Description:

Benjamin Butler
various, ca. 1862-1872
Benjamin Butler Multi Signed Large Archive Supporting Disabled Civil War Veterans
Archive

[CIVIL WAR.] Archive of materials related to the National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, 1862-1872. 17 documents + 4 lithographs of Benjamin F. Butler, each with facsimile signatures; 31 pp. Expected folds and general toning; a few minor edge tears; overall, very good.

This small archive chronicles some of the day-to-day operations of the National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in the years immediately after the Civil War. Massachusetts Major General and future Governor Benjamin F. Butler served as the first president of the Board of Directors from 1866 to 1879. The archive includes three documents signed by Benjamin F. Butler and several more issued under his authority; it also includes four lithograph portraits of Butler and a biographical sketch published during the war.

The National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers (1865-1930) was a facility to provide care for volunteer soldiers who had been disabled through loss of limb, wounds, disease, or injury during service in the Union forces in the Civil War. In March 1865, Congress passed and President Abraham Lincoln signed legislation establishing the National Asylum. The first facilities were in Togus, Maine (1866), Dayton, Ohio (1867), and Milwaukee, Wisconsin (1866). Congress later approved facilities in Hampton, Virginia (1870), Leavenworth, Kansas (1884), Santa Monica, California (1884), Marion, Indiana (1888), Danville, Illinois (1898), Johnson City, Tennessee (1903), and Hot Springs, South Dakota (1907). General Benjamin Butler served as the first president of the Board of Managers from 1866 to 1879. Congress changed the name of the institution to the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in 1873 and loosened eligibility requirements in 1884 to allow any disabled veterans to apply, whether they were disabled during the Civil War or not. In 1930, the Veterans Bureau, the Bureau of Pensions, and the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers were consolidated into the Veterans Administration.

Contents
• Printed biographical sketch of Benjamin F. Butler from Evert A. Duyckinck, ed., National Portrait Gallery of Eminent Americans, 2 vols, New York: Johnson, Fry & Company, 1862. 2:423-426 (lacks 427). 4 pp.
• Benjamin F. Butler, Signed Order for the purchase of postage stamps from the Lowell Post Office, January 21, 1867, Lowell, Massachusetts, 2 pp.
• E. B. Wolcott, Signed Check for $20,000 to H. H. Camp, Cashier of the First National Bank of Milwaukee, to charge to the account of Benjamin F. Butler, January 13, 1868, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 2 pp.
• Account of National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers to New York State Soldiers Home for October and November 1868 for $6,211.20 for outdoor relief, with receipt, December 12, 1868. 1 p.
• Account of National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, to William H. Wiegel for $150 for salary as commandant of the soldiers' home at Rochester New York for January 1869, with receipt, February 2, 1869. 1 p.
• Bill from Wm. Cameron & Co., publishers of Nashville Daily and Weekly Union, to Benjamin F. Butler for advertising the National Military Asylum, February 12, 1869, Nashville, Tennessee. 2 pp.
• William H. Wiegel, Signed Check for $100 to William Wakenshaw, February 26, 1869, Newark, New Jersey. 1 p.
• Account of National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, to D. C. G. Field for $93.45 for travel to Washington for "arranging the accounts of the General Treasurer," March 1, 1869, Lowell, Massachusetts, with receipt. 1 p.
• Account of National Asylum for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, to Louis Leo for $10 for outdoor relief for April 1869, with receipt, April 2, 1869. 1 p.
• William C. Capelle, Autograph Letter Signed, to B. D. Whitney, April 9, 1869, Boston, Massachusetts, on Office of Surgeon General of Massachusetts letterhead. 1 p.
• Bill from Proprietors of the Press to Benjamin F. Butler for advertising, July 26, 1869, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 2 pp.
• Benjamin F. Butler, Signed Railroad Pass for James L. King from Washington, DC, to Baltimore, September 8, 186[9?]. 1 p.
• Account of Charges to Benjamin F. Butler for Asylum to the Western Union Telegraph Company, November 1869, New York, New York. 1 p.
• Benjamin F. Butler, Signed Railroad Pass for Frederic Klier from Washington, DC, to Columbus, Ohio, January 6, 1870. 1 p.
• George J. Carney, Copy of Letter to J. B. Thomas, December 27, 1870, Lowell, Massachusetts. 2 pp.
• Pitkin & Co., Receipt to Benjamin F. Butler of $20,00 for clothing shipped to asylum, April 6, 1871, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 1 p.
• E. F. Brown, Copy of Letter to Benjamin F. Butler, April 21, 1871, Dayton, Ohio, on National Asylum letterhead, 2 pp.
• James K. Morgan, Western Union telegram, to William Woodward, January 18, 1872, New York, New York. 1 p.

Benjamin F. Butler (1818-1893) was born in New Hampshire but moved to Massachusetts with his family as a child. He graduated from Colby College in 1838 and was admitted to the bar in Massachusetts in 1840. In 1844, he married Sarah Hildreth, with whom he had four children. In 1852, he won election to the Massachusetts legislature as a Democrat and in 1858 to the state senate. He narrowly lost a campaign for governor in 1859. He began the Civil War as a brigadier general of Massachusetts troops and occupied the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis and prevented secessionists from leading Maryland into the Confederacy. He soon received an appointment as major general of volunteers and was sent to secure Fort Monroe at the mouth of the James River and was placed in charge of the Department of Virginia. While at Fort Monroe, he initiated the policy of not returning fugitive slaves who escaped to Union lines, considering them contraband of war. In May 1862, he commanded the army force that helped capture New Orleans. As military governor of New Orleans, Butler was a controversial figure, earning the nickname "Beast Butler."

President Lincoln recalled Butler in December 1862, and in November 1863 gave Butler command of the Department of Virginia and North Carolina. In May 1864, the forces under Butler's command became the Army of the James. As Ulysses S. Grant led the attack on Confederate forces from the north, he ordered Butler to attack from the east. Butler's hesitation allowed Confederates to box his Army of the James in at Bermuda Hundred, but it later participated in the siege of Petersburg. Butler's mismanagement of the expedition against Fort Fisher, North Carolina, allowed Grant to relieve him of command in January 1865, although Butler had become a popular Radical Republican. After the Civil War, Butler represented Massachusetts in Congress from 1867 to 1875 and 1877 to 1879. With support from the Democratic and Greenback parties, Butler won election as governor of Massachusetts in 1882 and served from 1883 to 1884. In the latter year, he ran for President of the United States as the candidate of the Greenback and Anti-Monopoly parties but was unsuccessful in gaining the Democratic nomination.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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