Jesse Anderson Forrest (April 9, 1834 – December 15, 1889) was an American slave trader, Confederate cavalry colonel, livery stable owner, and cotton plantation owner of Tennessee and Arkansas, United States.
Biography
Before the war, the Forrest brothers were engaged in the slave trade at Memphis and up and down the Mississippi River.[1][2] Jesse Forrest fought alongside his brother Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest in the American Civil War,[3] as well as under command of other Confederates such as Gideon J. Pillow.[4] He enlisted as a private in the Tennessee Mounted Rifles and was a lieutenant colonel by 1862.[5] News reports during and after the war describe him as a colonel; the Confederate Officers' Card Index lists his highest rank as lieutenant colonel.[6] He was listed as colonel commanding the 21st Tennessee Cavalry Regiment when he was injured in a fight near Decatur in 1864.[7] After the war he worked as an "extensive levee and railroad contractor, farmer, and dealer in livestock."[5] A father of six, in later life he owned three large plantations at Walnut Bend, Arkansas.[8] He died of "malarial hemaeturia" in Memphis, Tennessee in 1889.[9]
References
- ^ "Entry for J E Forrest and Sarah Forrest, 1860". United States Census, 1860 – via FamilySearch.
Occupation: Negro Trader
- ^ Huebner, Timothy S. (March 2023). "Taking Profits, Making Myths: The Slave Trading Career of Nathan Bedford Forrest". Civil War History. 69 (1): 42–75. doi:10.1353/cwh.2023.0009. ISSN 1533-6271. S2CID 256599213. Project MUSE 879775.
- ^ "Jesse Forrest". Memphis Avalanche. 1889-12-20. p. 1. Retrieved 2023-12-19.
- ^ "Memphis". Memphis Bulletin. 1863-08-04. p. 1. Retrieved 2023-12-19.
- ^ a b "Col. Jesse A. Forrest". The Intelligencer. 1889-12-26. p. 2. Retrieved 2023-12-19.
- ^ "Entry for Jesse Anderson Forrest". United States Confederate Officers Card Index, 1861–1865 – via FamilySearch.
- ^ Confederate military history. Vol. 8. Atlanta, Ga.: Confederate Publishing Co. 1899. p. 244. Retrieved 2023-12-19 – via HathiTrust.
- ^ "Col. Jesse A. Forrest". Nashville Banner. 1889-12-17. p. 4. Retrieved 2023-12-19.
- ^ "Entry for Jessie A Forrest, 15 Dec 1889". Tennessee, Shelby County, Memphis, Board of Health Death Records, 1848–1913 – via FamilySearch.