GENERAL NATHAN B. FORREST.
The Life of General Nathan Bedford Forrest. By John Allan Wyeth, M.D. (Harper and Brothers. $4.)—In this Life of one of the most remarkable cavalry leaders on the Confederate side in the American.Civil War we have the work of a genuine enthusiast, Dr. Wyeth served for two years in a regiment of Alabama cavalry which had formerly served under Forrest, and, as he tells us, was "impressed by the enthusiastic devotion to him of these veterans who had followed his banner from the first year of the war." Ile undertook the Life, and his method was to collect personal reminiscences from "every surviving officer or soldier of his command" whose address he could obtain. So the book is largely a collection of extracts from letters, generally from obscure corre- spondents. The method has its faults, for the narrative is apt to be confused, but in return it provides many interesting personal recollections. Forrest was a blacksmith's son, born, of course, in a log-cabin ; he made a great fortune in commerce ; held high command in the War ; and then, like so many of those heroic, unconventional soldiers on both sides, returned quietly to his old life. The book deals with the least interesting part of the War, the guerilla fighting in Tennessee from Fort Donelson onwards, and it reveals the amateurishness of much of that desperate and sanguinary contest. But Forrest stands out as a figure in a thousand, a born leader of men, fierce, hot-tempered, extraordinarily energetic, but also kindly and faithful. Dr. Wyeth's great merit is his enthusiasm, which redeems even his very great faults of style. He calls a right hand a "right upper extremity," and there is a great deal of tawdry rhetoric in the book.
Previous page
