory was to build fortifications. Okay. Okay. So by May, 1862 James st Claire Morton was promoted to chief engineer of the army of the Ohio leader army of the Cumberland, and he came to Nashville.
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Personally chose the sites that would be used for the fortifications. The work began in August. The, the labor force was comprised primarily by free African-Americans, enslaved people, and self emancipated people. Okay. Gotcha. So when throughout that spring and summer what, what the federal army did was essentially create pockets of free soil in the South making escape a lot more attainable for slave populations in fortifications. You could become a Freeman. Right. Okay. Right. So, so you have, you have soldiers congregating on these Hills that have been chosen for the fortifications. Right. Which is welcome, very welcoming to enslave people. So you kind of have you have people coming in and rebuilding their life, trying to rebuild new lives and freedom at the same time that the army is planning to build these fortifications. Yeah. So that's where the labor force comes from.
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And you know, it slate enslaved people are often portrayed, at least that's been my experience in school, that enslaved people were portrayed as just passive bystanders who were handed freedom earned by others by others to talk about anything else. Exactly. Right. But what you find at Fort Negley, the rest of the fortifications in Nashville and in other occupied cities, is that enslaved people made calculated decisions. Yeah. They were, you know, they were getting information. They, they understood that if they left the plantation, they were walking into complete uncertainty. They had never seen northerners before. They didn't know if they were sympathetic to their plight. Right. Even though the distances were drastically reduced, they still had to be on the lookout for slave catchers. Masters tracking them. They knew once they left the plantation, it was likely they would never see their family again.
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They knew that they were walking into a situation where there was overwhelming disease, lack of supplies lack of housing. So they really made those those difficult choices. And what's really amazing Dr. Thomas Flegel, who's a professor at Cumberland community college, did his dissertation and found that the majority of slaves who successfully escaped were women and children. Cause women understood that the law at the time said your condition of slavery was based on your mother's condition of slavery. So they understood if they could get themselves freedom, they could get their, their children and all future children's, all future children to freedom. Yeah. That makes me think of a Harriet Tubman. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I mean, they really understood and made some extremely difficult decisions. And I think one of the, one of the really frustrating things that I hear much more often than I like is, well, you know, they were better off in slavery.
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And that's just, I mean, that's in comprehensible, I mean, yeah. Right. They didn't take those risks for no reason. Exactly. Exactly. And I, you know, and I asked sometimes when I ask people, you know, let's say that like, are you saying you would volunteer? Is that right? You know, so I mean, we don't, we don't understand what it's like to not be free. We were born free. Right. We really can't judge others while we're on this topic. I remember, you know, I think a lot of people had read in the news a little while ago, a few years ago, a year or two ago, that there were things that were found on this property, you know, during the, was it the demolition of Greer stadium? Do you want to talk about that? Yes. so in 2016, 2017 the city of Nashville attempted to open up the portion of Fort Negley park previously occupied by Greer stadium for private development.
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Okay. so of course a number of historians preservation is concerned. Citizens began questioning that because even when it was decided in the 1970s to build Greer stadium you know, it was, it was, seems to have been pretty common knowledge that there was that that had been civil war burial ground. Oh wow. Prior. so the city hired an archeologist, Tennessee Valley Valley archeology archeological research. They conducted a survey and what they found was a high likelihood of human remains. Okay. So fortunately when the athletic park was built by the works progress administration in the 1930s and forties, they brought in several feet of filtered, which protected those archaeological deposits. And then through ground penetrating radar, the archeologists also found a normal Lees that could be interpreted as graves. Okay. Gotcha. So phase two of the, of the survey is set to begin next month and hopefully we will get more data on that property and what kind of remains are over there. Okay. How long are they estimating phase two to take?
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Maybe a month, six weeks. Is any of this ground penetrating? That I'm not sure about. Okay. I know they will be digging test pits. Gotcha. At this point they did dig some test pits as part of that 2017 survey as well, but did not recover any human remains out. What we do know is that because of the number of deaths in Nashville during the civil war, the city cemetery could not hold everybody, hold everyone. So additional cemeteries had to be consecrated and we know that some of those aren't within Fort Negley parks, border borders. So there's a, there were an estimated 40,000 people buried in Nashville during the civil war and we only know we only have records on about 15,000 of those, which were largely federal soldiers and some Confederate soldiers. So civilians, we really don't, we don't know a whole lot about where they are. Okay.
