Alexander Hugh Holmes Stuart (1807-1891)

U.S. Congressman, Presidential Cabinet Member. He graduated from the University of Virginia in 1828, studied law, was admitted to the bar and commenced to practice law in Staunton, Virginia. He was a member of the Virginia State House of Delegates, (1836-39) and elected as a Whig to the Twenty-seventh Congress, serving (1841-43). An unsuccessful candidate for reelection, he served as Secretary of the Interior in the Cabinet of President Fillmore, (1850-53). He was a member of the Virginia State Senate (1857-61) and with the advent of the Civil War, he was a member of the Virginia State secession convention in 1861. After the war, he was instrumental in restoring Virginia to the Union in 1870 and a member of the Virginia State House of Delegates, (1874-77). From 1882, until his death, he was a rector of the University of Virginia and president of the Virginia Historical Society.

Bio by: John "J-Cat" Griffith