Park
Fort Negley Park
Star-shaped Civil War stone fort built by forced Black labor, now a hilltop park with skyline views.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Fort Negley Park in Nashville follows the nearly three thousand Black Nashvillians, enslaved and free, forced to build the Union's largest inland stone fortress in eighteen sixty-two. It tracks the money the army spent, the wages it promised, and how few laborers ever saw payment. You will hear about the punishing conditions on the hilltop and the toll construction took on the people who raised its walls. Best heard standing at the limestone wall itself, where the stone was quarried and set by hand.
This audio guide was created using AI.