Her father was a prominent local merchant who had invested in lumber yards and steamboats, taking advantage of Wheeling growing economic importance in the 1830s.
[1] By 1860, she had returned to Wheeling and joined her brother's practice, advertising her services as being specialized for women and children.
She continued to practice medicine, but was increasingly distracted by the war, and she was eventually summoned to court and charged with slandering a pro-Union woman.
Sources imply that her pro-Southern stance during the conflict also resulted in her being ostracized from the Northern medical community, as her name does not appear on all contemporary lists of female M.Ds.
[1] After the conclusion of the Civil War, Hughes continued to work as a physician in Wheeling, but sources have noted that mentions of her decrease after 1870.