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Yeah. so going back to the forts, you know, we talked about you know, a lot of it's, it's labor force is everything. The design of the Fort is actually something that is pretty cool and it's, it's pretty special about Fort Negley. Do you want to talk about the, the design of, of Fort Negley and how it took its shape?
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Yeah. So what's really incredible and for, for us living in 2019, it's kind of hard to wrap our minds around how slowly technology developed even 150 years ago. Absolutely. So it was 17th century fortification design that was being taught at West point. Okay. In the years proceeding the civil war. So James st Clair Morton, chief engineer for the army of the Cumberland was a West point graduate and learned these really medieval techniques, techniques. Yes. So but James st Claire Borton was, was a brilliant engineer and he and others recognized that artillery technology was developing and that masonry fortifications would not be able to withstand that kind of fire power. So he started leaning more towards, well, really not leaning. I mean he was a a devoted advocate of earth and fortifications, but when he got to st cloud Hill, because of the very little soil, he had no choice but to revert back to the, to the masonry fortification.
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Interesting. So Fort Negley has been called a star for it, but really it is Morton's own design. That's why you can look at star forts all around the world and you're not gonna find one that looks like Fort Negley. Right. It's because he combined a star Fort with a bastion Fort. Okay. So the bastions are those two protrusions at the front? Yes. Towers? no. So they would be these right here. Okay. And so those were inner locking chambers that allowed soldiers to keep an eye on those Southern approaches. So no one's will pike Murfreesboro. Yeah. And not be and be protected from enemy fire. The soldiers referred to those to those bastions as tunnels, but they are not subterranean. They're on the surface. So that's one of the that's one of the misconceptions that have been handed down. That there are tunnels on the property.
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There may be, but we've been all over this property. Never found a tunnel. Right. We would, if we had found a tunnel, we would be really excited about. So the, so those star points are called Dan's one of those would have held a cannon and the cannon had the ability to be pivoted 180 degrees to, to allow for overlapping fields of fire. Okay. was this like a six foot cannon? Cause I know like the different size canons mattered. Okay. So the re unfortunately the reports and the inspections that are done are, are not exactly clear. So there's one inspection that says there are 11 heavy guns. Okay. Well the definition of the heavy gun is a gun that you put in afforded vacation. Okay. So what that gun is, is questionable. You know, and, and at Fort Negley, his artillery changed over time.
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So there were, you know, field guns and mortars. The two largest guns would have been 30 pound paragons. Okay. And those would have come at least by early to mid 1864 they were contained within the case mates, which were basically bomb proofs made out of earth, wood and railroad iron those cannons, which were also present at the state Capitol and other forts around Nashville. Okay. The tube was 11 feet long and weighed about 4,200 pounds. Wow. And that could fire a 30 pound projectile about three and a half miles, not necessarily with accuracy. So they were accurate about two miles. There was a 100 pound Paragon or river. And unfortunately I, I don't know the, the weight of what that tube would have been. Gotcha. but we're talking about some pretty, pretty massive cameras. Yeah. Yeah.
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So how did the design did it seem to really hold its weight as far as battle when it was battle tested? Did it seem to do well? Yeah. And I think, I think what it, what it did so well was it was extremely intimidating. It w it was not something like, because it was complex. Well it was unlike any thing any anyone had ever seen. No one had seen anything like this. So on Kirkpatrick Hill where the city reservoir is today, there was a, a small wooden block house on Curry's Hill where Rose Park is on edge Hill Avenue. Okay. Was Fort Morton. Fort Morton was a very low profile. Earth and Fort. Yes. It blended into the landscape. And then, you know, within close proximity you have this absolutely massive Fort of wood railroad, iron, stone, earth, three levels of defense bristling with Canon. You know, it's, it's visible from downtown. It's visible from the Capitol building. There was an 80 foot flagpole in the center and they flew the, the biggest American flag they could get their hands on. So for miles around there was, there was no question about who held control of Nashville.
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Okay. So now I guess let's, let's talk about the events that led to an actual battle here in, in Nashville. You know we, we had talked about this previously we had on some people from the battle of Franklin trust and we talked about the battle of Franklin Franklin and obviously this is right before the battle of Nashville. And so, you know, what are some of the, the events that led up to a battle actually happening here in the city?
