Fort Negley, on St. Cloud Hill, was the largest inland Union Army fortification built during the Civil War, and its earthworks are one of Nashville's most morally complex historic sites. After Union forces captured Nashville in February 1862, they fortified the city against Confederate counterattack. Fort Negley, on St. Cloud Hill south of downtown, was the centerpiece of that defensive system.
The fort was built largely by enslaved and recently freed Black people — an estimated 2,700 African Americans, some impressed against their will, others volunteering for freedom, constructed the earthworks under brutal conditions and with high mortality. The fort held: Nashville never fell again, and in December 1864, Union forces launched the Battle of Nashville from nearby positions, destroying the Confederate Army of Tennessee. The fort then fell into ruin and was lost under vegetation for decades.
Archaeological work and restoration in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries uncovered and stabilized the earthworks. The site is now a city park with interpretive exhibits that take seriously the story of the men who built it and were never adequately recognized.