Hun-Hut: Hunt through Hutchinson

See below for annotated biographies of American abolitionists and anti-slavery activists. Source: Scribner’s Dictionary of American Biography.


HUNT, Freeman (March 21, 1804-March 2, 1858), publisher and editor, Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 5, Pt. 1, p.

HUNT, FREEMAN (March 21, 1804-March 2, 1858), publisher and editor, born in Quincy, Massachusetts, was a descendant of Enoch Hunt of Bucks County, England, who came to America and settled in Weymouth, Massachusetts, some time before 1652, and the youngest child of Nathan and Mary (Turner) Hunt. His father, a ship-builder by trade, died when Freeman was three years old. He was only twelve when he left home for Boston to become an office boy for the Boston Evening Gazette. After learning the printer's trade, he entered the employ of the American Traveller, afterward called the Boston Daily Traveller. Somewhat later the editor, in tracing the source of some commendable anonymous contributions, found to his surprise that they were written by his young workman, Hunt thereafter, the lad's worth received recognition by rapid advancement. In 1828, however, he decided to go into the publishing business with John Putnam, and under the firm name of Putnam & Hunt they continued the publication of the Juvenile Miscellany, edited by Lydia Maria Child [q.v.]. The firm also furthered the candidacy of Jackson by publishing a newspaper, the Jackson Republican, a sheet which did not long survive; it issued the first woman's magazine of any consequence in the United States, the Ladies Magazine, begun in January 1828; and in 1830 published American Anecdotes in two volumes, prepared by Hunt. The partnership with Putnam dissolved, Hunt for the next few years was associated with various ventures: the Penny Magazine; the establishment in New York of a short-lived weekly newspaper, the New York Traveller; and the Boston Bewick Company, composed of authors, artists, printers, and booksellers united for the purpose of cooperative publishing, whose magazine, the American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge, Hunt for a time edited. Later, in New York, Freeman Hunt & Company brought out, among other books, Letters about the Hudson River and Its Vicinity (1836), which went through at least three editions.

Thus far in his career, Hunt's son says, he had felt "a certain dissatisfaction with what he had accomplished, and a desire to do something in a literary way beyond merely transient and occasional writing, and which might prove of lasting benefit to his fellow man" (Freeman Hunt, Jr., post, p. 202). After a survey of the periodical literature of the day, he saw an opening for a magazine in a field as yet untouched. There was not, he discovered, a single magazine to represent the claims of commerce. Accordingly, with the encouragement and financial aid of friends, and the energetic exercise of his own business ability, he established a periodical of this character. It was known as the Merchants' Magazine and Commercial Review until 1850, and from then until 1860, when the original name was resumed, as Hunt's Merchants' Magazine. For nineteen years his time and energies were largely concentrated upon the development of this child of his brain. He even directed it from his bedside during his last sickness, and when the March 1858 number was placed in his hand the day before he died, he smiled and remarked: "This work has been my hobby in life and my hobby in death" (Ibid., post, p. 206). He also published during this later period, Lives of American Mer chants (2 vols., 1858), and Wealth and Worth, a Collection of Maxims, Morals and Miscellanies for Merchants and Men of Business (1856). He was always interested in politics and, good New Englander that he was, strongly favored the abolition of slavery. His disposition was kindly, he was diligent in business, and keenly sympathetic with those struggling against obstacles. He had his own personal obstacle to struggle against in a ''foible for drink" (New York Times, March 4, 1858). He was married, first, May 6, 1829, to Lucia Weld Blake, who died ten months later; second, January 2, 1831, to Laura Faxon Phinney, who died in i851; and third, October 1853, to Elizabeth Thompson Parmenter.

[Freeman Hunt, Jr., in Memorial Biographies of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, vol. III (1883); T. B. Wyman, Genealogy of the Name and Family of Hunt (1862-63); F. L. Mott, A History of American Magazine 174r- 1850 (1930); Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, April 1853; New York Times and Tribune, March 4, 1858, Evening Post, March 3, 1858.]

