John Hunter (Royal Navy Officer) - Overview

Overview

John Hunter was born in Leith, Scotland, the son of William Hunter, a captain in the merchant service, and Helen, née Drummond, daughter of J. Drummond a lord provost of Edinburgh. As a boy Hunter was sent to live with an uncle in the town of Lynn in Norfolk, where, and also at Edinburgh, he received the classical education of the time. Hunter was sent to University of Edinburgh, but soon left it to join the navy as a captain's servant to Thomas Knackston in HMS Grampus. In 1755 he was enrolled as able seaman on the Centaur, became a midshipman and served on the Union and then the Neptune. Hunter passed examinations and qualified for promotion to lieutenant in February 1760. He was not, however, appointed lieutenant until 1780. When the preparation of the First Fleet was in progress, he was made second-in-command on HMS Sirius. The captain of that ship, Arthur Phillip, was in command of the new colony of New South Wales. Hunter carried a dormant commission as successor to Phillip if he should have died or was absent. As with many of the First Fleet officers, he had fought in the American Revolutionary War (1775 to 1783).

An expedition to explore the Parramatta River was led by Hunter early in 1788. This expedition explored and made soundings as far as Iron Cove, Five Dock Bay and Hen and Chicken Bay on the Parramatta River. The Sir William Dixson Research Library in Sydney holds the original copy of the chart of the expedition, entitled Chart of the coasts and harbours of Botany-Bay, Port-Jackson and Broken-Bay, as survey'd by Capt.n John Hunter of H.M.S. Sirius. The expedition was significant because it may have marked the first contact to take place between the British and the Indigenous owners of the land, the Wangal Clan, in 1788. William Bradley's log says that this contact took place while Hunter was having breakfast and is remembered in the name of the suburb, Breakfast Point.

After the loss of HMS Sirius off Norfolk Island, Hunter returned to England in 1792, and there he prepared for publication his interesting An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island, With the Discoveries That Have Been Made in New South Wales and the Southern Ocean Since the Publication of Phillip's Voyage, published at the beginning of 1793. An abridged edition appeared later in the same year. In the first edition of this work is found the earliest reference to the possibility of there being a strait between the mainland and Tasmania. On page 126 Hunter says: "There is reason thence to believe, that there is in that space either a very deep gulf, or a straight, which may separate Van Diemen's Land from New Holland." Whilst in England, Hunter saw service in the war with France. With Arthur Phillip's resignation from the governorship of New South Wales in July 1793, Hunter applied for the position in October and was appointed governor in January 1794. Various delays occurred, and it was not until February 1795 that he was able to sail. Hunter arrived at Sydney on 7 September 1795 on HMS Reliance and took up the office of governor on 11 September 1795.

When the platypus was first discovered by Europeans in 1798, a pelt and sketch were sent back to the United Kingdom by John Hunter