Hillis

ernment and protect their citizens successfully.
His own comment on his failure is that they
"heard me respectfully, but did not give me their
sympathy" (Politics and Pen Pictures, p. 310).
He took no part in the organization of the Con-
federate government, but when President Lin-
coln called for volunteers he became a supporter
of that government on the ground that the coer-
cion of a state was a usurpation of authority by
the president, and justified Southern resistance.
In 1861 he was Confederate commissioner under
appointment of President Davis, to influence
Tennessee to secede from the Union. He organ-
ized "Hilliard's Legion" and served in the West
in Bragg's army with the rank of colonel. On
Dec. i, 1862, he was honorably discharged from
service, having resigned to give his attention to
his personal affairs. He returned to Montgom-
ery and resumed the practice of law.

After the war he made his home in Atlanta,
Ga., and practised there. He was an unsuccess-
ful candidate for Congress in 1876. In 1877
President Hayes appointed him minister to Bra-
zil, where many Southerners had settled at the
close of the war, the appointment being a friend-
ly gesture toward these voluntary exiles. Hil-
Hard's period of service fell during the time that
the emancipation of slaves was in progress in
Brazil, and he lent a support to those who were
agitating a quicker and more drastic method
which attracted wide notice. In 1881 he re-
turned to Atlanta, where he died. He had some
literary skill, prepared the introduction and notes
for a translation of Alesandro Verri's Roman
Nights (1850), and was the author of a novel,
De Vane: A Story of Plebeians and Patricians
(1865). His best work, however, was done in
his reminiscences, Politics and Pen Pictures at
Home and Abroad (1892). He also published a
collection of his early speeches under the title
Speeches and Addresses (1855). He was t™*06
married: first to a Miss Bedell; and second to a
Mrs. Mays, nee Glascock.

[A good critical study is Toccoa Cozart's "Henry W.
Milliard," in Trans. Ala. Hist. Soc.t vol. IV (1904) ; A.
B. Moore, Hist, of Ala. and Her People (1927), vol. I,
gives an excellent picture of the political struggles in
which he engaged; the story of his rivalry with Yancey
may he found in J. W. Du Bose, The Life and Times
of William Lowndes Yancey (1892) ; see also A. D.
Jones, The Am. Portrait Gallery (1855); W, Brewer,
Ala. Her Hist., Resources, War Record,, and, Public
Men (1872); T. M. Owen, Hist, of Ala. and Diet, of
Ala. Biog., vol. Ill (1921); Am. Rev., Dec. 1849; At-
lanta Constitution, Dec. 18, 1892.] H.F.

HILLIS, DAVID (November i;88-July 8,
1845), Indiana pioneer, was born in Washing-
ton County, Pa., the son of William Hillis, a sol-
dier in the Revolution, and Jane (Carruthers)
Hillis, whose father was a planter on the James

Hillis
River, in Virginia. The family was caught in
the westward movement and reached Kentucky
in 1791. When twenty years of age, David mi-
grated to Indiana Territory. He obtained a large
tract of land near Madison, southwest of Cin-
cinnati, where he built a cabin on the bluffs of
the Ohio. In time he became one of the most ex-
tensive farmers in his part of the commonwealth.
He employed many men to clear his farm and
bring it under cultivation, and later a number
of tenants lived on his lands. During the terri-
torial period, the Indian frontier was but a short
distance from his home, the natives were hostile,
and Hillis of necessity became an Indian fighter.
In the War of 1812, he was made lieutenant-
colonel of the 6th Indiana Militia (Indiana Mag-
azine of History, March 1924, pp. 13-14), and
led several attacks on the Indian villages along
the forks of the White River. Hillis also went
to the relief of Capt. Zachary Taylor who was
in charge of Fort Harrison, just north of Terre
Haute on the Wabash. From 1813 to 1814 he
was lieutenant in Captain Dunn's company of
rangers.
Having somehow acquired a fair education
during his youth, Hillis served as a civil engi-
neer and was employed by the federal govern-
ment as a surveyor of public lands in Indiana,
Illinois, and southern Michigan. A short time
after Indiana entered the Union as a state, he
was elected an associate judge of the Jefferson
County circuit court. He had no training for
such an office, but is said to have "displayed a
legal acumen unusual in one not bred to the law,"
(Woollen, post, p. 174) and to have satisfied the
attorneys who practised before him. He was
elected to the lower branch of the general assem-
bly of Indiana in 1823, and reflected five times
before 1832. In the latter year, he was chosen to
the upper house and reflected in 1835, the sena-
torial term being three years. In the exciting
state election of 1837, when both parties were
divided over the extensive internal improve-
ment system launched in 1836, Hillis was a can-
didate for lieutenant-governor on the ticket with
David Wallace [g.p.]. Both Wallace and Hillis,
who were elected, championed the simultaneous
construction of the whole system of public works,
while the opposing candidates, also Whigs, called
"modifiers" or "classifiers," advocated the com-
pletion of but one or two of the improvements at
first, and others later. After his term as lieuten-
ant-governor was finished, Hillis was again
elected to the Indiana house of representatives,
in 1842 and in 1844.
He belonged to the religious sect known as
Seceders, and was the mainstay of the church