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So who had had been promising his army of Tennessee that they would return and recapture Nashville? Yes. I always think of, you know, MacArthur in his, I will return speech, you know, when he left the Philippines. So this was, this was Hood's promise, a promise that he was obviously undeterred to keep after devastating losses at Franklin. So the, the army of Tennessee leaves Franklin arrives or leaves Franklin on November 30th, arrives in Nashville on December 1st and starts digging in. Well, from the time they start digging in, the fortifications in Nashville are firing on them almost nonstop.
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Oh, yes. Four because the battle of Nashville was on the 15th and 16th. So they are being constantly bombarded. Were they losing casualties at this point? [inaudible] Yeah. And, and you know, here's a R you'll, they've just been through this horrendous battle and Franklin then they March all this way, shoeless many of them codeless where they are, they have hardly any rations to go, a lot to go around. They arrive in Nashville, a winter storm sets in with sleet and ice and freezing rain and they're told to start digging trenches. And by the way, you can't have campfires because the tenants can see you. Yeah, exactly. I mean, so you can imagine how frustrated and angry a lot of these Confederate soldiers dead. I mean, it's, it's amazing to me that, you know, when the battle actually started, they were willing to move. I think I would have been like, sorry, I'm going to go get some food.
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I can't, I can't go without food and shoes for this long. Expect me to fight. So it was, it was really miserable. And of course during that two weeks you have a general George Thomas is just amassing more and more true in Nashville and just build the Edo, strengthening their fortifications, building fortifications. There's one newspaper report in the days leading up to the battle where you have a group, civilians would go out to the entrenchments, you know, beyond Fort Negley and just want to gawk at the army. And they were snatched up handed acts as pickaxes and shovels and put to work. So you didn't, you did not want to, you did not want to look like you had nothing to do around this time. How big was the defense line for the federal army? By the battle of Nashville, it ended up being around 20 miles.
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Wow. Yeah. Unfortunately there's maybe a mile left Nashville. Yep. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And so if, if you're someone living outside of the city and you know, this battle is coming, I mean, you're pretty, you're pretty panicked. You know, you're trying to find somewhere else to go. And what normally is going to happen is you don't go far enough and the battle's going to end up finding you anyway. But for people in Nashville that two weeks leading up to the battle, the circus was in town and the actual legitimate surface actual circus and they are selling out every show, Oh my, the circus is performing on the 15th and 16th people are at the circus. So you can hear the cannon fire and the music. Exactly. So I mean really gives you an idea of how successful these fortifications were. That if you're an average civilian, you're thinking about getting your ticket to the circus.
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You're not thinking about it being interrupted by a battle. Wow. so I mean, without these fortifications, the federal army would not have been able to hold this city. And, and I think a Fort Negley in a lot of ways. Like, you know, I ate a tangible example of psychological warfare. I mean you're, you are going about your business in downtown Nashville and you can see this, you can see this massive horde on the Hill and, and you know, and in addition, you have a military governor in Andrew Johnson who is fond of reminding the civilians you join forces with Confederates coming in and out of the city because the lines were porous, you know, people were getting through and we will open up our guns on you. We want a station. Oh, yo. Yeah. So I mean it was an and really, you know, by 1863 or so, you see citizens in Nashville and the federal army kind of settling into everyday life.
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Every, yeah. I mean, they've become like, it's not 1862 anymore where they're angry that federal soldiers are in their churches. You know, it's like, you know, well, this is life. This is life. The city is protected. You know, we don't, we don't have to worry about battles taking place in downtown. You'll, there were, of course, there were always issues between the army and civilians. Like, well, they're not issuing us enough passes to get out in and out of the city or things like that. But I mean, it really, of course, after some event or something there, there would be crackdowns on civilians. You know, there were, there were a lot of smugglers and towns, so it's like, well, we broke up the smuggling ring so now we're going to crack down on civilians. But they really settled in and by that point they also had a very clear idea of how devastating this war had become.
