Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life

Civil War America

by Elizabeth D. Leonard

Benjamin Franklin Butler was one of the most important and controversial military and political leaders of the Civil War and Reconstruction eras. Remembered most often for his uncompromising administration of the Federal occupation of New Orleans during the war, Butler reemerges in this lively narrative as a man whose journey took him from childhood destitution to wealth and profound influence in state and national halls of power. Prize-winning biographer Elizabeth Leonard chronicles Butler's successful career in the law defending the rights of the Lowell Mill girls and other workers, his achievements as one of Abraham Lincoln's premier civilian generals, and his role in developing wartime policy in support of slavery's fugitives as the nation advanced toward emanciaption. Leonard also highlights Butler's personal and political evolution, revealing how his limited understanding of racism and the horrors of slavery transformed over time, leading him into a postwar role as one of the nation's foremost advocates for Black freedom and civil rights, and one of its notable opponents of white supremacy and neo-Confederate resurgence.

Butler himself claimed he was "always with the underdog in the fight." Leonard's nuanced portrait will help readers assess such claims, peeling away generations of previous assumptions and characterizations to provide a definitive life of a consequential man.

Genres: Civil War, Biography, History, American Civil War, American History

384 pages, Hardcover

First published April 19, 2022

Reviews

[Sean Chick · Rating 2 out of 5]

Andrew Jackson once said “I was born for the storm, and a calm does not suit me.” The same could have been said by one of Jackson’s admirers, Benjamin Butler. He was accused throughout his career of rank opportunism, incompetence, graft, and skullduggery. He was also seen as a champion of blacks, women, and most of all the working class. He changed the course of the Civil War by accepting escaped slaves while also overseeing a number of embarrassing defeats. His was a riotous life in war and politics, that spanned the fading of the Jacksonian era and the dawn of the progressive one. No wonder he has more biographies than your average general in blue or gray. I also once saw a historian in New Orleans give Butler a ringing endorsement for his stand against treason (I will always chuckle at the memory as a picture of George Washington on the Confederate seal was behind him) only to field angry questions, one man saying his presentation was an attempt to “put lipstick on a pig.” Ah Butler! It seems only you can make a Civil War question and answer session turn into a fiasco.

The latest outing is Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life by Elizabeth D. Leonard. This is a book firmly in the progressive tradition. As a caveat, I am not. I view history as at best cyclical and at worst a flat circle, putting me more in line with Polybius and Frederick Nietzsche than John Dewey. I state this as it colors how one will view this book. It also will be colored by how one views Butler. Leonard though might be the most positive. She even comments on Butler’s “supposed lack of physical beauty.” I thought the one thing everyone agrees on about Butler is that he was among the ugliest generals of the war.

Leonard’s concentration is on Butler’s views and political actions in favor of blacks, women, and the working class in general. These graft easily upon the “holy trinity” of race, gender, and class, the first two being more favored in current scholarship. In this regard, the book is best as cataloguing Butler’s transforming views on race, from neutrality on the slavery issue to one of the last radical holdouts. This led him to leave first the Democrats then the Republicans. I appreciate that Leonard did not shy away from describing how Republicans abandoned black voters, including Ulysses S. Grant. There is also nuance in how Butler proceeded on the slavery issue during the war and Leonard highlights that. If this had been a short book on that subject or a journal article I would give it high marks. Alas, this is not the case.

The Butler of Leonard’s pen is a simple man. True he can be arrogant, selfish, and morally flexible; Butler was hardly a champion of Chinese immigrants for instance. Yet, the book is laudatory. Discussions of Butler’s less savory aspects are either not discussed in much detail or brushed aside. These include corruption, overstepping legality, and the outrageous lies Butler spun throughout his career. One could say these were common vices then and now, but not everyone subscribed to them, and in each case Butler was considered special. In 1864 he even tried to replace Abraham Lincoln (who Butler thought was an imbecile) on the ticket, a point Leonard does not comment on. Leonard would say that Butler’s foibles are only better known because he had powerful enemies. There is truth in that, but Butler’s own words and actions underlined the point, and made him a trapped man. His aggressive use of the pen and political tricks made him friends and enemies, then and now. His wit was acidic, which drew unlikely admiration from Confederate general Richard Taylor, who was also a master of insult.

The weakest point is the discussion of Butler’s military career. Leonard is best here describing his administration of New Orleans and his views on race, although of the former some of the less savory aspects are not given enough due. It is in discussing campaigns and battles that Leonard utterly fails. The Bermuda Hundred campaign was a turning point for Butler. Before that he was admired in the North for his hard war policies. That admiration disappeared after he lost at Drewry’s Bluff. Leonard though does not even mention the battle. For her confusing narrative she did not consult Glenn Robertson and Herbert Schiller, who wrote the definitive works on Bermuda Hundred. Butler’s role in the battle of Petersburg, where he bungled on June 16-17, is not even mentioned.

