Benjamnin F. Butler, Butler's Book: Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences of Major-General Benjamin Butler

There were many other questions in regard to my action examined into by the Committee on the Conduct of the War on the occasion referred to, but as my explanations can be found at any time in the official reports of my evidence, there seems to be no necessity for further referring to them here, especially as they form no part of the reasons for which I was removed.

That I had refused the vice-presidency, and that I had refused the secretaryship of war was known to General Grant.

The fact that at a meeting at the Fifth Avenue Hotel which was represented to him as having been gotten up by my friends for that very purpose, I had been nominated for the presidency, was impressed upon General Grant's mind by officers of his staff, as showing that I was thereafterwards a positive rival. Nothing could have been farther from the truth. But still it had an effect upon his mind, and from that hour until after he was President no kindly word of friendship ever passed from his lips to my ear.

Lest I should do something to my credit, he did not mean that I should go with the expedition to Fort Fisher, and when, not knowing how his mind lay, I persuaded him to let me go, he was glad to take advantage of the fact that that expedition, although not under my charge, was not a success, for the foundation of my removal from command, which he requested within a few days after my return from that expedition.

I know the pressure that was brought upon him to induce his action, and the people who made it I do not forget or forgive. But I do forgive him, because he was misled and deceived. As it was, he alleged against me, as his reason for my removal, nothing except what I had done or left undone as a commander of the army or department. After my removal, to justify Grant's action, his advisers caused to be instituted a very searching and cruelly conducted investigation into the acts of my subordinate officers in the department, especially into those of General Shepley,--afterwards Mr. Justice Shepley of the United States Circuit Court, First Circuit, a most honest and high-minded gentleman, who had the administration of affairs in Norfolk, and afterwards those of the military district, including the vicinage around Norfolk, Fortress Monroe, and Yorktown, which were claimed to have been very improperly administered,--and into the action of my provost marshal of the