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And they didn't want that in Nashville. I mean, people did not want a battle of Nashville to take place. They were not, I mean, I mean, even some people that had been the most ardent secessionists were like, please hood, do not try. Those. Do not endanger the city like this. Wow. How many men did hood have when the battle of Nashville actually started? He had about 30,000 and then many men were here guarding Nashville. About 55. 55,000. Okay. Yeah. And, and you know, and not only were there more men, but they were well supplied and trained and trained and fresh. You know, the battle of Nashville is the, the largest use of us colored troops. Oh wow. Okay. So that time, wow. And it's the battle of Nashville where U S colored troops really proved themselves on, on the battlefield. And you, there were you know, there were units at Fort Negley that were kept on reserve that that didn't even, didn't even get to the battle lines.
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People would have been stationed at Fort Negley during the battle of Nashville. So Fort Negley was built for a thousand men. Okay. So a thousand men within the walls. And then there would have been a soldiers camp right outside of the, the Sally port. And then down the Hill is that where adventure science centers in that area and then beyond the soldiers camp would have been the African American labor camp that stretched all the way to Franklin pike eighth Avenue. Oh, wow. That's a lot. So there were, so, there were thousands of people on this Hill. The other thing by 1864 and this is, this is completely amazing to us. There were the exchange barracks which was used to, to in process in and out process troops. But according to the reports, this was an absolutely huge, complex, huge. I mean, something like the, the dining hole served 2,500 men.
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I mean, something like that. And there is any, it is within yards of Fort Negley. Wow. There's absolutely no remnant of this absolutely huge, complex deal with barracks for theft. There's no photograph of it. Wow. It's amazing how there were thousands of people on this Hill and today the largest artifact we found is the canteen behind you. Oh, my knee. It is amazing how like that human activity has been wiped away and we're not quite sure how it goes a lot too. Like the army doesn't build things. They don't build permanent installations a lot of the time. I mean, even though Fort Negley is primarily masonry, it's a field fortification, it is not a permanent fortification. So I do wonder if they think like, wow, that's pretty amazing. That's still here. Yeah. You know, that's crazy cause cause the other forts, you know, have five major fortifications and 21 minor installations in Nashville.
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We have Fort Negley. Right. [inaudible] why do you think that is? Why do you think we still have Fort Negley and not anything else? You know, that is a good question. I think part of it is that Fort Negley was occupied by federal troops until September, 1867. At that point, anything of value, the wood, the railroad iron was stripped away and sold. The Canon were sent out West. So it was really, they really abandoned a stone skeleton on the Hill. The other forts were, there are reports that the army and citizens in Nashville began dismantling some of the other Fords before Lee surrendered at Appomattox. That is how effectively destroyed the army of Tennessee was that the civil war ended in middle Tennessee. The civil war ended for Nashville. So how many casualties was there from the battle of Nashville? So there were, on the federal side, there were about 3000 killed, missing wounded about 6,000 on the federal side. And, and plus on the Confederate side, thousands of prisoners of war. Wow.
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Okay. So with all of these casualties, was this considered the last battle in Tennessee or was there another one towards like Memphis after the battle of Nashville?
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I mean, I think this really was the, the last one. Yeah, the last major battle.
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Okay. So what would you say about Fort Negley in its role in the civil war as a whole? You know, do, I mean this is kind of hard to, to make a guest with, but do you think that without Fort Negley wood, would the civil war have looked different? I know that's, that's definitely hard to say.
(00:50:16):
I mean, I think yes, it would, it definitely would have looked different. How necessarily it would it look different. I mean, I think is there a greater possibility that Confederate forces would have had some success trying to retake the city? Yeah. Would it, would not having Fort Negley have deprived enslaved people you know, something that, something that could come to represent freedom. Yeah, I mean, I think that's where, I mean, I always say there's always been so much focus on battles, battles and leaders, right. And you know, there are, there are still historians that think, I mean, they kind of approach Fort Negley, like it materialized on December 15th and then it just disappeared after the battle of Nashville. But the story is really that, that occupation story and, you know, and as the research has come out, it's really that that story about the enslaved population.
