 One member of the 9th New Jersey, 2nd Lieutenant Ethelbert Hubbs of Commack, Long Island, New York, chose to retire from the military in September 1863 to accept an appointment as a Special Agent of the Treasury Department, charged with administering the program on "Abandoned Lands and Plantations" in Craven County, North Carolina (The Freedmen's Bureau).Following his service with the Treasury Department, Hubbs remained in New Bern, North Carolina, for more than twenty years as editor and publisher of The New Bern Daily Times and proprietor of Hubbs & Co, General Store, in partnership with his brother Orlando Hubbs who served as Sheriff of Craven County and later in the United States Congress as Representative of the Eastern District of North Carolina.Both men were prominent in the Republican Party – the "party of Lincoln" – and in the Masonic Order.