Albert Newell Hubbard was born on November 7, 1833, in Windsor, Massachusetts, to Edmund and Sally Hubbard. His father was a carpenter who owned $950 of real estate in 1850. He grew up in Windsor, and as one writer later observed, he “was brought up like most country boys of his time, receiving only a limited share of common school advantages.” Nonetheless, he “inherited considerable executive ability,” and he “went away to work at an early age.”
He married Venila Crittenden in Hawley, Massachusetts, on October 3, 1854, and they had four children: Aline, born around 1856; Albert Clarence, born around 1858; Elmer, born around 1867; and Eli, born around 1881. They lived in Windsor, and Hubbard worked as a farm laborer. By 1860, they owned $105 of personal property.
Hubbard enlisted in the Union army on July 19, 1862, and mustered in as a private in Company B of the 34th Massachusetts Infantry on August 1. The regiment took part in the General Philip Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley campaign, the siege of Petersburg, and the Appomattox campaign. He was wounded in the Battle of Cedar Creek on October 13, 1864, but he eventually recovered and rejoined the regiment. He eventually earned a promotion to sergeant. He remained devoted to the Union, telling his wife in September 1864, "I hope you may never know the horrors of war as the folks in this place [Virginia] do but it is the fruit of secesh and let it come till the last armed fo[rce] expires or returns to the support of the old flagg which we have sworn to protect." He mustered out in Richmond, Virginia, on June 16, 1865.
He returned to Windsor after the war and resumed his work as a farmer. By 1870, he owned $925 of real estate. He applied for a federal pension in December 1869 and eventually secured one at a rate of $12 per month. He joined the local Grand Army of the Republic post and served on Windsor’s school board for several years. He and Venila belonged to the Congregational church, and he acted as superintendent of the Sunday school. He remained in Windsor for the rest of his life, and he died there of liver and kidney disease on July 24, 1905.