A. E. P.


HUNT, Harriot Kezia, MD, 1805-1875, physician, medical reformer, abolitionist, women’s rights activist (Hunt, Harriot, Glances and Glimpses, 1856, J. R. Chadwick [autobiography]; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 5, Pt. 1, p. 385; American Reformers: An H.W. Wilson Biographical Dictionary, New York, 1985, pp. 459-460)

HUNT, HARRIOT KEZIA (November 9, 1805- January 2, 1875), pioneer woman physician and reformer, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the daughter of Joab and Kezia (Wentworth) Hunt. She was descended from Enoch Hunt, who was admitted a freeman of Newport, Rhode Island, in 1638. Her father, a ship-joiner, lived in the old North-End of Boston; Harriot and a younger sister, Sarah Augusta, were brought up in a nautical, as well as a deeply religious, atmosphere. The family were greatly influenced by the Trinitarianism of John Murray. At an early age Harriot Hunt had a firm conviction that women should have some useful occupation. She began to put her thoughts into practice by taking pupils into her father's house in 1827. This, her first endeavor, was moderately successful, but in 1833, when her sister had a long illness, she turned her attention from teaching to medicine. Sarah Hunt was treated by a Dr. and Mrs. Mott, both English physicians of somewhat questionable reputation, and recovered. Meanwhile Harriot, under the influence of Mrs. Mott, began the practice of medicine and in 1835 had so far prospered that both she and her sister began to advertise themselves as physicians. Their practice consisted largely of general hygiene and hydrotherapy, mixed with considerable psychotherapy; their patients were chiefly neurasthenic women. "We were frequently surprised," Harriot Hunt wrote in her autobiography, "by the successful termination of many of our cases through prescriptions for mental states." After her sister's marriage, Harriot continued alone, her practice ever growing and extending beyond the confines of Boston. She lectured frequently on the hygiene of sex and in 1843 formed a Ladies' Physiological Society. At the meetings, often held in her house, she talked to large groups of women. She gained a certain notoriety by being refused admittance to the Harvard Medical School in 1847 and again in 1850.

In the last twenty-five years of her life, in addition to her medical practice in Boston, she became one of the "emancipated ladies" of the age and was well known as a temperance reformer, a phrenologist, an anti-tobacconist, and a leader in the anti-slavery movement. More important, however, was her work for woman's suffrage. She attended many of the early national conventions and often served on committees. By 1856 she was known outside of Massachusetts as one of the ardent supporters of the feminist movement and in that year she wrote her autobiography, Glances and Glimpses, a book of considerable value in depicting (in a rather narrow way) the times in which she lived. She added nothing definite to medicine, although she was part of the movement which opened medical education to women in America. Fredrika Bremer, after visiting Harriot Hunt in 1853, described her (Homes of the New World, New York, 1853, I, 142) as a "zealous little creature" and a "very peculiar individual" but added that she was "really delighted with her.'

[The principal reference is Harriot Hunt's autobiography. See also Harriet H. Robinson, Massachusetts in the Woman Suffrage Movement (1881); Jas. R. Chadwick, "The Study and Practice of Medicine by Women," Internal. Review, October 1879; Bessie Rayner Parkes, Vignettes (1866); T. B. Wyman, Genealogy of the Name and Family of Hunt (1862-63); the Boston Journal, January 5, 1875.]

H.R.V.


HUNT, Nathan (October 26, 1758-August 8, 1853), Quaker preacher, pioneer in education,

HUNT, NATHAN (October 26, 1758-August 8, 1853), Quaker preacher, pioneer in education, was born in Guilford County, North Carolina. He was the son of William Hunt, a distinguished Quaker preacher who was born in 1733 in Rancocas, New Jersey. His mother's maiden name was Sarah Mills. The father died of smallpox while on a religious mission in England in 1772. Nathan received a meager school education, but possessed a mind of strong native capacity and by means of extensive reading and much meditation and reflection became a leader in his community and in his religious denomination.