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I mean, I think you could argue that Fort Negley meant a whole lot more to enslaved people than it did to even the soldiers stationed here. You know? I mean, because they're here doing their thing, which is, you know, a lot of boredom, a lot of boredom waiting for something to happen, waiting to be transferred till the next place. Right. You know, I mean, it was like, it was a place where soldiers came back and visited like, Oh, this is nostalgic. Look, children, this is, this is what I did during the war. But it didn't take on that meaning that it did for African-Americans. I think it also took on a lot of meaning for for Nashvillians because it, if it was a symbol of freedom for enslaved people, it was absolutely a symbol of oppression for, for Confederates. And really you'd asked earlier about, you know, how did Fort Negley survive? I mean, that is a good question. I mean, sometimes it seems like divine intervention because Nashville has tried to eliminate the sport so many times over the years. I mean, they, they have talked about a like an auditorium, a military school, a vocational school. They talked about putting the zoo here. They even talked about quarrying out st cloud Hill to fill in another quarry. You build a park there? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Every time
(00:53:34):
All of those things just seem to fall through. So was it, was Fort Negley a protected during those, those federal [inaudible]? Was it, was it protected at that point? No. it didn't it was not given national register designation until 1975, but that national rate and that national register designation at the time only covered the eight acres within the ring road that in circles Fort Negley. So that's why it did not prevent the sound stadium from being built. The agreement with adventure science center came about 10 years earlier. So so did the city of Nashville like pay to restore everything or was that federal money? How did that work? It was initially during the in 1935 when the works progress administration started restoring the Fort, that was federal money. Okay. and then the city contributed funds when they created the, the athletic park where the sound stadium was. But then in 2004, when those, when some repairs were done, the boardwalks and interpretation was added. And then when the visitor center was built, that was all city money. Okay. That's incredible. Yeah. So,
(00:55:16):
You know, obviously, you know, what we see today has, has been the, the hard work of a lot of, of people, you know, trying to make sure that this stays a place where we can discover the history of Fort Negley. What, what all is there here on the property for, for people to, to come and see and experience.
(00:55:42):
So the stone work remains on the Hill that was left untouched pretty much or did they have to rebuild that in 1935? Well, that is a good question. That is, that is one of those debates that are still going on. Unfortunately, we don't know how much of the stone remained when the WPA came in. I mean, I can take you up there and show you this stone was quarried during the civil war. This stone was quarried during the WPA. Right. but of course I can't, I no idea. Like was that was the civil war quarried stone in place when the WPA came in? Right now, some of these stones are absolutely enormous. Three feet, three feet deep. They're enormous. So, I mean it's a way, a lot, a lot. Yeah. So I mean it's, it's hard to say how much was up there.
(00:56:48):
In the mid 1990s, an expert with the national park service came in and estimated that the Fort is about 50, 50 WPA and civil war era. I do know that the stone, this is, this is, you know, this is not debated that the stone that the WPA did use was quarried from Fort Negley Hill. So it's, so, I mean, in a way that might make things a little bit harder. If they had used like Indiana limestone, then we would be able to say, Oh, well this is, this is exactly what the WPA rebuilt. Indistinguishable. Exactly. Exactly. Interesting. Yeah. So, so there's, there's the, you know, the original walls that people can explore. Obviously not to full height, but the walls are still there. What else is, is available to see up there on the Hill? So we have an interpretive panels and we have boardwalks so you can actually walk inside the Fort.
(00:57:48):
Yes. we recently completed a cultural landscape report, which will lay out and inform a new master plan that will hopefully come very soon. So that will give, hopefully give people even more to see or and do because it will reincorporate that formerly leased property back into the park and hopefully there will be some really exciting additions. Right. We also have a, a small visitor center with a 20 minute film on Fort Negley, some interactive exhibits, artifacts on display. We do a number of programs. Some of them are recurring, some of them are special events. So you guys are pretty busy here. Yeah. Yeah. So the, the national civil war round table meets here on the second Tuesday of each month at seven o'clock. The sons of union veterans camp 62 wow. Meets here every other month. On the fourth Tuesday at the business meeting as it's six.
(00:59:08):
The program is at seven. Okay. so they will meet again in January. The African American historical and genealogical society meets here on the first Saturday at nine 30, 10 o'clock. Okay. we also have a fossil programs which highlight Fort Negley. He's a geologic past. So have you guys found a lot as far as any fossils or things of significance here? Yes. So the, so when the WPA quarried the, the limestone outcroppings located just below the Western re read-alouds they revealed some really amazing coral fossils. So there are some giant coral heads that are still in place. And there are some of the, some of those are the most impressive fossils of their kind in the region. So when we decided to to have programs on fossils, we entered in a partnership with Vulcan materials company. So they actually bring us dump truck loads full of fossil rich sediment from their Corey in Western Tennessee.
