South's Forgotten Fire-Eater

The story of the American Civil War is typically told with particular interest in the national players behind the war: Davis, Lincoln, Lee, Grant, and their peers. However, the truth is that countless Americans on both sides of the war worked in their own communities to sway public perception of abolition, secession, and government intervention. In north Alabama, David Hubbard was an ardent and influential voice for leaving the Union, spreading his increasingly radical view of states' rights and the need to rebel against what he viewed an overreaching federal government. You have likely never heard of Hubbard, the grandson of a Revolutionary War soldier who fought under Andrew Jackson in the War of 1812. He was much more than that stereotype of antebellum Alabama politicians, being an early speculator in lands coerced from Native Americans; a lawyer and cotton planter; a populist; an influential member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama; and a key promoter of the very first railroad built west of the Allegheny mountains. Alabama's Forgotten Fire Eater is the story of Hubbard's radicalization, describing his rise to becoming the most influential and prominent secessionist in north Alabama. Despite growing historical interest in the "fire eaters" who whipped the South into a frenzy, there has been little mention until now of Hubbard's integral involvement in Alabama's relationship with the Confederacy. Now historian Chris McIlwain offers Hubbard's story as a cautionary tale of radical politics and its consequences.

CHRIS MCILWAIN is a lawyer-historian from Tuscaloosa. Born in Chattanooga in 1955 and raised in Huntsville by his rocket scientist father, McIlwain graduated in 1977 from the University of Alabama with a double major in political science and sociology. He then attended the university's law school, from which he received his Juris Doctorate in 1980. He practices law in Tuscaloosa as president of his own firm. McIlwain is the author of three books: Civil War Alabama; 1865 Alabama: From Civil War to Uncivil Peace; and The Million Dollar Man Who Helped Kill a President. McIlwain is also a frequent contributor to the Alabama Review and a lecturer on Alabama history at schools, civic groups, and the Alabama Department of Archives and History.