He married Martha Ruckman in 1778 and settled on the paternal farm which was near the Revolutionary battlefield of Guilford Court House. The family suffered serious financial losses on the occasion of the conflict. His first wife died in 1789 leaving six children, and three years later he married Prudence Thornburgh, by which union there were two children. His power as a preacher developed late in life. Although he began to speak in public meetings at the age of twenty-seven, he was not recorded a minister until he was thirty-five. From that time until old age weakened him he was an almost constant traveler and itinerant preacher. A mystic and seer rather than a reflective and argumentative preacher, he had sudden "insights" and "saw" into the state and condition of individuals and meetings. He acquired a remarkable prestige and attained a rare influence in Quaker circles, both at home and abroad. During the years 1820-21 he traveled in England, Ireland, and Scotland where large audiences, both Quaker and non-Quaker, came to hear his messages. He became the intimate and beloved friend of such distinguished men in England as the great chemist, William Allen, and the famous banker, Samuel Gurney. For some years previous to its opening in 1837 he was chairman of a committee to found and direct the New Garden Boarding School, which has since grown into Guilford College. He secured many contributions to the funds for this enterprise both in the United States and abroad. He was a powerful opponent of slavery in the midst of a slave-holding people. When the opposition, led by the conservative John Wilbur, of Westerly, Rhode Island, to the "evangelical" teachings of the English Quaker Joseph John Gurney, was causing dissension and division in various parts of the country, Hunt was instrumental in preventing a "separation" in North Carolina. He was a wise leader of public thought and sentiment and a strong religious guide within his own denomination; few persons have been more beloved by their contemporaries. He died at a ripe old age, in August 1853.

[Memoirs of William and Nathan Hunt (1858); M. M. Hobbs, "Nathan Hunt and his Times," Bull. Friends' Historical Society of Philadelphia, November 1907; A. G. Way, "Nathan Hunt," in Quaker Biographies, 2 series, vol. I (n.d., 1926); The Friend (Philadelphia), Eighth Month 20, 1853; The Annual Monitor, 1854, pp. 167-208.)

R.M.J.


HUNT, Ward (June 14, 1810-March 24, 1886), justice of the United States Supreme Court,

HUNT, WARD (June 14, 1810-March 24, 1886), justice of the United States Supreme Court, was born in Utica, New York, the son of Montgomery and Elizabeth (Stringham) Hunt, and a descendant of Thomas Hunt who resided in Stamford, Connecticut, in 1650. His father was for many years cashier of the First National Bank of Utica. He attended the Oxford and Geneva academies in both of which he was a class mate of Horatio Seymour. At seventeen he entered Hamilton College but transferred to Union College where he graduated with honors in 1828. After a period of study in the law school at Litchfield, Connecticut, he returned to Utica and entered the office of Judge Hiram Denio. He was admitted to the bar in 1831 but his health broke down and necessitated his spending the winter in the South. On his return he entered a law partnership with Judge Denio and soon had an extensive practice. In 1838 he was elected as a Jacksonian Democrat to the New York Assembly from Oneida County and served one term. He opposed the annexation of Texas and the extension of slavery. He served as mayor of Utica in 1844. As the slavery controversy increased in bitterness Hunt abandoned his earlier affiliations and actively supported the candidacy of Van Buren and Adams on the Free-Soil ticket in 1848. He helped organize the Republican party in New York in 1856, was a zealous supporter of its policies, and was actively considered by the Republican caucus in Albany in 1857 as a candidate for the United States Senate.

