Tuesday, October 3, 2017

Major-General Benjamin F. Butler to Brigadier General John W. Phelps, May 23, 1862

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF,
New Orleans, May 23, 1862.
Brigadier-General PHELPS,
Commanding Camp Parapet:

GENERAL: You will cause all unemployed persons, black and white, to be excluded from your lines.

You will not permit either black or white persons to pass your lines, not officers or soldiers or belonging to the Navy of the United States, without a pass from these headquarters, except they are brought in under guard as captured persons with information; these to be examined and detained as prisoners of war if they have been in arms against the United States or dismissed and sent away at once, as the case may be. This does not apply to boats passing up the river without landing within lines.

Provision dealers and market men are to be allowed to pass in with provisions and their wares, but not to remain overnight. Persons having had their permanent residence within your lines before the occupation of our troops are not to be considered unemployed persons.

Your officers have reported a large number of servants. Every officer so reported employing servants will have the allowance for servants deducted from his pay roll.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,
BENJ. F. BUTLER,
Major-General, Commanding.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 15 (Serial No. 21), p. 443-4

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