Everything about Benjamin Franklin Butler Politician totally explained
Benjamin Franklin Butler (
November 5 1818 –
January 11,
1893) was an American
lawyer and
politician who represented
Massachusetts in the
United States House of Representatives and later served as
governor. During the
American Civil War, his administration of occupied
New Orleans, his policies regarding
slaves as "
contrabands", his ineffectual leadership in the
Bermuda Hundred Campaign, and the fiasco of
Fort Fisher rank him as one of the most controversial "
political generals" of the war. He was widely reviled for years after the war by Southern whites, who gave him the nickname "Beast Butler".
Early life
Butler was born in
Deerfield, New Hampshire, the son of Captain John Butler, who served under
Andrew Jackson in the
War of 1812 (during the
Battle of New Orleans). He was named after
Founding Father Benjamin Franklin. After the death of his father, his mother operated a boarding house in
Lowell, Massachusetts. He attended Waterville College (now
Colby College) in
Maine and graduated in 1838. He was admitted to the
Massachusetts bar in 1840, began practice at Lowell, and soon attained distinction as a lawyer, particularly in criminal cases. He married
Sarah Hildreth, a stage actress and daughter of Dr.
Israel Hildreth of Lowell, in 1842. Their daughter, Blanche, eventually married
Adelbert Ames, a Mississippi senator who had served in the
U.S. Army during the Civil War.
Entering politics as a
Democrat, Butler first attracted general attention by his vigorous campaign in Lowell advocating the passage of a law establishing a ten-hour day for
laborers. He was a member of the
Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1853, and of the
Massachusetts Senate in 1859, and was a delegate to the
Democratic National Conventions from 1848 to 1860. In the
convention of 1860 at
Charleston, South Carolina, he advocated the nomination of
Jefferson Davis (voting for him on the first fifty-seven ballots) and opposed
Stephen A. Douglas, and in the ensuing campaign he supported
John C. Breckinridge. His military career prior to the Civil War began with him as a third lieutenant in the Massachusetts Militia in 1839; he was promoted to
brigadier general of the militia in 1855. These ranks were closely associated with his political positions and Butler received little practical military experience to prepare him for the coming conflict.
Civil War
Governor
John A. Andrew sent Butler with a force of Massachusetts troops to reopen communication between the
Union states and
Washington, D.C. A major railroad connection from the Northeast passed through
Baltimore and immediately after the start of the war it was unclear whether
Maryland would stay in the Union. Butler arrived with the 8th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment by steamer at
Annapolis on
April 20 1861. He employed his expert negotiation skills with the
Governor of Maryland and, by
April 22, his regiment had disembarked and was put to work repairing damaged railroad tracks around Baltimore. At the same time, the 7th New York Infantry arrived and Butler assumed command of the entire force; his military career would be characterized by his eagerness to assume authority in the absence of official instructions. While Butler remained at Annapolis, the New Yorkers were the first Union troops to march into Washington following
President Lincoln's initial call for volunteers. On
May 13, Butler's remaining force occupied Baltimore without opposition. Lincoln appointed him one of the first
Major Generals of U.S. Volunteers, ranking from
May 16 1861. (Also on that day, appointments were given to
John A. Dix and
Nathaniel P. Banks. Both appeared on the promotion order before Butler, making him the third highest ranking major general of volunteers.)
Assigned command of
Fort Monroe in
Virginia, Butler declined to return to their owners
fugitive slaves who had come within his lines, on the grounds that, as laborers for fortifications, and so on, they were
contraband of war, thereby justifying granting these slaves a relative freedom, in spite of the
Fugitive Slave Law. The U.S. Congress later
mandated that other Union commanders refuse to return slaves to their erstwhile masters. In the conduct of
tactical operations, Butler was almost uniformly unsuccessful, and his first action at
Big Bethel, Virginia, was a humiliating defeat for the
Union Army. He was also head of the
Department of Virginia.