Hunt had early ambitions for judicial office. In the late forties he ran for the supreme court of the state but was defeated, owing, it is alleged, to the opposition of the Irish vote which was antagonistic because of his successful defense of a policeman who had been charged with the murder of an Irishman. Again in 1853 he ran on the Democratic ticket for the same office, but his political deflection to the Free-Soilers five years earlier brought about his defeat. In 1865 he ran as a Republican for the court of appeals, to succeed his former partner, Judge Denio, and ·was elected. Three years later he became chief judge of that tribunal and remained as commissioner of appeals under the judicial reorganization effected by constitutional amendment in 1869. In the autumn of 1872 he was nominated by President Grant to the associate justiceship on the Supreme Court left vacant by the resignation of Justice Samuel Nelson, and he took his seat on January 9, 1873. He never returned to the bench after the Court's adjournment for recess on December 23, 1878. Early in January 1879 he suffered a paralytic stroke affecting his right side. He recovered slowly, but never completely, and remained an invalid until his death. In spite of his physical condition he did not resign from the Court until Congress by special act of January 27, 1882, extended to him the benefits of the act of 1869 which permitted federal judges to retire on full pay at the age of seventy years after ten years of service. The special act was introduced and sponsored by Hunt's former colleague on the bench, Senator David Davis. Hunt had not served ten years; he had in fact served only six years, and in the debates on the bill to pension him he was sharply criticized for having continued in office so long after becoming unfit to perform his judicial duties (Congressional Record, 47 Congress, 1 Session, pp. 505, 612-18). The act itself made the grant of Hunt's pension conditional upon his resigning within thirty days. He resigned on the day of its enactment.

Hunt was not a conspicuous member of the Supreme Court and his name is not associated with any outstanding decision or doctrine. He was, however, a hard-working and an able judge, and his decisions, though not brilliantly written, are clear and represent careful research. He wrote the opinion of the Court in 149 cases, only eight of which related to constitutional problems. He wrote four dissenting opinions and dissented without opinion in eighteen cases. He was married twice: to Mary Ann Savage, of Salem, New York, in 1837, who bore him a son and a daughter; and to Maria Taylor of Albany in 1853.

[Hunt's opinions are found from 15 Wallace to 98 U. S. Reports. For a memorandum on his resignation and an obituary notice see ro5 U. S., ix-x, and 118 U. S., 70 I. Other sources include: M. M. Bagg, Memorial History of Utica, New York (1891); H. L. Carson, The Supreme Court of the U. S.: Its History (1892), vol. II; David McAdam and others, History of the Bench and Bar of New York (1897), vol. I; D. S. Alexander, A Political History of the State of New York, vol. II (1906), vol. III (1909); T. B. Wyman, Genealogy of the Name and Family of Hunt (1862-63); C. E. Fitch, Encyclopedia of Biography of New York (1916); New York Times, New York Tribune, March 25, 1886.]

R.E. C.


HUNT, Washington (August 5, 1811-February 2, 1867), governor of the state of New York,

HUNT, WASHINGTON (August 5, 1811-February 2, 1867), governor of the state of New York, son of Sanford and Fanny (Rose) Hunt, was born at Windham, New York. He was descended from Jonathan Hunt; who moved from Connecticut to Northampton, Massachusetts, about 1660. In 1818 his parents moved to Portage, New York, where he attended common school. In 1828 he moved to Lockport and two 'years later he took up the study of law. He was admitted to the bar in 1834. In 1836 he became the first county judge of the newly organized Niagara County and in a comparatively short time was recognized as one of the political leaders in the western section of his state., Although early in his career he had been a Democrat, he was led to join the Whigs and in 1842 he was elected to Congress. He served continuously until 1849, and in the Thirtieth Congress he was chairman of the committee on commerce. Opposed to human servitude and political proscription in every form, he severely criticized President Tyler because he believed Tyler labored zealously for the extension of slavery in the Southwest. In 1849, thanks to the efforts of Thurlow Weed, for many years Hunt's intimate friend and political backer, Hunt was chosen comptroller of the state of New York. The following year, by 262 votes, he defeated Horatio Seymour for the governorship of the state.