(01:00:35):
So that is located beside the front porch of the visitor center and people are welcome to come and dig in that pile and take whatever they'd like from that pile. So that was our way of encouraging people to take fossils from there. And Fort Negley is fossils but, and the stone work is, is full of fossils as well. Bracket pods, cephalopods all kinds of things. Our fossil programs have become more popular than our civil war programs. This fall we had about around a thousand elementary school, kids come through field trips. Wow. That's cool. Yeah. So and those field trips are led by volunteers and they're really great programs. And a few weeks when, I guess it's been more like a few months ago, I heard a little boy say this is the best day of school ever. You know. So I mean it's always great when you hear kids that are, you know, like, okay kids time to get on the bus.
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No, it's really cool when they're not, when they're not more concerned about lunch and they don't want to leave. That's right. Yeah. Cause you guys also have reenactments. We do. So we have, we have living history events. And our big event is the, in commemoration of the battle of Nashville. So this year it will be on December 14th nine to four and we will have reenactors onsite and then we will also have a number of programs by local historians. Okay. Awesome. And if anybody would like to join our email events list they can just contact us@fortnegleyatnashville.gov.
(01:02:34):
Great. Yeah, I've been to, I think it was maybe 2016 one of the that I, I think it was that December event and it's, it's super fun. Like they are dressed and everything to the like it is, it almost looks perfect. Yeah. Yeah. So that's really cool to see. What are some of your favorite parts about Fort Negley on a personal level?
(01:03:03):
Hmm. I mean there's, I mean that's hard to pin down. I mean, I mean, I just think, I mean there's just, there are so many amazing stories. Yeah. And it is, it is such a complex story. You know, when I, when I first started here and I was leaving my other job, people said, why would you want to, why would you want to go to a civil war site? We already know everything. What else do you expect to find? And it's like, I mean, we, we haven't even scratched the surface. I mean, it's just, it's interesting discoveries every day. And just, and I'll tell you, they did not keep records the way we do. I mean it, it can be frustrating, but it can be very fascinating. And when I came here, I thought, okay, well I'm going to identify every unit stationed at Fort Negley. I thought a simple Google search, you know, that'll 11 years later, I am still trying to bomb down all of the units that were stationed here because, and because it's not a matter of just looking in, you know, regimental histories, you have to, a lot of times you have to actually come across a letter or a memoir or someone who's written about being here and then work backward from that.
(01:04:36):
So yeah.
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What do you think about the contrast of this? What a lot of people come in here, you know, these people coming into Nashville are new, they see a pit of dirt here in the middle of downtown. What do you think? It's a pretty interesting contrast with Fort Negley and the civil war Fort in a, a thriving city just right in a [inaudible] away. Yeah.
(01:05:01):
Well. Yeah, I mean it's, it's pretty amazing to think that during the time of the civil war, Fort Negley was well outside of the city limits. Oh, really? I mean, this was, this was on that miles from Capitol, from the Capitol. I, yeah. So I, and now the city goes well beyond Fort Negley and I don't know, I mean, I feel like a lot of newcomers that come in, I don't know that they necessarily notice Fort Negley. I think they're there. They've been drawn here because of the economic prosperity and everything else that Nashville has to offer. And it seems like, you know, people discover the history of a place later. I mean, most often what we hear is, I've lived here for 20 years and I've never been here. I mean, that's where we hear the most. So I think it'll be a matter of time before yeah. Some of the newcomers make their way here. Right. It seems like people who are, who are visiting from outside who were, you know, they are on a mission to track the civil war through the Western theater and they come to Fort Negley and they know exactly what it is. Right. And it is, you know, they have planned to come here. So I mean, I, and I've only, I mean I've only worked in Nashville for 11 years, but the changes I've seen, I'd like to see us preserve more history.
(01:06:45):
Yeah. Do you think that the, the more as a, you know, even not even as a visitor to a city, but you know, as a, as a resident of a city, do you think that, you know, knowing the history of your city, you know, has an important impact on the city itself?
