A usually tolerate and understanding President Abraham Lincoln on Monday, January 2, 1865 gruffly informed a group of Kentucky citizens who asked to have controversial General Benjamin Butler transferred to their state, “You howled when Butler went to New Orleans. Others howled when he was removed from that command. Somebody has been howling ever since at his assignment to military command. How long will it be before you, who are howling for his assignment to rule Kentucky, will be howling to me to remove him?” After years of supporting Benjamin Butler for purely political reasons, the president apparently had enough of Butler’s command failures. Within a week, he would direct Ulysses Grant to relieve Butler, bringing to an end the often controversial general’s Civil War service.
00000174-b11b-ddc3-a1fc-bfdbb1a20000The Schreiner University Department of History is honoring the sesquicentennial of the American Civil War with a series of short vignettes focusing on events from 1861 through 1865. The Civil War was the most destructive conflict in American history, but it was also one of our most defining moments as a people and as a nation. Let us know what you think about "This Week in the Civil War." E-mail your comments to Dr. John Huddleston at jhuddles@schreiner.edu.Airs: Weekdays at 5:19 a.m., 8:19 a.m., 4:19 p.m. on KTXI and 4:49 a.m., 9:29 p.m. on KSTX.