The errors in the text start to pile up. She attributes Lincoln wanting to replace Grant with Butler in 1863 to Grant’s drunkenness. In reality it was because Grant was surprised at Shiloh and his first Vicksburg offensive was a failure. At the same time Leonard ascribes the victories at Iuka and Corinth to Grant, when William Rosecrans was the commander at each. When Butler survives the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, she fails to mention that it was a committee filled Butler’s political allies and meant less to make sure the war was well fought and more to advance radical Republican interests. Butler could have committed murder in front of an audience and survived, as Jefferson C. Davis did, who was shielded by his political allies. The personal research on Butler’s family is solid, and we get a healthy dose of Sarah Butler, his witty wife, in the text. On military matters the book though is poorly researched. Of the period of 1864-1865, it is useless.

The worst part though is not the shoddy discussion of military matters, but rather the progressive bias which leads to biased language. Butler’s opponents are often treated in the worst possible light. Sometimes “moderate” is placed in scare quotes to describe Republican opponents. Indeed, Butler’s enemies are often described as white, wealthy, racist, and conservative. Were they all that way? Some worried that Butler in power would over step. That was no idle fear. He was part of a scheme to impeach Andrew Johnson no matter what. Regardless of the feelings about Johnson, the impeachment process was troubling and Butler casually circulated defamatory lies. The execution of William Mumford was troubling from a constitutional and legal standpoint. Here it is presented as just what a traitorous gambler deserved. More concerning, during the war and then before the Supreme Court, Butler argued for expansive military powers in a time of crisis. The court decided civilian courts should handle things when possible. Leonard loves to comment on how Butler was ahead of the game on women’s rights, but what about him being ahead of the game on the Patriot Act? Cannot do that though, as it is a more uncomfortable question. Even more uncomfortable is how could such a man of the people lose reelection as governor of Massachusetts and then be laughed off in his 1884 presidential run? Is it all just the actions of white, wealthy, conservatives? That question is also not answered.

Consider also that in describing Ebenezer Hoar, Leonard has to point out his opposition to Johnson’s impeachment and black rights and calls his attempt to block Butler’s election to Congress as “hijinks.” Hoar though settled the Alabama claims and was a founder of the Free Soil Party. Also his “hijinks” worked. I am not saying Hoar was a great man, but he is not a two-bit villain. Furthermore, Leonard in the same pages calls Frederick Douglass “the great man.” Was he? An accomplished orator and activist certainly, but Alexander and Alfred he was not. Indeed, one could argue there were abolitionists of greater importance than Douglass.

The last issue is the prose. The sentences sometimes verge on run on territory. Leonard too often quotes others historians for their views. The book does not flow or sing. One could do worse. There are number of flawed and poorly written Confederate biographies I have suffered through, published by minor presses and espousing at best a diet Lost Cause interpretation. Leonard’s work here is at least better than something by Michael R. Bradley but not by too much.

Perhaps worst, Leonard has made Butler a dull cipher for a contemporary progressive worldview, a forerunner to the radicals of today. That argument is solid. Butler is in that tradition. Yet, how will this book age if that worldview were to fall? Her quotation of a run on sentence by Ibram X. Kendi already dates the book. This tale is one of Butler as a hero in a Manichean struggle, the tragedy of life absent outside of the failure to live up to current social views. As such, the book is boring and divorced from the fire and fury that was Benjamin Butler.

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

A much needed reassessment of one of the Civil War's most controversial figures, this biography fills a gap in the period's historiography. The author cites many sources that have been overlooked or ignored by previous historians. We are left with a fair and balanced view of one of the North's most abused personalities. I found the narrative to be very engaging and lively. A worthy effort.

[John Yingling · Rating 5 out of 5]

I looked forward to reading this book and wasn't disappointed in the least. Finally, we have a balanced look at Benjamin Butler's life, instead of having to read the usual "Beast Butler" or "Spoons" derogatory names he has been saddled with. Instead I read about his stable marriage and his family life, and his political life that has its ups and downs, with a fair amount of successes. The author doesn't shy away from his military failures, but balances this out with his many successes. He was a superior administrator, and was beloved by most of the soldiers who served under him, especially the African-American troops. The most impressive aspect of his life, to my thinking, was his championing of black soldiers in particular, but also for African-Americans in general. He championed their cause as American citizens, deserving of all the rights and privileges they were entitled to. An excellent book, and a very personal look at a man deserving of respect for what he did as a soldier, politician and citizen.