Later, in 1861, Butler commanded an expeditionary force that, in conjunction with the
United States Navy, took
Forts Hatteras and Clark in
North Carolina. In May 1862, he commanded the force that occupied
New Orleans after it was captured by the Navy. In the administration of that city he showed great firmness and severity. New Orleans was unusually healthy and orderly during the Butler regime. Many of his acts, however, gave great offense, such as the seizure of $800,000 that had been deposited in the office of the
Dutch consul and his imprisonment of the French
Champagne magnate
Charles Heidsieck. Most notorious was
Butler's General Order No. 28 of
May 15, issued after some provocation, that if any woman should insult or show contempt for any officer or soldier of the
United States, she'll be regarded and shall be held liable to be treated as a "woman of the town plying her avocation", for example, a
prostitute. This order provoked protests both in the
North and the
South, and also abroad, particularly in
England and
France, and it was doubtless the cause of his removal from command of the
Department of the Gulf on
December 17 1862. He was nicknamed "Beast Butler," and "Spoons," for his alleged habit of pilfering the silverware of Southern homes in which he stayed.
On
June 7 he'd executed one
William B. Mumford, who had torn down a
United States flag placed by
Admiral Farragut on the
United States Mint in New Orleans; for this execution, he was denounced (December 1862) by
Confederate President Jefferson Davis in General Order 111 as a
felon deserving
capital punishment, who if captured should be reserved for execution.
In November 1863, Butler commanded the
Department of Virginia and North Carolina, and, in May 1864, the forces under his command were designated the
Army of the James. He was ordered to attack in the direction of
Petersburg from the east, destroying the rail links supplying
Richmond and distracting
Robert E. Lee, in conjunction with attacks from the north by
Ulysses S. Grant. Grant had little use for Butler's military skills, but Butler had strong political connections that kept him in positions beyond his competence. Rather than striking immediately at Petersburg as ordered, Butler's offensive bogged down east of Richmond in the area called the
Bermuda Hundred, immobilized by the greatly inferior force of
Confederate General
P.G.T. Beauregard, and he was unable to accomplish any of his assigned objectives. But it was his mismanagement of the expedition against
Fort Fisher,
North Carolina, that finally led to his recall by General Grant in December. He resigned his commission on
November 30 1865.
Postbellum political career
Butler was a
Republican Member of the
U.S. House of Representatives from 1867 to 1875 and again in 1877 to 1879. Despite his pre-war allegiance as a Democrat, in Congress he was conspicuous as a
Radical Republican in
Reconstruction legislation, and wrote the 1871
Ku Klux Klan Act. Along with Republican Senator
Charles Sumner, he proposed the
Civil Rights Act of 1875, a seminal and far-reaching law banning racial discrimination in public accommodations. The law was declared unconstitutional, and racial minorities in the United States would have to wait nearly a century before the
Civil Rights Act of 1964 would revive, and expand, the provisions of the law Butler backed.
Butler was one of the managers selected by the
House to conduct the unsuccessful trial of
impeachment, before the
Senate, of President
Johnson, opening the case and taking the most prominent part.
He exercised a marked influence over
President Grant and was regarded as his spokesman in the House. He was one of the foremost advocates of the payment in
greenbacks of the
government bonds. During his time in the House, he served as chairman of the
Committee on Revision of the Laws in the 42nd Congress and the
Committee on the Judiciary in the 43rd Congress.
In 1872, Butler was among the several high-profile investors who were deceived by
Philip Arnold in a famous
diamond and gemstone hoax.
Butler ran unsuccessfully for governor of Massachusetts as an independent in 1878, and also, in 1879, when he ran on the
Democratic and
Greenback tickets, but, in 1882, he was elected by the Democrats, who won no other state offices. From 1883 to 1884, he was
Governor of Massachusetts. As presidential nominee of the
Greenback and
Anti-Monopoly parties, he polled 175,370 votes in the
presidential election of 1884. He had bitterly opposed the nomination by the Democratic party of
Grover Cleveland and tried to defeat him by throwing his own votes in Massachusetts and
New York to the Republican candidate,
James G. Blaine.
Butler's income as a lawyer was estimated at $100,000 per year shortly before his death. He was an able but erratic administrator, and a brilliant lawyer. As a politician, he excited bitter opposition, and was charged, apparently with justice, with corruption and venality in conniving at, and sharing, the profits of illicit trade with the Confederates carried on by his brother at New Orleans and by his brother-in-law in the Department of Virginia and North Carolina, while General Butler was in command.
Butler died while attending court in
Washington, D.C.. He is buried in his wife's family plot in Hildreth Cemetery,
Lowell, Massachusetts. His descendants include the famous scientist
Adelbert Ames, Jr., suffragist and artist Blanche Ames Ames,
Butler Ames, and
George Plimpton.
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