[1] The medal was commissioned by Major General Benjamin Butler and was intended to recognize meritorious or heroic acts of bravery performed by African American soldiers at the Battle of Chaffin's Farm and New Market Heights.

[1] In May 1865, and later that year, the Butler Medal was presented to nearly two hundred African American Union soldiers.

The Butler Medal was solid silver, suspended from a red, white, and blue ribbon meant to be worn around the neck.

The front of the medal depicts African American troops moving forward in battle, below an inscription in Latin which reads, Ferro iis libertas perveniet: "Freedom Will be Theirs by the Sword."

[2] The obverse of the medal has a curved inscription that says, in capital letters: DISTINGUISHED FOR COURAGEAfter the war, Butler said the following about the medal: I had the fullest reports made to me of the acts of individual bravery of colored men on that occasion, and I had done for the negro soldiers, by my own order, what the government has never done for its white soldiers – I had a medal struck of like size, weight, quality, fabrication, and intrinsic value with those which Queen Victoria gave with her own hand to her distinguished private soldiers of the Crimea...