Hunt's administration as governor was far from brilliant. Personally honest, and scrupulous in the performance of his duties, he was not always tactful and as a consequence he became a party to a legislative squabble regarding the Erie Canal. When in 1852 Seymour defeated him for reelection he retired to his farm near Lockport. His interest in politics, however, did not cease and in 1856 he was chosen temporary chairman of the last national Whig convention. His refusal to ally himself with the rising Republican party, largely on the ground that it was a sectional organization, led to his estrangement with Weed. In 1860 he served as chairman of the Constitutional Union convention at Richmond, Virginia, which nominated Bell and Everett, he himself declining the nomination for the vice-presidency. He was also influential in fusing the Douglas-Bell electoral tickets in New York. In the presidential campaign of 1864 he was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention and offered a resolution calling for a convention of the states, which was defeated in committee. He strongly opposed the reelection of Lincoln arid in return was severely criticized by the Republican press. His last appearance on the political stage was in 1866 as a delegate to the National Union Convention. Personally Hunt was very well liked and possessed a wide circle of friends. In 1834 he married Mary Hosmer Walbridge, daughter of Henry Walbridge of Ithaca, New York. He was a lifelong member of the Protestant Episcopal Church and a prominent lay delegate to many of its conventions. He was interested in agriculture and devoted much of his time and effort to administering his large landholdings. He died in New York City.

[C. Z. Lincoln, ed., State of New York: Messages from the Governors (1909), vol. IV; D. S. Alexander, A Political History of the State of New York, vols. II (1906) and III (1909); P.A. Chadbourne and W. B. Moore, eds., The Pub. Services of the State of New York: History, Statistical, Descriptive and Biographical (1882); T. W. Barnes, "Memoir of Thurlow Weed" (1884), which is Vol. II of the Life of Thurlow Weed; C. E. Fitch, Encyclopedia of Biography of New York (1916), vol. I; S. J. Wiley and W. S. Garner, Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Niagara County, New York (1892); T. B. Wyman, Genealogy of the Name and Family of Hunt (1862-63); New York Times, February 3, 1867.]

H. J. C.


HUNTER, David Dard (“Black David”), 1802-1886, General, U.S. Army.  In 1862, he organized and formed all-Black U.S. Army regiments without authorization from the Union War Department.  Established the African American First South Carolina Volunteer Regiment in May 1862.  Without authorization, he issued a proclamation that emancipated slaves in South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.  President Lincoln ordered the Black troops disbanded and countermanded the emancipation order. 

(Dumond, 1961, p. 372; Rodriguez, 2007, pp. 66, 140, 243, 275, 690-691; Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. III, p. 321; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936, Vol. 5, Pt. 1, p. 100; American National Biography, Oxford University Press, New York, 2002, Vol. 11, p. 516).

HUNTER, DAVID (July 21, 1802-February 2, 1886),  Union soldier, was born at Washington, D. C., the son of Reverend Andrew Hunter [q.v.] and his second wife, Mary (Stockton) Hunter, daughter of Richard Stockton [q.v.], a signer of the Declaration of Independence. In 1818, his father being at that time chaplain in the United States Navy stationed at the Washington Navy Yard, young Hunter was appointed to West Point. Graduating in 1822, he served in the 5th Infantry until he became a captain in the 1st Dragoons in 1833. While stationed at Fort Dearborn, Chicago, he was married, between 1828 and 1831 to Maria Indiana Kinzie. He invested in Chicago lands and in 1836, resigning from the army, settled in Chicago to engage in business with his brother-in-law, John H. Kinzie. He reentered the army in 1842 as a paymaster with the rank of major, and in this capacity was with General Taylor's forces in the Mexican War.

