General Butler’s Proclamation to the People of the City.
Memphis papers of the 6th & 7th have been received by the Cincinnati Commercial. The most important news contained in them is that from New Orleans.
GEN. BUTLER’S PROCLAMATION.
The flowing proclamation of General Butler appears in the N. O. Delta of Saturday, May 3. It was issued on the occasion of Gen. Butler assuming control as Military Governor. The proclamation was handed to the newspaper editors with the request that it should be published. All the offices refused to print it. A guard was then sent to the True Delta office, possession taken, northern printers sent for, the document set up, put in the form, and worked off in the regular edition of the paper.
HEADQUARTERS DEP’T OF THE GULF,
NEW ORLEANS, May, 1862
The city of New Orleans and its environs, with all its interior and exterior defences, having been surrendered to the combined naval and land forces of the United States, who have come to restore order, maintain public tranquility, enforce peace and quiet under the laws and constitution of the United States, the Major General commanding the forces of the United States in the Department of the Gulf hereby makes known and proclaims the object and purposes of the government of the United States in thus taking possession of the city of New Orleans and the State of Louisiana, and the rules and regulations by which the laws of the United States will be for the present, and during a state of war, enforced and maintained, for the plain guidance of all good citizens of the United States as well as others who may heretofore have been in rebellion against their authority.
Thrice before, has the city of New Orleans been rescued from the hands of a foreign government, and still more calamitous domestic insurrection, by the money and arms of the United States. It has of late been under the military control of the rebel forces, claiming to be the peculiar friends of its citizens; and at each time, in the judgment of the commander of the military forces holding it, it has been found necessary to preserve order and maintain quiet by the administration of law martial. Even during the interim from its evacuation by the rebel soldiers and its actual possession by the soldiers of the United States, the civil authorities of the city have found it necessary to call for the intervention of an armed body known as the “European Legion” to preserve pubic tranquility. The commanding General, therefore, will cause the city to be governed until the restoration of municipal authority, and his further orders, by the law martial – a measure for which it would seem the previous recital furnishes sufficient precedents.
All persons in arms against the United States are required to surrender themselves with their arms, equipments, and munitions of war. The body known as the “European Legion” not being understood to be in arms against the United States, but organized to protect lives and property of the citizens, are invited to still cooperate with the force of the United States to that end, and, so acting, will not be included in the terms of this order, but will report to these headquarters.
All ensigns, flags, and devices, tending to uphold any authority whatever, save, the flags of the United States, and the flags of the foreign Consulates, must not be exhibited, but suppressed. The American ensign, the emblem of the United States, must be treated with the utmost deference and respect by all persons, under pain of severe punishment.
All persons well disposed towards the government of the United States, who shall renew the oath of allegiance, will receive the safeguard and protection of their persons and property of the armies of the United States, the violation of which is punishable with death.
All persons still holding allegiance to the Confederate States will be deemed rebels against the government of the United States, and regarded and treated as enemies thereof.
All foreigners not naturalized and claiming allegiance to their respective governments, and not having made oath of allegiance of to the supposed government of the Confederate States, will be protected in their persons and property as heretofore under the laws of the United States.
All persons who may heretofore have given their adherence to the supposed government of the Confederate States, or have been in their service, who shall lay down and deliver up their arms, and return to peaceful occupations, and preserve quiet and order, holding no further correspondence nor giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States, will not be disturbed in person or property, except so far, under the orders of the Commanding General as the exigencies of the public service may render necessary.
The keepers of all public property, whether State, National, or Confederate, such as collections of art, libraries, museums, as well as all public buildings, all munitions of war, and armed vessels, will at once make full returns thereof to these headquarters, all manufacturers of arms and munitions of war will report to these headquarters their kind and places of business.
All rights of property, of whatever kind, will be held inviolate, subject only to the law of the United States.
All individuals are enjoined to pursue their usual avocations, all shops and places of business and amusement are to be kept open in the usual manner, and services to be held in churches and religious houses, as in times of profound peace. Keepers of all public houses, coffee houses, and drinking saloons, are to report their names and numbers to the office of the Provost Marshal, and will there receive licenses and be held responsible for all disorders and disturbances of the peace arising in their respective places.
A sufficient force will be kept in the city to preserve order and maintain the laws.
The killing of an American soldier by any disorderly person or mob is simply assassination and murder, and not war, and will be so regarded and punished.
