Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life

This is a hybrid event. In person, $10 per person fee, no charge for MHS Members, EBT Cardholders, or virtual guests. The in-person reception starts at 5:30 and the program will begin at 6:00.

Benjamin Franklin Butler was one of the most important and controversial military and political leaders of the Civil War and Reconstruction eras. Elizabeth D. 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 fugitives from enslavement as the nation advanced toward emancipation. Leonard also highlights how Butler’s limited understanding of racism and the horrors of enslavement transformed over time, leading him into a postwar role as one of the nation’s foremost advocates for Black freedom and civil rights, and a notable opponent of white supremacy and neo-Confederate resurgence.

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