In 1860, Hunter, then serving in Kansas; commenced a correspondence with Lincoln advising him of secession rumors. Invited to accompany the President-Elect on his inaugural trip to Washington, he sustained an injury to his collar bone early in the journey and was unable to continue with Lincoln's party. When he arrived at the Capital later, he was put in charge of a guard of 100 gentlemen volunteers to protect the White House, spending every night in the East Room. Commissioned colonel of cavalry in May 1861, he was made brigadier-general of volunteers a few days later and appointed to command the 2nd Division of McDowell's army. In July he participated in the Bull Run campaign. Much straggling and disorder occurred, and the attack led by Hunter's division, was late, and was made by small detachments one at a time which were successively defeated. Hunter, however, severely wounded at the beginning of the engagement, was not to blame for the poor conduct of the troops, which was due in the main to their lack of training.

In October, he was sent to Missouri to relieve Fremont whom, on November 2, he superseded as commander of the Western Department. He at once repudiated Fremont's convention with Sterling Price whereby both generals agreed to force the disbandment of unauthorized armed bodies, and in accordance with orders withdrew the Union forces for rest and reorganization. Later in November he was assigned to command in Kansas, but since there was at the moment no enemy in that state, he was able to send troops to assist in the expedition against Forts Henry and Donelson, and to Canby in New Mexico.

In March 1862 he assumed command of the Department of the South. Fort Pulaski, Georgia, was at once besieged, and after heavy bombardment surrendered on April 11. The next day Hunter issued an order liberating the slaves which had fallen into Federal hands, and on May 9 followed it by another liberating all slaves in his department. Applauded by abolitionists, this move caused uneasiness in border states and excitement in Congress, and on May 19 the President issued a proclamation annulling the order on the ground that it exceeded the General's authority. Hunter had also sanctioned the raising of a negro regiment (the 1st South Carolina), and in that action was upheld by Congress. The Confederate States proclaimed him a felon, and ordered his execution if captured. He now attempted to take Charleston, but lost the battle of Secessionville on June 16, and was forced to suspend further operations.

When he left his department on leave to seek more active duty, he was employed as president of courts martial which tried General Fitz-John Porter [q.v.] and inquired into the loss of Harper's Ferry. Returning to his department, he conducted minor operations until "temporarily" relieved in June 1863, when he was again employed on court-martial duty and in making an extensive inspection of the troops and conditions in the Mississippi Valley. In May 1864, upon the defeat of Sigel in the Shenandoah Valley, Hunter was recalled and assigned to command this important sector. He was ordered to move up the Valley, cross the Blue Ridge to Charlottesville, and then proceed to Lynchburg, living on the country and cutting all railroads and canals. It was left to his discretion as to whether, upon completion of his mission, he should return to the Potomac, or join Grant's army near Richmond. He marched south, and on June 5 won the battle of Piedmont. He captured many prisoners and forced Lee to detach Breckinridge's division, and later Early's corps, to prevent the serious loss of supplies and destruction of communications which Hunter was accomplishing. On June 16 he invested Lynchburg, but the next day Early's forces commenced to arrive, and skirmishing resulted. Since his ammunition was nearly exhausted, Hunter decided not to fight, and in order to avoid an engagement retired into West Virginia. He thus left the Shenandoah Valley open to Early, who, quick to seize his advantage, marched down the Valley and threatened Washington. Hunter made every effort to reach railroads so as to be on the Potomac ahead of Early, but he failed to arrive in time to prevent the Confederates from raiding in the vicinity of the Capital. Hunter has been criticized for this campaign, though he succeeded in his principal mission, which was to weaken Lee's army at a critical hour.

On August 4, Grant arrived at Hunter's headquarters, bringing with him Sheridan, whom he had selected to be the leader of the field forces under Hunter's direction, with a view to driving the enemy once for all from the Shenandoah Valley. Hunter thought it better to resign his command so as to leave Sheridan entirely free, and his resignation was accepted on August 8. He was again engaged on court-martial duty from February 1, 1865, until the end of the war. Directed to accompany the remains of President Lincoln to Springfield, Illinois, he was recalled to become president of the military commission which tried the conspirators. He later became president of the Special Claims Commission and of the Cavalry Promotion Board. Brevetted brigadier-general and major-general for gallant and meritorious conduct during the war, he was retired from active service in 1866 as a colonel, and resided thereafter in Washington, where he died.