[CASPER HILEMAN · Rating 5 out of 5]

Benjamin Butler was the most maddening, cantankerous, disagreeable Union General and anti-slavery advocate in the Civil War. Eventually breaking away from both the Republican and Democratic parties when he felt they betrayed the principles of equality. "the true touchstone of civil liberty is not that all men are equal but that every man has the right to be the equal of every other man—if he can."

[Becky Loader · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was not familiar with Butler's life outside the Civil War until I read this book. His life was very full with being a lawyer and a politician, as well as a military man. The author is not only a good writer, but also an excellent researcher and scholar. The bibliography cites original sources and extensive verification of information.

[Stan Prager · Rating 4 out of 5]

Those who have heard of Benjamin Butler tend to remember him principally by the pejorative sobriquets dipped in venom attached to him by Confederate military and civilian leaders during the American Civil War: “Beast,” an epithet earned when as military governor of occupied New Orleans he issued an order equating all the fine southern ladies in the city with prostitutes, following certain episodes that saw them dumping chamber pots out of windows upon passing Union soldiers; and, “Spoons,” assigned based upon a more than passing suspicion that while establishing order he was also regularly lining his pockets. But he was actually an individual of far greater significance than implied by the unfortunate monikers meant to mock him. A Zelig-like figure—or perhaps a craftier Forrest Gump—Butler pops up everywhere, not only during the Civil War where he made a name for himself (for both good and for ill), but on the eve of secession, during Reconstruction, and in the decades that followed. And he was funny-looking too— a dead ringer for Dennis Franz as Detective Andy Sipowicz on NYPD Blue—making him an ideal target for the outlandish political cartoons that ruled his day. Thus, there exists in the historical record a Butler of legend that is mostly caricature, as well as a more nuanced portrait of a complex, fascinating, and by all means flamboyant character who carved a deep groove on his era, for better and for worse. Larger-than-life is an often-overused cliché, but it suits Butler perfectly.
That life gets a detailed scholarly treatment in Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life [2022], by award-winning historian Elizabeth D. Leonard, a meticulously researched, well-written, if sometimes tedious chronicle that is long on the laudatory and too often a bit blurry when tracking her subject’s many trails of malfeasance. Leonard, a professor at Colby College, Butler’s alma mater when it was known as Waterville College, found inspiration for this work in an article written by her late mentor, Colby’s Civil War historian Harold B. Raymond. Her book explores Butler’s public life without neglecting his private one, a welcome approach for the reader who looks to biography to go beyond dates and deeds to establish a sense of greater intimacy with the protagonist.
Benjamin Franklin Butler (1818-1893) was born in New Hampshire, but as a boy moved with his family to Lowell, Massachusetts, where his mother ran a boarding house for workers at the local textile mills. After Waterville, he became a lawyer and took cases in turn representing the mills, where he also invested, as well as their beleaguered employees. He seems to have developed genuine empathy and affection for these workers, especially the young girls, who labored fourteen hours a day in often brutal conditions, and he became a spirited advocate for “ten hour day” legislation. A pro-slavery, pro-southern “doughface” Democrat who supported first Jefferson Davis and then John C. Breckinridge in the election that put Lincoln in the White House, secession transformed him into a Major General who occupied Baltimore and helped keep Maryland in the Union. Next he went to Fort Monroe in Virginia and demonstrated in the bungled Battle of Big Bethel the lack of military prowess that was to define him on the battlefield throughout much of the war. At the same time, he distinguished himself by devising a clever legal loophole that declared the enslaved who fled to federal lines “contraband of war” who would not be returned to the rebels, a landmark policy later adopted by the Lincoln Administration.
Next up was his stint in New Orleans, which began when he had a civilian tried and executed for tearing down a United States flag. But despite the contempt he provoked in the subject population, he also effected a humane administration that saved many from starvation and disease, and he formed the very first African American regiment in the US Army, the 1st Louisiana Native Guard. That Jefferson Davis loudly called for his execution if captured only added to his popularity back home. Still, in concert with his felonious brother, he confiscated cotton and resold it for personal profit, just one of many financial irregularities that followed his military career. Glaring examples of corruption led to his being replaced in New Orleans, but as one of Lincoln’s “political generals” who abandoned the Democrats and was reborn as a leading Radical Republican, he was reshuffled rather than cashiered, eventually ending up in Norfolk, Virginia in command of what became the Army of the James. Here he famously created multiple regiments comprised of former rebel prisoners of war who became known as “Galvanized Yankees,” while also allegedly enabling illicit trade between northern merchants and the Confederacy. Yet, in 1864, Grant gave him critical responsibility for a planned attack on strategic Petersburg, but Butler dropped the ball entirely and his army ended up out of action, bottled up at Bermuda Hundred. He then botched an attempt to take Fort Fisher, which not long after fell almost effortlessly to Adelbert Ames, his future son-in-law. Finally, Grant and Lincoln had enough of him.
