Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Hunt, Roger

617336Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 28 — Hunt, Roger1891William Arthur Jobson Archbold

HUNT, ROGER (fl. 1433), speaker of the House of Commons, may have belonged to the same family as the Thomas Hunt who was prior of Walsingham in 1455 (Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, i. 347, cp. i. 443). He was probably the son of Roger Hunt who was attornatus regis in 1406; he lived at Chalverston in Bedfordshire. He was returned to the House of Commons as member for the county of Bedford in 1414 and 1420, and afterwards sat for Huntingdonshire until 1433. In 1420 he became speaker, and held the office for that session and for the session of 1433; in the latter year the plague necessitated a prorogation. Hunt was a lawyer, and was counsel for John Mowbray, the earl-marshal, against the representative of the Earl of Warwick in 1425 in a dispute as to precedence. In 1438 he became a baron of the exchequer, and in 1433 a grant of 200l. was made to him from the customs of London. Hunt was married, and left a son Roger.

[Manning's Lives of the Speakers, p.65; Foss's Judges of England, p. 358; Return of Members of Parliament, vol. i.]

W. A. J. A.