inclined to believe the worst about anyone with Confederate sympathies. The New York Times vilified Blackburn as "The Yellow Fever Fiend" and "a hideous devil". Historian Edward Steers concedes that the evidence against Blackburn was circumstantial, but in his book Blood on the Moon, he contends that enough evidence survives not only to prove Blackburn's involvement in the plot, but to show that high-ranking Confederate officials up to and including President Jefferson Davis were aware of, condoned, and financed it. As well as a violation of his Hippocratic Oath, Blackburn's plot was one of the earliest attempts at a refined biological warfare. Post-war humanitarian work After his acquittal, Blackburn remained in Canada to avoid arrest and prosecution by U.S. authorities. When he learned of a yellow fever outbreak in New Orleans and the Texas Gulf Coast, Blackburn wrote to President Andrew Johnson on September 4, 1867, asking permission to return to the U.S. and help treat the disease. Not waiting for Johnson's response—which never came—Blackburn returned to the U.S., arriving in Louisville on September 25, 1867, en route to New Orleans. After rendering aid during the epidemic, he and his family moved to an Arkansas plantation owned by his wife. No attempt to arrest Blackburn was made, and he returned to Kentucky with his family in early 1873. The family lived in Louisville's Galt House hotel, and Blackburn resumed his medical practice in that city. During a cholera epidemic in 1873, Blackburn rightly theorized that the disease was spread by the consumption of contaminated water, but most citizens accepted the competing theory that cholera was a miasmatic disease. This theory was espoused by Thomas S. Bell, a better-known physician in Louisville. Thousands died as a result of failing to heed Blackburn's advice to boil potentially contaminated water before drinking it. Blackburn's philanthropic work included treating victims of yellow fever outbreaks in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1873 and Fernandina, Florida, in 1877. He refused to accept compensation for his services in either city, but was presented with gifts from appreciative residents in both cases. Several southern newspapers also carried glowing accounts of Blackburn's service. Louisville's Courier-Journal carried an announcement of Blackburn's candidacy for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in Kentucky on February 11, 1878. It is not clear why, with only meager prior political experience, he decided to seek the office. He may have been influenced by the members of his family who