Butcher (nickname)

Butcher or The Butcher is used as an epithet or nickname for several people and fictional characters:

People known by the epithet

• Butcher of Amritsar: Reginald Dyer (1864–1927), British Indian Army officer responsible for the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar
• Butcher of Ankara: Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
• Butcher of Baghdad: Saddam Hussein (1937–2006), President of Iraq until deposed in 2003
• Butcher of the Balkans (disambiguation), several people
• Butcher of Balochistan and Butcher of Bengal: Tikka Khan (1915–2002), Pakistan Army four-star general and first Chief of Staff
• Butcher of Bangui: Jean-Bédel Bokassa (1921-1996), Central African politician, military officer, and Emperor of the Central African Empire
• Butcher of Bega: Graeme Stephen Reeves (born 1949), Australian deregistered gynecologist and obstetrician
• Butcher of Beijing: Li Peng (李鹏; 1928–2019) top level Chinese Communist Party official known for supporting the use of violence against the Tiananmen Square Protests
• Butcher of Beirut: Ariel Sharon (1928–2014), Israeli Prime Minister and general
• Butcher of Beslan: Shamil Basayev (1965–2006), Chechen militant Islamist and rebel leader
• Butcher of Bosnia:
  • Ratko Mladić (1943–2026), Bosnian Serb former general and Chief of Staff of the Army of Republika Srpska
  • Radovan Karadžić (born 1945), Bosnian Serb former politician and President of Republika Srpska
• Butcher of Brentwood: O.J. Simpson (1947-2024), American football player, actor, media personality, and accused murderer
• Butcher of Bucha: Azatbek Omurbekov (born 1983), Russian military officer
• Butcher of Budapest: Yuri Andropov (1914-1984), Chairman of the KGB, and leader of the Soviet Union
• Butcher of La Cabaña: Che Guevara (1928–1967), Argentine Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, guerrilla leader, diplomat and military theorist
• Butcher of Cesena: Antipope Clement VII (1342–1394)
• Butcher of Chechnya:
  • Vladimir Putin, President of Russia
  • Vladimir Shamanov, Russian politician, senior commander of the Ground Forces during the First Chechen War
• Butcher of Congo: King Leopold II of Belgium
• Bucther of Damascus: Bashar al-Assad (born 1965), President of Syria until deposed in 2024
• Butcher of Drogheda: Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658), Commonwealth military and political leader
• Butcher of Eastern Visayas: Jovito Palparan (born 1950), Filipino fugitive, politician and former army general
• Butcher of England: John Tiptoft, 1st Earl of Worcester (1427-1470), English nobleman
• Butcher of Gaza: Benjamin Netanyahu (born 1949), Prime Minister of Israel
• Butcher of Genoa: Friedrich Engel (1909–2006)
• Butcher of Hama: Rifaat al-Assad (1937-2026), Syrian military officer and politician
• Butcher of Hanover: Fritz Haarmann (1879–1925), German serial killer
• Butcher of Kentucky: Stephen G. Burbridge (1831–1894), Union major general during the American Civil War
• Butcher of Khan Younis: Yahya Sinwar (1962–2024), chairman and leader of Hamas
• Butcher of Kurdistan: Ali Hassan al-Majid (1941–2010), Iraqi Defense Minister, Interior Minister, military commander and chief of the Iraqi Intelligence Service, better known as "Chemical Ali"
• Butcher of Lyon: Klaus Barbie (1913–1991), World War II SS-Hauptsturmführer and Gestapo member
• Butcher of Mirpur: Abdul Quader Molla (1948–2013), Bangladeshi Islamist leader and politician
• Butcher of Plainfield: Ed Gein (1906–1984), American murderer and graverobber
• Butcher of Prague: Reinhard Heydrich (1904–1942), German World War II Nazi official and one of the main architects of the Holocaust
• Butcher of Rangoon: Sein Lwin (1923–2004), Burmese brigadier general and briefly President of Myanmar (Burma)
• Butcher of Riga: Eduard Roschmann (1908–1977), Austrian SS officer and commandant of the Riga ghetto during 1943
• Butcher of Rostov: Andrei Chikatilo (1936–1994), Soviet serial killer
• Butcher of Samar: Littleton Waller (1856–1926), US Marine Corps officer
• Butcher of the Somme: Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (1861–1928), British First World War field marshal
• Butcher of the Syria: Aleksandr Dvornikov (born 1961), Russian army general
• Butcher of Uganda: Idi Amin (c. 1925–2003), President of Uganda and major general
• Butcher of Warsaw:
  • Josef Albert Meisinger (1899–1947), German SS officer
  • Heinz Reinefarth (1903–1979), German SS officer
• The Butcher Brothers, alter-egos of American film directors Mitchell Altieri and Phil Flores

People with the nickname

• Imre Arakas, Estonian criminal known as "The Butcher"
• Prince William, Duke of Cumberland (1721–1765), son of King George II of Great Britain and general known to his political enemies as "Butcher" Cumberland
• John Ronald Brown (1922–2010), American surgeon convicted of second-degree murder after operating without a license
• Edward Cummiskey (died 1976), New York City mobster known as "The Butcher"
• Robert Hansen (died 2014), an American serial killer, nicknamed the Butcher Baker
• Sir Arthur Harris, 1st Baronet (1892–1984), Marshal of the Royal Air Force during the Second World War
• Lisandro Martínez (born 1998), Argentine footballer, "The Butcher" or "Butcher of Amsterdam" when playing for Ajax Amsterdam
• Andrew Mrotek (born 1983), "the Butcher", American drummer for the band The Academy Is...
• William Poole (1821–1855), leader of the New York City gang the Bowery Boys, bare-knuckle boxer, and a leader of the Know Nothing political movement, known as "Bill the Butcher"
• Ivan Serov (1905–1990), Soviet intelligence officer and first chairman of the KGB, called "The Butcher" by British media.
• Archie Skym (1906–1970), Welsh rugby union footballer
• Valeriano Weyler, 1st Duke of Rubí (1838–1930), Spanish general and Governor General of the Philippines and Cuba
• Andoni Goikoetxea (born 1956), Spanish footballer, "The Butcher of Bilbao"
• Pompey, nicknamed adulescentulus carnifex (Latin, 'Teenage Butcher'), Roman general and statesman

Wrestlers with the ring name

• The Butcher (Brutus Beefcake, born 1957), ring name of professional wrestler Edward Leslie
• Abdullah the Butcher, ring name of professional wrestler Larry Shreve (born 1941)
• "Butcher", a ring name of former professional wrestler Paul Vachon (1938-2024)
• The Butcher, ring name of professional wrestler Andy Williams (1977-2026)
• Necro Butcher, ring name of American professional wrestler Dylan Keith Summers (born 1973)

Fictional characters

• Butcher of Arlav: Biff Simpson (Hunters)
• Butcher of Bakersfield: Benjamin "Ben" Richards (The Running Man)
• Butcher of Blaviken: Geralt of Rivia (The Witcher)
• Butcher of Bogon: Ratchet (Ratchet & Clank)
• Butcher of Skull Moon: The Doctor (Doctor Who)
• Butcher of Stilwater: The Protagonist/The Boss/"Playa" (Saints Row)
• Butcher of Torfan: Commander Shepard (Mass Effect)
• Butcher of White Orchard: Geralt of Rivia (The Witcher)
• The Butcher (American Horror Story), from the TV series American Horror Story: Roanoke
• The Butcher, a monster in the video game Silent Hill: Origins
• The Butcher, a physical embodiment of "rage" that powers the Red Lantern Corps in the DC Comics universe