Following the Union occupation of Donaldsonville beginning in 1862, Federal forces constructed Fort Butler on the west bank of the Mississippi River as part of their broader military strategy to control Louisiana's river parishes. The fort's establishment represented an important Union foothold in the region during the Civil War.
On June 28, 1863, Confederate forces launched an attack against Fort Butler in an attempt to dislodge the Union garrison. The engagement marked a significant moment in American military history, as it was one of the first occasions when free blacks and fugitive slaves fought as soldiers on behalf of the Union cause.
The Union garrison successfully defended Fort Butler against the Confederate assault. This successful defense demonstrated the military capability of African American soldiers early in their formal participation in the war and contributed to the broader Union effort to maintain control of strategic positions along the Mississippi River. The fort's historical importance was later recognized when it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
Union ~25; Confederate ~261
Content adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in the US, drawing on NRHP records, battlefield archives, census history and geological data to tell the full story of a place.