Hunter was a handsome man, a typical beau sabreur. He was not a great general, but he had the highly commendable qualities of initiative and energy and he never allowed personal interests to stand between him and duty. [War of the Rebellion: Official Records (Army), 1 series, II (Bull Run), III, VIII (Missouri), XX, LXV, LXVI (Atlantic Coast), LXX, I:XXI (Shenandoah); Battles and Leaders of the Civil War (4 volumes, 1887- 88); R. M. Johnston, Bull Run (1913); G. W. Cullum, Biographical Register (3rd ed., 1891); Report of the Military Services of General David Hunter during the War of the Rebellion (1873), a short autobiography; R. C. Schenck, "Major-General David Hunter," Magazine of American History, February 1887; Papers of the Mil. History Society of Massachusetts, volume VI (1907); Seventeenth Annual Report Association Graduates U.S. Military Academy (1886); T. C. Stockton, The Stockton Family of New Jersey (1911) ; A. T. Andreas, History of Chicago, volume I (1884); Army and Navy Journal, February 6, 1886; Washington Post, February 3, 1886.]

C. H. L.


HURD, John Codman (November 11, 1816- June 25, 1892), publicist,

HURD, JOHN CODMAN (November 11, 1816- June 25, 1892), publicist, son of John Russell and Catharine Margaret (Cadman) Hurd, was born in Boston, though he was reared and lived much of his life in New York City. As a boy he attended the grammar school connected with Columbia College. His father was a sufficiently successful merchant to afford his son a college education, and having completed the freshman and sophomore years at Columbia College, he went to Yale, where he graduated in 1836. For a year longer he remained in New Haven, studying in the Yale Law School; he then returned to New York, where he spent two years more in a law office before being admitted to the bar. Though nominally engaged in the practice of law, he was never active in that profession. Being a man of independent means, he devoted much of his time to business and indulged his scholarly inclinations. After his father died in 1872, he traveled far and wide, particularly in the Orient, and returned to live the remainder of his life in Boston. He was never married. At the time when the slavery controversy was at its height, Hurd was engaged in a painstaking analysis of the legal phases of that problem. In 1856 he published Topics of Jurisprudence Connected with Conditions of Freedom and Bondage. The first thick volume of his Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States appeared in 1858 and the second volume, four years later. For thorough research, exhaustive discussion, and impartial treatment, this treatise on the most exciting topic of the age has never been excelled. Beginning with elementary principles of jurisprudence pertaining to personal bondage, he traced the legal history of chattel slavery from ancient times as a background for his analysis of American constitutional and statutory law, including the judicial decisions and dicta relating to such legislation. This work established his reputation as one of the most learned legal writers in the country. After the Civil War he directed his attention to the problem of reconstruction. This led him into the realm of political philosophy and in January 1867 he contributed a discriminating article on "Theories of Reconstruction" to the American Law Review. After many years of careful study he came to the conclusion that the United States was a nation in fact. He believed that the nature of the Union was determined by social and political forces, not by the provisions of the federal constitution. Sovereignty he conceived to be the authority behind the law rather than the law itself, and therefore the location of supreme power in the United States could be discovered only by an examination of actual conditions and events. Inc basing his explanation upon facts instead of premises selected to justify a preconceived opinion of what the American Union ought to be, he considered himself unique. These ideas he expounded with many nice distinctions in The Theory of Our National Existence (1881) and in The Union-State: A Letter to Our States-rights Friend (1890).

[History and Biographical Record of the Class of 1836 in Yale College (1882); Obit. Record Graduates Yale University,1890-1900 (1900); Boston Transcript, June 25, 1892.]

J.E.B.


