As of 2026, there is essentially one major public statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest that remains in Tennessee: a large equestrian statue in Columbia, Tennessee , which was relocated from Memphis and now sits at an antebellum mansion owned by a private group that plans to reconstruct and display it as a Confederate memorial. By contrast, most of the once-prominent Forrest monuments in public spaces across Tennessee have been removed or relocated.

Quick answer

  • Standing public statues in Tennessee: ~1 (the Columbia equestrian statue).
  • Busts/monuments in government spaces: The Nathan Bedford Forrest bust that was in the Tennessee State Capitol was voted to be relocated to the Tennessee State Museum in 2021 and is no longer displayed in the capitol.
  • Other Forrest memorials: Many Forrest plaques, road names, and park references remain, but the big public statues and gravesite memorials in cities like Memphis and Nashville have been removed or moved.

What has been removed or relocated

Nashville equestrian statue (1998–2021)

  • A large, widely ridiculed equestrian statue of Forrest stood along Interstate 65 in Nashville from 1998 until December 2021.
  • It was removed after more than 20 years of controversy and protests, so it does not remain in Tennessee as a public monument.

Memphis statues and gravesite markers

  • In 2017, two Confederate statues in Memphis—one of Forrest and one of Jefferson Davis—were removed from their prominent park locations.
  • Forrest’s remains, originally interred in a Memphis park, were removed in 2021 and moved to a Confederate museum outside Tennessee, and associated gravesite memorials were dismantled or relocated.

State Capitol bust

  • A bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest hung in the Tennessee State Capitol for decades.
  • In March 2021, the Tennessee Historical Commission voted to relocate it (along with busts of two Union admirals) to the Tennessee State Museum, and it is no longer on display in the capitol.

What remains in Tennessee

Columbia equestrian statue

  • The most prominent Forrest statue still physically in Tennessee is the large on‑horse statue that was moved from Memphis and is now at an antebellum mansion in Columbia, Tennessee.
  • Local reporting indicates that the statue, graves, and associated memorial elements are being (or plan to be) reconstructed and displayed as part of a private Confederate memorial site.
  • This is effectively the only remaining major public-facing statue of Forrest in Tennessee, though it is on private property rather than in a city park or government building.

Other Forrest-related symbols

  • According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Tennessee is home to more than 100 Confederate symbols , including about 47 monuments, more than 40 highways or roads, and several parks—not all of them specifically to Forrest, but many named for Confederate leaders generally.
  • Some roads, plaques, and small markers that mention Forrest or link to his legacy likely still exist, but these are not the large statues or monument complexes that people usually think of when asking about “statues and memorials.”

Why the count is low now

The number of visible Forrest statues in Tennessee has dropped sharply because:

  • Public pressure and legal changes allowed cities and the state to remove or relocate monuments that had become symbols of racial oppression.
  • High-profile controversies (Nashville statue, Memphis gravesite, State Capitol bust) led to the removal or relocation of the most prominent Forrest monuments.
  • Surviving Forrest memorials are now mostly in private or semi-private settings, like the Columbia mansion site, rather than in public parks or government buildings.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.