After the war, he embarked on a career in Congress that soon had him managing the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson, which failed for a variety of reasons, not least his own mediocre performance. He championed civil rights, women’s suffrage, and the working poor, but managed to drift through a variety of ideologies, alliances, and parties that saw him develop his own peculiar brand of politics known as “Butlerism,” and led to a single term as a populist Democratic Governor of Massachusetts, followed by a landslide defeat in his bid for the presidency as nominee of the Greenback and Anti-Monopoly parties. Near the end of his life, he published a one thousand page autobiography—Butler’s Book—that revels in his self-importance, and sits on the shelves of my home library. Through it all, he amassed vast wealth and proved to be ingenious, opportunistic, stubborn, difficult, ego-driven, ambitious—and so chameleon-like that many wondered if he was less given to populism than demagoguery. For all his passions on various sides of various issues, in the end the question was whether Benjamin Franklin Butler actually fervently believed in anything other than Benjamin Franklin Butler.
I first encountered Butler back in 2014, when I had a key role in a grant-funded project to digitize the recently rediscovered letters, diaries, and memoirs of the 31st Massachusetts Volunteers, the regiment Butler commanded in New Orleans, materials now available on the web for public access. This motivated me to read up on him, in a number of sources. Some biographers might claim that much of the calumnies charged against Butler were grievance-driven slanders manufactured by proponents of the “Lost Cause” to magnify minor peccadillos in an enduring retaliation for his insults to the honor of southern women and his eagerness in putting African Americans in uniform. Leonard seems to take that position, as well, acknowledging, for example, the financial improprieties that clung to Butler’s tenure in New Orleans, but laying all the blame on Butler’s brother. But the more one reads about Butler, who was hardly naïve and indeed quite shrewd, the more difficult it is to accept that he was some kind of innocent bystander to corruption—or that his shifting allegiances to ideas and principles were always sincere.
Ever the opportunist, Butler did however seem to muster up honest sympathy for the downtrodden, even if he often only put it to best use when there was a mutual benefit for him. Leonard may have missed an opportunity to focus more deeply on Butler’s paternalistic relationship with the Lowell mill girls he sought to shield from overly harsh conditions, since this seems to have left a truly lasting impression. Those who have read Robert Caro may find similar echoes in young Lyndon Johnson’s defining moment as schoolteacher to poverty-stricken Mexican-American children. Both men deeply felt those respective sufferings, and both carried that with them ever after. And each, a century apart, became ardent defenders of black Americans in their struggle for civil rights.
As noted earlier, Leonard dwells a good deal upon the private sphere of Butler’s life, which was marked by a long and happy marriage blessed with several children, and by all indications he was a loving father and an attentive family man. But sometimes the author goes overboard: throughout the book, too many paragraphs are plagued with excerpts from correspondence given to insignificant chatter about quotidian happenings that add nothing to the narrative. There are even multiple references to Butler’s gratitude for the homemade sausages his sister sends him! This stands in stark underscore to Leonard’s coverage of Butler’s part in Johnson’s impeachment, which the astonished reader will find amounts to all of three paragraphs. Moreover, whenever Butler stumbles, as he did mightily in this episode, or seems to be caught with his hand in the cookie jar, as occurred more than once, Leonard takes him at his word and ever gives him the benefit of the doubt, which frequently equates to a superficial treatment of negative incidents that then give way to longer looks at his accomplishments. It should be noted, though, that Leonard is a careful historian who does report dissenting views, even if the latter sometimes seem to have been tacked on begrudgingly.
Still, this tendency towards the all-too-forgiving only serves to dial the volume down on Butler’s so-called “noisy, fearless” life, in which he cast himself as both hero and scoundrel. To varnish away the villain only dulls the outsize impact of his legacy. As it turns out, this book is not quite a hagiography, but it does suffer from a lack of balance that consistently celebrates Butler while rarely finding fault. And that’s a shame, because Butler, warts and all, was a colorful, intriguing character made far more compelling by his manifest blemishes. But for more on that, the reader will have to turn elsewhere.


Letters, diaries, and memoirs of the 31st Massachusetts Volunteers are here: https://31massinf.wordpress.com/


Review of: Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life, by Elizabeth D. Leonard – Regarp Book Blog https://regarp.com/2024/06/20/review-...

