HIL'DRETH, RICHARD ( 1807-65). An Ameri can historian, born at Deerfield, Mass. lie gradu ated at Harvard College in 1826, studied law, and began to practice in Boston in 183(1. In 1832, however, he abandoned his profession to become editor of the Boston Atlas. in the autumn of 1834, being 'out of health, he went to the South, where he resided nearly two years on a slave plantation in Florida, and used his oppor tunity to study the workings of slavery. The result was a powerful anti-slavery novel, pub lished in 1837 under the title of The Slave, or a Memoir of Arch!, Moore. It was reprinted in England, and in 1852 was republished in America under the title of The White Slave. When the annexation of Texas began to attract attention. he published in the Boston At/us a series of articles which did much to intensify the hostility of the Northern people to that scheme. After publishing a History of Banks (18371 he passed the winter of 1837-38 in Washington as corre spondent of the Atlas, and. upon his return to his editorial chair, entered warmly into the cam paign for the election to the Presidency of Gen eral Harrison, a life of whom he published in 1839. A year later (1840) he translated Du mont's version of Bentham's Theory of Legisla tion. The same year appeared his Despotism in America, a work on the political, economical, and social aspects of slavery. A second edition with
an added chapter was issued in 1854. From 1841) to 1843 he resided in Demerara. British Guiana, busying himself in editing two free-labor news papers. After his return be published a Theory of Morals (1344) and a Theory of Politics(1853).. The work, however, for which he is most remem bered is his History of thc United States, in six volumes (1849-56) , in which he attempts to present the founders of the in their true character, without trying to heighten their virtues or disguise their mistakes and faults. The first three volumes treat the period from 1492 to 1789; the second three from 1789 to the close of Monroe's first term (1821). The bias is Federalist, the treatment accurate and vigor ous; but the graces of style are lacking, and the work is more consulted than read. In 1855 MI dreth published Japan as It Was and Is, and in 1856 Atrocious Judges, based on Campbell's Lives. For several years, ending with the inau guration of Lincoln as President, he was engaged on the stair of the New York Tribune. He went abroad in the summer of 1861 as United States consul at Triest, and died in Florence.