Benjamin Franklin Butler

Benjamin Franklin Butler was a Massachusetts lawyer and politician who became a Union major general during the American Civil War. He commanded Fort Monroe early in the conflict and developed the “contraband” policy that treated enslaved people escaping to Union lines as property of war rather than returning them to Confederate claimants. In 1862 he took command in New Orleans after the city’s capture by Union forces.

Butler’s administration of New Orleans was forceful and controversial. Measures intended to impose order, including General Order No. 28, made him notorious in the Confederacy, while his occupation policies also intersected with emancipation and wartime federal authority. After the war he served repeatedly in the United States House of Representatives and was governor of Massachusetts in 1883.

In Frank Yerby’s Captain Rebel, Butler is a real historical presence behind the Union occupation of New Orleans and the pressures facing Confederate blockade runner Tyler Meredith. His inclusion anchors the maritime adventure to the city’s documented wartime administration.