Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 28.djvu/292

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Hunter
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Hunter

but many appear to be irretrievably lost, Surtees (Durham, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 161) pays a high tribute to the value of Hunter's labours. The greater portion of Hunter's library was sold to John Richardson, bookseller, of Durham, for about 350l. His cabinets of Roman antiquities and coins were acquired by the dean and chapter of Durham. Hunter was elected F.S.A. on 15 Dec. 1725 (Gough, List of Soc. Antiq., p. *4). Three letters from Lister to Hunter are printed in Nichols's `Literary Anecdotes,' ix. 690-1.

[Surtees's Durham, vol. i. pt. i. Introd. pp. 7-8, vol. ii. pp. 287-8; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. viii. 282-7.]

G. G.

HUNTER, Sir CLAUDIUS STEPHEN (1775–1851), lord mayor of London, born at Beech Hill, near Reading, 24 Feb. 1775, was youngest son of Henry Hunter (1739–1789) of Beech Hill, Berkshire, a barrister, by Mary, third daughter of William Sloane, the great-nephew of Sir Hans Sloane, bart. His sister Mary (d. 1847) was second wife of William Manning, M.P. for Leamington, and was thus mother of Cardinal Manning. He was educated at Newcome's school at Hackney, and afterwards by a protestant clergyman in Switzerland. He entered as a student of the Inner Temple, but was subsequently articled for five years to Beardsworth, Burley, & Moore, solicitors, of Lincoln's Inn. He commenced business in 1797 as a solicitor in Lincoln's Inn, in partnership with George Richards. A wealthy marriage in the same year proved of assistance, and his practice grew very large. He was solicitor to the commercial commissioners under the income duty acts, the London Dock Company, the Royal Institution, the Society for the Promotion of Religion and Virtue and Suppression of Vice, the Linnean Society, and the Royal Exchange Assurance Company. In September 1804 he was chosen alderman of the ward of Bassishaw, and then relinquished the general management of his business to his partner. Two years afterwards he was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the Royal east regiment of London militia (becoming colonel 10 Jan. 1810), and devoted much time to his regiment, which was occasionally called upon to serve at a distance from the metropolis. In June 1808 he was elected sheriff of London. He retired from business as a solicitor on 11 Jan. 1811, and was called to the bar. On 9 Nov. 1811 he became lord mayor of the city of London, when he revived all the ancient ceremonies worthy of renewal, and his pageant was exceptionally magnificent. He was created a baronet on 11 Dec. 1812 and made an honorary D.C.L. of the university of Oxford 23 June 1819. In 1835 he removed from the ward of Bassishaw to that of Bridge Without, and at the time of his death was the ‘father of the City.’ He died at Mortimer Hill, Reading, Berkshire, 20 April 1851. His first wife, whom he married 15 July 1797, Penelope Maria, only daughter of James Free, having died in 1840, he married again, on 25 Oct. 1841, Janet, second daughter of James Fenton of Hampstead; she died at Cambridge Terrace, Hyde Park, 21 Jan. 1859. By his first wife he had two sons and a daughter. His elder son John (1798–1842) left a son, Claudius Stephen Paul, who succeeded his grandfather in the baronetcy.

[Foster's Baronetage; Times, 11 Nov. 1811, p. 2; European Mag. September 1812, pp. 179–184, with portrait; Gent. Mag. July 1851, pp. 88–90; Illustrated London News, April 1851, p. 329.]

G. C. B.

HUNTER, GEORGE ORBY (1773? –1843), translator of Byron into French, was probably the English officer of the name who was appointed ensign in the old 100th foot in 1783, promoted lieutenant in the 7th royal fusiliers in 1785, and after holding the adjutancy of the latter corps for a few years, sold out of the army in February 1790. The name does not occur in either the English or Indian army lists from 1790 to 1843. The register of deaths at Dieppe shows that `Georges Orby Hunter, colonel of English infantry, of the supposed age of 70, parentage and wife unknown, and having his domicile at No. 6 Grande Rue, Dieppe, died there on 26 April 1843.' Hunter was engaged on a translation of Byron's works into French. He completed `The Giaour,' `Bride of Abydos,' 'Cain,' and the first 186 stanzas of `Don Juan.' The work was finished by M. Pascal Ramé, and was published, in three vols. 8vo, at Paris in 1845.

[Army Lists; Registre des Actes de Décès de la Ville de Dieppe at the Mairie of Dieppe; Œuvres de Byron, traduites de Orby Hunter et Pascal Ramé (Paris, 1845), preface. For incidental notices of the family of Orby Hunter, of Crowland, Lincolnshire, see Hunter, Robert, major-general; also Manning and Bray's Surrey, iii. 231; Gent. Mag. 1769 p. 511, 1791 pt. ii. p. 969; Hist. MSS. Comm. 8th Rep. i. 290-4.]

H. M. C.

HUNTER, HENRY (1741–1802), divine, born at Culross, Perthshire, on 25 Aug. 1741, was the fifth child of David and Agnes Hunter. In 1754 he was sent to the university of Edinburgh, and became tutor first to Alexander Boswell, afterwards lord Balmuto, and subsequently, in 1758, in the family