An esteemed planter, politician, and military leader influential in the affairs of both South Carolina and Texas, James Hamilton (1786--1857) so declined in reputation during the last twenty years of his life that his home state refused to acknowledge him when he died. Robert Tinkler's superb, first-published biography of Hamilton conveys the enormous drama, dignity, and pathos that marked Hamilton's pursuit of the greatness achieved by his prominent Revolutionary-era forebears and his subsequent profound reversal brought on by debt.

While a member of Congress during the 1820s, Hamilton...