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Doc. 1.-the Fort Pillow massacre.

April 13, 1864. The Joint Committee on the Conduct and Expenditures of the War, to whom was referred the Resolution of Congress instructing them to investigate the late Massacre at Fort Pillow, designated two members of the Committee--Messrs. Wade and Gooch--to proceed forthwith to such places as they might deem necessary, and take testimony. That Sub-Committee having discharged that duty, returned to this city, and submitted to the Joint Committee a Report, with accompanying papers and testimony. The Report was read and adopted by the Committee, whose Chairman was instructed to submit the same, with the testimony, to the Senate, and Mr. Gooch to the House, and ask that the same be printed.

Messrs. Wade and Gooch, the sub-committee appointed by the Joint Committee on the Conduct and Expenditures of the War, with instructions to proceed to such points as they might deem necessary for the purpose of taking testimony in regard to the massacre at Fort Pillow, submitted the following report to the Joint Committee, together with the accompanying testimony and papers:

In obedience to the instruction of this Joint Committee adopted on the eighteenth ultimo, your Committee left Washington on the morning of the nineteenth, taking with them the stenographer of this Committee, and proceeded to Cairo and Mound City, Illinois; Columbus, Kentucky; and Fort Pillow and Memphis, Tennessee; at each of which places they proceeded to take testimony.

Although your Committee were instructed to inquire only in reference to the attack, capture, and massacre of Fort Pillow, they have deemed it proper to take some testimony in reference to the operations of Forrest and his command immediately preceding and subsequent to that horrible transaction. It will appear, from the testimony thus taken, that the atrocities committed at Fort Pillow were not the result of passions excited by the heat of conflict, but were the results of a policy deliberately decided upon and unhesitatingly announced. Even if the uncertainty of the fate of those officers and men belonging to colored regiments who have heretofore been taken prisoners by the rebels has failed to convince the authorities of our Government of this fact, the testimony herewith submitted must convince even the most skeptical that it is the intention of the rebel authorities not to recognize the officers and men of our colored regiments as entitled to the treatment accorded by all civilized nations to prisoners of war. The declarations of Forrest and his officers, both before and after the capture of Fort Pillow, as testified to by such of our men as have escaped after being taken by him; the threats contained in the various demands for surrender made at Paducah, Columbus, and other places; the renewal of the massacre the morning after the capture of Fort Pillow; the statements made by the rebel officers to the officers of our gunboats who received the few survivors at Fort Pillow--all this proves most conclusively the policy they have determined to adopt.

The first operation of any importance was the attack upon Union City, Tennessee, by a portion of Forrest's command. The attack was made on the twenty-fourth of March. The post was occupied by a force of about five hundred men, under Colonel Hawkins, of the Seventh Tennessee Union cavalry. The attacking force was superior in numbers, but was repulsed several times by our forces. For the particulars of the attack, and the circumstances attending the surrender, your Committee would refer to the testimony herewith submitted. They would state, however, that it would appear from the testimony that the surrender was opposed by nearly if not quite all the officers of Colonel Hawkins's command. Your Committee think that the circumstances connected with the surrender are such that they demand the most searching investigation by the military authorities, as, at the time of the surrender, but one man on our side had been injured.

On the twenty-fifth of March, the enemy, under the rebel Generals Forrest, Buford, Harris, and Thompson, estimated at over six thousand men, made an attack on Paducah, Kentucky, which post was occupied by Colonel S. G. Hicks, Fortieth Illinois regiment, with six hundred and fifty-five men. Our forces retired into Fort Anderson, and there made their stand — assisted by some gunboats belonging to the command of


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N. B. Forrest (4)
D. W. Gooch (3)
B. F. Wade (2)
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Albert P. Thompson (1)
S. G. Hicks (1)
Thomas H. Harris (1)
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