Court Carney's Reckoning with the Devil grapples with the troubled, complex legacy of Nathan Bedford Forrest a slave trader, Confederate general, and prominent Klansman. More than a century after his death, Forrest's image continues to resonate with certain groups and bear varied interpretations, reflecting the intricate interplay of history, memory, and a contested past. Carney explores how historical omissions and erasures continually reshape perceptions of Forrest as well as the Civil War. Central to Forrest's narrative is his involvement in the slave trade, a key to his ascent in the southern social hierarchy. Carney traces Forrest's trajectory from a prosperous slave trader in Memphis to a politician and eventual military leader in the Confederacy during the Civil War. Forrest's postwar years reveal his struggle to rebuild his life, leading him to engage in various economic ventures and eventually join the Ku Klux Klan. Carney argues that the slave trade, the Fort Pillow massacre, and his Klan affiliation were the fundamental elements shaping Forrest's image. Those elements, although steeped in racism and white supremacy, were marked by an ambiguity and malleability that allowed Forrest to attract admirers as well as detractors as his image was memorialized in postwar white southern culture. Carney covers distinct phases of Forrest's memorialization, from the unveiling of statues in Memphis in 1905 to his representation in literature and media and the controversies surrounding his monuments in the 2010s. That history culminates with the removal of the Memphis statue in 2017, reflecting the evolving societal perspectives on symbols tied to racism. Forrest's significance lies in his capacity to encompass conflicting narratives hero and villain, rebel and patriot. Carney contends that understanding Forrest's legacy is essential for comprehending the intricacies of the southern past and its enduring impact on American society. By exploring the fluidity of Forrest's image, Carney's work illuminates the nuanced interplay of history, memory, and the ongoing struggle to reckon with a tumultuous past.
Court Carney is professor of history at Stephen F. Austin State University. He is the author of Cuttin' Up: How Early Jazz Got America's Ear and coeditor of The Politics and Power of Bob Dylan's Live Performances: Play a Song for Me.
Carney has written an urgent and compelling book that traces the life and legacy of Nathan Bedford Forrest across two centuries. Considering the reality, romanticization, and reckoning with equal care and craft, Carney draws out one of the South's and nation's most infamous ghosts and demonstrates how he continues to haunt our politics and culture. Through deep research and insightful analysis, Reckoning with the Devil considers Forrest in his moment, our moment, and every moment in between. - Charles L. Hughes, author of Country Soul: Making Music and Making Race in the American South and Why Bushwick Bill Matters ""While Nathan Bedford Forrest has never commanded as much attention as Robert E. Lee or Stonewall Jackson, he has persisted since the Civil War as an iconic figure of white southern resistance. Carney's book expertly traces the movement of Forrest's image through popular culture, in books, advertisements, monuments, ceremonies, and the screen, from his own lifetime to the present, paying particular attention to transformative moments like the Progressive Era, the Southern Agrarian movement, the Shelby-Foote-and-Ken-Burns-fueled resurgence of interest in Forrest in the later twentieth century, and the recent endeavors to remove his memorials, up through the rise of the new right-wing paramilitaries in our own times, providing insight into the changing role of racism within white southern identity over time."" - Elaine Frantz Parsons, author of Ku-Klux: The Birth of the Klan during Reconstruction ""In his wonderfully creative work, Carney interprets Forrest as resilient, pragmatic, fluid, and, most of all, ambiguous in every part of his life. The former slave trader, Confederate hero, arch-villain of the Fort Pillow massacre, and Klansman could (and did) represent practically any element of the Civil War memorial landscape: autodidactic military genius, violent racist, self-made millionaire, and unreconstructed rebel."" - John David Smith, author of An Old Creed for the New South: Proslavery Ideology and Historiography, 1865-1918