HURLBERT, William Henry (July 3, 1827-September 4, 1895), journalist and author,

HURLBERT, WILLIAM HENRY (July 3, 1827-September 4, 1895), journalist and author, son of Martin Luther Hurlbut and Margaret Ashburner (Morford) Hurlbut and half-brother of Stephen Augustus Hurlbut [q.v.], was born at Charleston, South Carolina. The change in his surname was brought about by the error of an engraver in making some cards for him, and he liked the spelling, "Hurlbert," so much that he retained it. Graduating at Harvard in 1847, he next entered the Harvard Divinity School, where he was graduated in 1849, then spent two years in study and travel in Europe. Returning to America, he entered the Unitarian ministry, but served only a short time, though during that period he wrote some hymns which were long in use. In 1852-53 he spent a year in the Harvard Law School. After visiting the West Indies, he published Gan-Eden or Pictures of Cuba (1854). In 1855 he became a writer on the staff of Putnam's Magazine and dramatic critic for the Albion, and in 1857 joined the New York Times. His brilliant but erratic genius was manifested in many ways. It is said that he could work on two or three editorials at once, dashing off alternate pages of them to send to the typesetters. He wrote many poems, and a play of his, Americans in Paris; or A Game of Dominoes, was performed at Wallack's in 1858 and published the same year. Having professed strong opposition to slavery, he was arrested while on a business trip in the South in 1861 and confined for a number of months in Richmond, but escaped in the summer of 1862, making his way on foot through the lines and to Washington. He now declared the Republican party to be a menace to the nation, and joined the staff of the New York World. In 1864 he published McClellan and the Conduct of the War, and took the stump for McClellan in the campaign of that year. He headed a group which purchased the New York Commercial Advertiser in 1864, but he and his associates could not agree, and the paper was sold in 1867 to Thurlow Weed. In 1866 he visited Mexico; the following year, as the representative of the World, he attended the Paris Exposition and the Festival of St. Peter in Rome. In 1871 he was special correspondent for the World with the commission sent by President Grant to Santo Domingo. From 1876 to 1883 he was editor-in-chief of the World. After 1883 he spent most of his time in Europe, writing many essays and articles for British and American periodicals during those latter years. He endeared himself to British Tories by his book, Ireland Under Coercion (2 vols., 1888) but, considering himself to have been insulted by a remark made by the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Coleridge, he wrote in retort a book of 500 closely printed pages entitled, England Under Coercion (1893). A suit for breach of promise, which he won, nevertheless caused him to leave England in 1891. He died in Cadenabbia, Italy, with a warrants till out against him in London, for perjury in connection with the suit. On August 9, 1884, he married Katharine Parker Tracy of New York.

[See H. H. Hurlbut, The Hurlbut Genealogy (1888); Catalog of the Artistic and Valuable Collections of Mr. Wm. Henry Hurlbert ... to be Sold by Auction (1883); J. M. Lee, History of American Journalism (1923); New York Times, September 7, 1895; New York Times Sat. Review, June 14, 1902; Times (London), September 7, 1895; World (New York), September 7, 8, 1895. The London newspapers of April 1891 and thereafter, during the trial of Evelyn vs. Hurlbert, contain much interesting material; though some of the charges made against Hurlbert in this trial would seem to have been refuted on good authority elsewhere (see letters of John Gilmer Speed of New York and W. W. Story, the sculptor, in the New York Sun, December 8, 1893). ]

A.F.H.



HUSSEY, Sarah, 1799-1858, Massachusetts, abolitionist, women’s rights activist.  Founder and organizer of Worcester Anti-Slavery Sewing Circle and Worcester County Anti-Slavery Society, South Division.  Wife of abolitionist John Milton Earle.  Organized anti-slavery fairs.  Cousin of Lucretia Mott.


HUTCHINSON Family, Jesse, 1778-1851, Jesse Jr., Judson, Asa, John, b. 1821, Abby, b. 1829 (Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1888, Vol. III, p. 334; Dictionary of American Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1936)



Source: Dictionary of American Biography, Volumes I-X, Edited by Dumas Malone, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1930.