[noreast_bookreviewsnh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Benjamin Franklin Butler by Elizabeth Leonard
.
.
Benjamin Butler; lawyer, politician, military general, businessman and advocate for the downtrodden people of America. The author takes a well deserved second look at the story of this controversial Union General of the Civil War and convincingly lays forth the case that history has not given him a fair shake and deserves much better. Butler is most remembered by nicknames such as “Beast Butler” or “Spoons” and is still today wrongly remembered by falsehoods that are propped up by the confederate “Lost Cause” myth. While maybe not the greatest military leader during the civil war, Butler had many strong attributes that offset that disadvantage. He was a first rate administrator and organizer who quite possibly guided President Lincoln and his cabinet on the path of emancipation for the slaves with Butlers “contraband of war” policy in the early stages of the war. He was a consistent advocate for black equality and actively promoted the use and formation of the US colored troops. He would go on to play a large role in the reconstruction era as a civil rights advocate and a voice for the less fortunate. Butler represented Massachusetts in congress multiple terms, was Governor of Massachusetts, nominee for President and an extremely successful businessman. Being well ahead of his time Butler advocated for women’s right and introduced an early amendment for their right to vote(which failed and would take another 50 years or so) and worked hand in hand with the likes of Susan B Anthony and Victoria Woodhull. Certainly a complex man with ever evolving opinions and beliefs that put him on the right side of history in one of the most tumultuous times in American history. Ben Butler wasn’t afraid to fight for what he thought was right and did not care who he upset or offended in the process. A very enjoyable read and would highly recommend!
.
.
“The true touchstone of civil liberty is not that all men are equal but that every man has the right to be the equal of every other man-if he can” -Benjamin Butler
.
.
#bookstagram #benjaminbutler #union #army #massachusetts #lowell #lowellma #unionarmy #majorgeneral #reader

[David Kent · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exceptionally well-researched and written biography of one of the Civil War's most maligned Union generals. Elizabeth Leonard won a Lincoln Prize for her earlier biography of Joseph Holt, and this book on Benjamin Butler was a finalist for the Lincoln Prize as well. She teases out the complexities of a man previously defined mostly by Lost Cause apologists and finds a man with highly recognized administrative general skills (less so, military skills) who was a champion of the rights of working class men and women both before and after the war. After the success of the African American men who served with him during the war, he shifted from at best ambivalent beliefs about slavery to a champion of African American rights during a time when the Republican party was abandoning them in favor of reconciliation between whites. Leonard has written a stellar biography that would behoove all of us to read given the parallels in today's society.

David J. Kent
Author, Lincoln: The Fire of Genius
President, Lincoln Group of DC

[Tyler Wolanin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought that this was a fairly brisk and comprehensive biography of a much-maligned Civil War/Reconstruction figure, whom I initially became interested in through readings in Massachusetts political history (possibly the only person sent here nowadays by the Martin Lomasney recommendation).
Not being a dad, I don't have a comprehensive enough grasp of Civil War history to adjudicate the historical and historiographic questions raised, but the author does bring in historians for citations on both sides of most contentious issues, the contemporary criticisms and subsequent rumors surrounding Butler's conduct and successes and failures. Sometimes I wish that the historiography were concentrated (or at least recapitulated) instead of being addressed as issues are raised in the narrative, but that's alright. It all got the job done, is the bottom line.

[Gerry · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the politician and general’s whole life, his military career being covered in three of the eight chapters. The major learning point will be about his dedication to the welfare of the common and frequently downtrodden man, whether factory worker or slave, regardless of gender. His supposed misdeeds (“Spoons) are only lightly covered, if at all; but the text does not read like a whitewash. Overall, an educational read.

[John Foley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is very well researched and the author’s viewpoint is very interesting.

My complaint is with the author’s style, which consists of long paragraphs, consisting of one long, comma-filled sentence after another with little relief.
. I find this book very dry and difficult to read. It seems like a textbook with no humor or interesting sidelights, to lighten the heaviness of the subject matter.

[Brandon Keselyak · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great narrative of the life of the often misunderstood Benjamin Butler. While a flawed man, his seemingly genuine change of character during the American Civil War represents how much one person can change when exposed to new information and cultures. His political goals the following years represent some of the best that 19th century had to offer, in comparison to his peers of his course.

[Haley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of research went into this book. I learned a lot about the military career of Benjamin Franklin Butler and other facts about him. The author did extensive research. A great informative read!

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

[l robin s · Rating 4 out of 5]

She beat me to it

[Idril Celebrindal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure any other politician has embodied the actual ideal of America, like it or not, as much as Butler did.