Volunteer Generals Butler and Dix end their Civil War military service

Benjamin Franklin Butler of Massachusetts and John Adams Dix of New York were both appointed as major-generals of volunteers on May 16, 1861 and became aggressive "political" generals. Both resigned on the same day. Butler's interpretation of escaped slaves as enemy "contraband" and his occupation of New Orleans and Dix's heavy hand in Maryland and his famous threat to shoot any man seeking to haul down the national flag made them reviled across the South. Later, Butler became a leading congressman and Dix governor of New York. (By John Osborne)