George Foster Shepley

George Foster Shepley (January 1, 1819 – July 20, 1878) was an American attorney and Union General. During the Civil War he became the acting mayor of New Orleans in 1862, the military governor of Louisiana from 1862 until 1864 and the military governor of Richmond in 1865. After the war he was nominated as United States circuit judge of the United States Circuit Courts for the First Circuit.

Early life George Foster Shepley was born on January 1, 1819, in Saco, District of Maine, then part of the Massachusetts Commonwealth. Shepley graduated from Dartmouth College in 1837 and read law at Harvard with his father Senator Ethel Shepley. He began his private law practice in Bangor, Maine, from 1839 to 1844 and later in Portland, Maine from 1844 to 1861. He married Lucy Ann Hayes in 1844 with whom he had five children. After her death, he married Helen Merrill in 1872.

After leaving Louisiana, Shepley was assigned to the District of Eastern Virginia as chief of staff of XXV Corps, in the Army of the James.