The owner of any house or building in or from which such murder shall be committed will be held responsible therefore, and the house be liable to be destroyed by the military authority.
All disorders and disturbances of the peace done by combination and numbers, and crimes of an aggravated nature, interfering with forces or laws of the United States, will be referred to a military court for trial and punishment. Other misdemeanors will be subject to the municipal authority, if it chooses to act. Civil causes between party and party will be referred to the ordinary tribunals.
The levy and collection of taxes, save those imposed by the laws of the United States, are suppressed, except those keeping in repair and lighting the streets, and for sanitary purposes. These are to be collected in the usual manner.
The circulation of Confederate bonds, evidences of the debt, except notes in the similitude of bank notes, issued by the Confederate States, or scrip, or any trade in the same, is strictly forbidden. It having been represented to the Commanding General by the civil authorities that these Confederate notes in the form of bank notes are, in a great measure, the only substitutes for money which the people have been allowed to have, and that great distress would ensue among the poorer classes if the circulation of such notes was suppressed, such circulation will be permitted so long as any one may be in considerate enough to receive them, till further orders.
No publications, either by newspapers, pamphlet, or handbill, giving accounts of the movements of soldiers of the United States within this department, reflecting in any way upon the United States or its officers, or tending in any way to influence the public mind against the Government of the United States, will be permitted, all articles of war news, or editorial comments, or correspondence, making comments upon the movements of the armies of the United States, or the rebels, must be submitted to the examination of an officer who will be detailed for that purpose from these headquarters.
The transmission of all communications by telegraph will be under the charge of an officer from these headquarters.
The armies of the United States came here not to destroy, but to make good, to restore order out of chaos, and the government of laws in the place of the passion of men; to this end, therefore, the efforts of all well-disposed are invited to have every species of disorder quelled and, if any soldier of the United States should so far forget his duty or his flag as to commit any outrage upon any person or property, the Commanding General requests that his name be instantly reported to the provost guard, so that he may be punished and his wrongful act redressed.
The municipal authority, so far as the police of the city and crimes are concerned, to the extent before indicated, is hereby suspended.
All assemblages of persons in the streets either by day or by night, tend to disorder and are forbidden.
The various companies composing the Fire Department in New Orleans will be permitted to retain their organizations, and are to report to the office of the Provost Marshal, so that they may be known and not interfered with in their duties.
And, finally, it may be sufficient to add, without further enumeration, that the requirements of martial law will be imposed so long as in the judgment of the United States authorities it may be necessary. And while it is the desire of these authorities to exercise this government mildly, and after the usages of the past, it must not be supposed that it will not be vigorously and firmly administered as occasion calls.
By command of Major General Butler.
GEO. B. STRONG, A. A. G., Chief of Staff.
From the Memphis avalanche, 7th
LATEST FROM NEW ORLEANS.
We have advices from New Orleans up to Saturday morning, 11 o’clock. Gen. Butler had taken the St. Charles Hotel for his headquarters, and the Evans House on Poydras St., had been converted into a hospital. The Jackson Railroad depot was taken possession of Saturday morning about 25 minutes past 11 o’clock. Federal pickets had been extended out as far as the crossing of the Jefferson and Jackson Railroads. Four gunboats and one transport started for Baton Rouge on Saturday morning at 9 o’clock. When they had gone up some sixteen miles from New Orleans, a small boat was sent ashore, and a section of telegraph wire from post to post was cut, so that the line could not be operated without putting in a new wire. Up to the time our informant left, 11 o’clock Saturday morning, only seven full federal regiments had been landed in New Orleans. The last train of cars from Jackson went down to “Kenner’s” on Sunday, and our informant states that it was understood that no train would hereafter be permitted to go down further than “Prairies,” some twenty miles from the city.
All the prisoners in our forts and on the gun boats had been paroled, except only the commander of the Louisiana, who after the forts had surrendered, cut loose the boat, set her on fire, and let her drift down the stream to a certain point, where she blew up and disappeared from mortal vision. For this act, after the surrender was made, he was sent to New York. Vast quantities of molasses, sugar, and cotton were destroyed. Only eighty bales of cotton could be found in the city, and that belonged to an Englishman, and was not destroyed. Provisions are represented as more plentiful, though flour still ranges from $25 to $30 per barrel. Al the papers in New Orleans are still published, though a Federal censor is placed over every office to examine all the matter and exclude whatever may prove inimical to the Federal cause.
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 17, 1862, p. 2
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