In April 1864, the Union garrison at Fort Pillow was comprised of almost six hundred troops, about half of them black. The Confederacy, incensed by what it saw as a crime against nature, sent its fiercest cavalry commander, Nathan Bedford Forrest, to attack the fort with about 1,500 men. The Confederates overran the fort and drove the Federals into a deadly crossfire. Only sixty-two of the U.S. black troops survived the fight unwounded. Many accused the Confederates of massacring the black troops after the fort fell and fighting should have ceased. The Fort Pillow Massacre became a Union rallying cry and cemented resolve to see the war through to its conclusion.