(01:07:04):
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, Nashville has an absolutely amazing civil rights history that does not get talked about enough. No. And just this, the story of occupation, I mean, very few American cities were occupied and occupied as long as Nashville was. And it was, you know, it
(01:07:36):
If, if this makes sense, like it was a pretty successful occupation. Yeah. I mean we, it was pretty amicable considering, so I feel like we should be, we should be talking about that more. And also, and also talking about, you know, what happened after the civil war and reconstruction, right. I mean, we had, we had, we had this whole population of people largely forgotten today. Yeah. And you know, they weren't, they were uplifted by the end of the civil war, the abolition of slavery, the Freedmen's Bureau. And then within a matter of years of the end of the civil war, you have a complete takeover by former Confederates. You have black codes enforced and you, you know, in word still dealing with those ramifications. Today we're still dealing with the, the segregation and,
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You know, the,
(01:08:56):
You know, in the, the gap between the, the wealthy and the poor is growing every day. So I mean that, unfortunately, Nashville has a, has a real history of
(01:09:14):
Displacing African Americans. I mean, it happened here, you know, the, the labor camp developed into a thriving little suburb called rock town, which evolved into, you know, thriving neighborhoods. And then when the highway came through, they were scattered to the wind, you know, and, and it, it really severed that connection between the African American community and Fort Negley. I mean, this, this place that was so important to their ancestors and, you know, they're through us tweeting the names of the, the laborers on the, the labor role. People have discovered that their ancestors ugly, but that connection was severed, you know, decades ago. And trying to, trying to rebuild that and trying to convince people like Fort Negley is more than a site of oppression. It's a, it's a symbol of freedom. Yeah. Wow. Hmm.
(01:10:27):
That's, yeah. Thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm blown away. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you for the invitation. Yeah. Like I've, I've been to Fort Nagley probably a lot. We used 200 times since I've lived here. And like, I, like I'm, I'm here, like if I'm looking for a place to walk and I don't want to be downtown near people, like I come here and bring my laptop here to work, like up there like, and so like for Nagley is near and dear to me, but I've never heard these stories. And so it's, it's giving me a better appreciation of this place that's literally miles from a thriving Metro downtown.
(01:11:09):
I mean it's, that's one of the, you know, you asked me about the amazing, like you're surrounded by the city and the highway, but when you're on top of that Hill, there's a lot of peace
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And you could see all of Nashville pretty much. And it's just, it's a super unique hidden gem here in the city of Nashville. And I really hope people listening to this that you would come to Fort Negley and experience it. Yeah, absolutely. It's, it's fun to watch. When you're up there, watch all the planes go in to the, to the airport cause you can just see them off in the distance to the South and they're just flying into the airport and you could watch them for days. The sunsets here are very hard to beat. There is probably contested as one of the best sunset spots in the city for sure. Have a great view of the skyline. You can look in any direction and see a lot of, a lot of Nashville gets tough a little bit towards the East and that direction. There's a lot of Hills that way. But yeah, it's, it's a beautiful place. Thank you for all the work that you've done to help this place come along. What's, what's in the future for Fort Negley talked about the master plan a little bit, but is there any execution of that master plan in place?
(01:12:28):
Like timelines? Not, not yet, not at this point. Personally, what would I hope to see here is a, something to memorialize the sacrifices of the African Americans who worked and died here. Right. and a, a community space that Mmm. That will attract multiple generations. Right. And we'll okay. Yeah. Former connection to Fort Negley and the history.
(01:13:14):
Yeah, absolutely. Well, awesome. Well this was, this was great. Thank you again for, for coming on and thank you for the work that you've done on Fort Negley and it definitely has, has benefited a, a lot of people and, and we hope it will benefit a lot more people in the future. And thank you for all the info. This was super fun, learned a lot. So we'll, we'll definitely, definitely do this, do this again and hopefully we'll make this, we'll make this a thing for for, you know, always coming around the battle of national and talking about Fort Negley and everything would be awesome. Yeah. All right. Thank you so much.
(01:13:53):
We hope that you learned a lot about the battle of Nashville and Fort Negley. Guys, this is a hidden gem here in the city of Nashville. It's literally just South of downtown, I believe it's four miles from the Capitol. So go follow us on Instagram at X PLR dot. Nash tweet at what you learned
(01:14:12):
About the battle of Nashville and Fort Negley at X PLR, underscore Nash. And then also go watch some of our YouTube videos. We have a history video. It's called a brief history of Nashville on our YouTube channel, and you can learn about Nashville history with video, and that's a X PLR. Dot. Nash, we hope you guys learned a lot of, we love having these history segments and we hope to bring you more. And so with that, have a great weekend. We will see you
(01:15:17):
[Inaudible].