Jesse Hill Ford
Jesse Hill Ford was an American writer of Southern literature, best known for his critical and commercial success in short fiction as well as the novels Mountains of Gilead and The Liberation of Lord Byron Jones.
Biography
He was born in Troy, Alabama on December 28, 1928. Ford was raised in Nashville, Tennessee. He attended Montgomery Bell Academy and received his Bachelor of Arts from Vanderbilt University. His education was interrupted by the Korean War, during which he served in the United States Navy. Following his discharge, he enrolled in the University of Florida, where he received a Master of Arts in 1955. After graduation he worked as a public relations director, but in 1957 he decided to devote himself to writing on a full-time basis. He and his family moved to Humboldt, Tennessee. Two years later, he won an Atlantic Monthly prize for the short story "The Surest Thing in Show Business". In 1961, he spent a year at the University of Oslo as a Fulbright Scholar and published his first novel, Mountains of Gilead, and in 1964 he wrote both the teleplay and theatrical scripts of The Conversion of Buster Drumwright.One year later, Ford published The Liberation of Lord Byron Jones, which was selected by the Book of the Month Club. A critical and commercial success, it earned him a Guggenheim Fellowship for fiction writing, and was later adapted by Ford and Stirling Silliphant for a 1970 feature film directed by William Wyler. Other works by Ford include Fishes, Birds, and Sons of Men, a compilation of his early short stories; The Feast of Saint Barnabas, which focused on a Florida race riot; and The Raider, a historical novel set in Tennessee before and during the American Civil War.
In 1971, Ford shot a black soldier, PVT. George Henry Doaks Jr., 19, he believed was a threat to his 17-year-old son when he saw Doaks' car parked on his private driveway. Coincidentally, the man's female companion was a relative of the woman who had served as the basis for The Liberation of Lord Byron Jones. He also contributed guest columns to USA Today in 1989 and 1990 after changing from politically liberal to conservative.
He was initially indicted on a charge of first degree murder by a Gibson County Grand Jury and released on $20,000 bond at the preliminary hearing.
He eventually returned to Nashville where, severely depressed following open-heart surgery and the publication of his collected letters, he died by suicide on June 1, 1996.
Novels
Mountains of Gilead The Liberation of Lord Byron Jones The Feast of Saint Barnabas- ''The Raider''
Short fiction
- ''Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men''
Other
The Conversion of Buster Drumwright- ''Mister Potter and His Bank''
Stories
| Title | Publication | Collected in |
| "The Surest Thing in Show Business" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "A Strange Sky" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "How the Mountains Are" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Beyond the Sunset" aka "Safe at Last" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Trout" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Cow" aka "Foxy" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Cave" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Trial" | The Atlantic | - |
| "Look Down, Look Down" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "To the Open Water" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Messenger" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Monday Morning, Mazatlan" | Shenandoah | - |
| "The Britches Thief" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Bitter Bread" | The Reporter | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Whenever I Left Carver Hill" | The Delta Review | - |
| "Duplicate Monday Nights" | The Georgia Review | - |
| "Wild Honey" aka "The Bee Tree" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Highwayman" | The Paris Review 10 | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Act of Self-Defense" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Savage Sound" | The Atlantic | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Winterkill" | Esquire | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "The Rabbit" | The Delta Review | Fishes, Birds and Sons of Men |
| "Gudliev" | The Delta Review | - |
| "The Collector" | The Atlantic | - |
| "The Doctor" | The Atlantic | - |
| "Destruction" | Esquire | - |
| "The Debt" | The Atlantic | - |
| "Big Boy" | The Atlantic | - |
| "The Jail" | Playboy | - |