Joshua HIlary Hudson ^{2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11}

  Noted events in his life were:

1. Residence: Age: 28 in 1860 in , Marlboro, SC. ¹¹

2. Military in , , SC: Lieutenant Colonel in Civil War. ¹⁰

3. Occupation: Opened law practice as an attorney on 1 Jan 1866 in Bennettsville, Marlboro, SC. ¹²

4. Residence: Age: 48 Marital Status: Married; Relation to Head of House: Self in 1880 in Bennettsville, Marlboro, SC. ⁹

5. Residence: Age: 68 Marital Status: Married; Relation to Head of House: Head in 1900 in Bennettsville, Marlboro, SC. ²

6. Book: Men of Mark in South Carolina: biography of Joshua Hilary Hudson, 1907. ⁸
HUDSON, JOSHUA HILARY, son of Dabney and Narcissa Cook Hudson, was born at Chester, South Carolina, January 29, 1832. Dabney Hudson was a tailor by trade, a man small of stature, handsome of person, genial and social. Joshua Hudson, the earliest known ancestor of this family, the great great-grandfather of the subject of this sketch, and a man of English parentage, settled in Amherst county, Virginia, in 1745.

Young Hudson was, as a boy, strong and healthy, fond of the usual sports and amusements of boyhood, and devoted to books. His early life was passed in the village of Chester. Fortunately, regular manual labor was required of him. Serving in every way in which a poor boy can help a poor mother, gave him the useful discipline which can come only through toil.

Young Hudson's life was, in every way, greatly influenced by his mother. She was a devout Christian, a member of the Baptist church, and a woman whose religion rose above form and ceremony and became a matter of character and life. She, in part, directed his reading, and thus deepened the impressions she had otherwise made upon his mind and heart. He early became interested in that greatest of classics, the Bible, which he supplemented with those other inexhaustible reservoirs of wisdom and inspiration, history and biography. School, early companionship and private study cooperated with the influences already named. In these circumstances the boy early developed an ambition to become a worthy and useful member of society, and his later associations with men in active life helped him greatly in carrying out his purpose.

The road to an education proved by no means a royal one to Joshua Hudson. Straitened circumstances, lack of free time, and indifferent school facilities, combined to retard his progress. He found it possible, nevertheless, to attend the village academy at Chester. Later he was enabled to attend South Carolina college. Here he showed the results of his earlier training, for he not only completed the college course in December, 1852, but received first honors. His alma mater, in which he had thus distinguished himself in early life, did not forget him, or lose sight of his later career. In June, 1908, the college conferred upon him the degree of LL. D.

Doctor Hudson's serious life work began when, after leaving college, he accepted the position of teacher of the school in Bennettsville, South Carolina; this work he continued from 1858 to 1857. Meanwhile he had occupied his spare time with the study of law, and, in 1857, he entered upon the practice of this profession.

From 1857 until January, 1906, when he retired from practice, the law, in one or another of its various aspects, demanded the attention of Doctor Hudson. From 1857 to 1878 he was a regular practitioner in the courts of his state. In 1878 he was made circuit judge of the fourth judicial circuit, in which position he continued until 1894, when he was made counsel for the receiver of the Cape Fear and Yadkin Valley railroad. The latter position he held until 1900. In January, 1907, he was chosen president of the South Carolina Bar association for the regular term of one year. He served as member of the South Carolina house of representatives in 1858-59, and, again, as state senator in 1905-06. In 1896 and 1897 he presided over the Baptist State conventions. He has also seen military service, having served in the Confederate army from 1862 to 1865. Entering as a private, he was advanced to the post of drill master in the Twenty-first regiment, and then, successively, to the ranks of adjutant, major and lieutenant-colonel of the Twenty-sixth South Carolina volunteers.

In the midst of his legal, public and other duties, Doctor Hudson has found time for literary work, having published a volume of ^^Sketches and Reminiscences,'' and, also, in 1908, an autobiography. He is a Mason, in which order he has held the position of worshipful master. In politics he has, through life, been a consistent Democrat. In religion he is, like his mother, a Baptist.

Doctor Hudson's life has been too full of labor to allow much place for diversion or relaxation. In college he was interested in gymnastics. His alternative now to work is rest. In answer to the question whether he had in any degree failed to accomplish what he had hoped to do in life, and, if so, what lessons might be drawn therefrom. Doctor Hudson said "I have been a worker all my life, but find now that I might have succeeded better if I had been more persevering." The advice he has to offer the young is temperance in all things, sobriety, morality, piety and diligent toil.

On May 4, 1854, Doctor Hudson married Miss Mary Miller. Of this marriage fourteen children were born, four of whom are living in 1907.

His address is Bennettsville, Marlboro county, South Carolina.
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7. Obituary: Augusta Chromicle: Obituary of Joshua Hilary Hudson on 23 Jul 1909 in Augusta, Richmond, GA. Joshua Hilary Hudson of Bennettsville, for sixteen years circuit judge of South Carolina and to the day of his death one of the leading legal men of the state, died today at the age of 77, at the residence of his daughter, Mrs. W. A. Williams of this city. Judge Hudson was born in Chester, this state, in 1832. He served with distinction throughout the Civil War, attaining the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the Confederate Army.
After his retirement from the circuit bench in 1894, Judge Hudson devoted himself with conspicuous ability to his legal practice. In 1906 he served in the state senate for one session.

8. Occupation: Circuit Judge, 4th Judicial Circle from 14 Feb 1878 to 14 Feb 1894 in , , SC. ¹³

Joshua married Mary E. Miller, daughter of Phillip Miller and Unknown, on 4 May 1854 in Bennettsville, Marlboro, SC.^{1 2 3 4} (Mary E. Miller was born on 11 Jan 1838 in , , SC,^{2 4 9 14} died on 2 Dec 1902 in Bennettsville, Marlboro, SC ¹⁴ and was buried in Bennettsville: Evergreen Cemetery, Marlboro, SC ¹⁴.)