Hunt

Chevalier of the Legion of Honor. He was
elected a member of the Societe Centrale des
Architects and was an honorary and correspond-
ing member of the Royal Institute of British
Architects and of the Society of Engineers and
Architects of Vienna. In 1893 he was awarded
the Queen's Gold Medal by the Royal Institute
of British Architects. He championed the theory
of better education for the architect. Early
American architecture grew up with the colo-
nies. Many builders and wood carvers with
natural talent and books brought over from
England designed and constructed beautiful
buildings in an adapted Georgian style, but, as
they passed away, their places were taken by
builders of a more speculative character and
without real tradition. In the nineteenth cen-
tury a bastard Romanesque became fashionable
and an enormous number of buildings were con-
structed by men without knowledge and without
ability. While there were marked exceptions to
this, it was chiefly through Hunt's personality
and example that realization of the defects of
American architecture and of the need for more
thorough training of its votaries took form.
Hunt went farther by establishing a studio in
his own office after the fashion of the French
architects and actually taught some of the men
who later received his mantle. It is for this, even
more than for the buildings which he designed,
that the monument erected to his memory on
Fifth Avenue opposite the site of the Old Lenox
Library is an expressive and merited tribute to
his talent

[Henry Van Brunt, "Richard Morris Hunt," Proc.
Twenty-ninth Ann. Convention Am. Inst. of Architects
OSss). pp. 71-89; Montgomery Schuyler, "A Review
of the Works of Richard Morris Hunt/1 Architectural
Record, Oct-Dec. 1895; Barr Ferree, "Richard Morris
Hunt: His Art and Work," Architecture and Building,
Dec. 7, 1895; P. B. Wright, Richard Morris Hunt;
Ferdinand Schevill, Karl Bitter (1917) ; Annuary of
the Am. Inst. of Architects; "Architectural Appreci-
ations . . . The New Metropolitan Museum of Art/*
Architectural Recordf Aug. 1902; Architects' and Me-
chanics' Jour.t Apr. 6, 1861; Gas Logic, Aug. 1924.;
T, B. Wyman, Geneal of the Name and Family of Hunt
(1862-63); J. V. Van Pelt, A Monograph of the Wm«
K. Vanderbilt House (1925); N. Y. Tribune, Aug.^ i,
1895; letters and records preserved by the Hunt family»
including Hunt's diary of his trip up the Nile in 1852.]

J.V.V-P.

HUNT, ROBERT (c. 1568-1608), clergyman
of the Church of England, was chaplain of the
expedition which founded Jamestown, Va., and
ministered to the settlers until his death. That he
held a living in Sussex at the time the expe-
dition was organized is indicated by the fact that
in November 1606 a patent was issued to Richard
Hakluyt "and to Robert Hunt clerk M.A. vicar
of the parish church of Heathfield co. Suss, dioa

Hunt

Chichester," permitting them "full and free li-
cense" to go to Virginia and, without giving up
their parishes in England, to hold "one or more
benefices, church dignities, or cures in the said
parts of Virginia or America" (G. B. Parks,
Richard Hakhiyt and the English Voyages, 1928,
p. 256). Hunt became vicar of Heathfield in
1602. One month before the expedition sailed he
made a will. A comparison of the signature with
that on the parish records of Reculver, County
Kent, proves that Robert Hunt of Heathfield was
the same Robert Hunt who was vicar of Recul-
ver from 1594 to 1602, and not son of the latter,
as has been frequently conjectured. The will also
reveals that he had a wife, Elizabeth, a son,
Thomas, and a daughter, Elizabeth. The wife
was Elizabeth Edwards of St. Margarets, Can-
terbury, whom he married in 1597 (Virginia
Magazine of History and Biography, October
*9*7t P- 412). Certain conditions imposed upon
his bequest to her indicate an unhappy state of
affairs in the home, which may have had some-
thing to do with his desire to go to America. In
1603 he had become a student in Trinity Hall,
Cambridge, it being recorded under July 6 of
that year that "Robertas Hunt electus Scholaris
Dris Hervye ad I2d" (Warren's Book, 1911, ed.
by A. W. W. Dale). He proceeded LLB. in
1606 (C. H. and Thompson Cooper, Athenae
Cantabrigienses, vol. II, 1861, pp. 493-94)*
While no conclusive proof is at hand, dates and
other circumstances make it possible that he is
the person referred to in the Alumni Oxomenses
as "Hunte, Robert of Hants, pleb. Magdalen Hall
matric. 14 Feb. 1588-9, aged 20; B. A. 23 Nov.
1592, M. A. 4 July 1595" (Joseph Foster, Alum-
ni Oxonienses, early series, 1891, II, 772). Ac-
cording to Capt Edward-Maria Wingfield, the
first president of the Council in Virginia, it was
at his suggestion that Hunt was chosen to go to
Virginia. "For my firste worke (W^ was to
make a right choice of a spirituall pastor) I
appeale to the remembraunce of my La of Caunt.
his grace, who gaue me very gracious audience
in my request And the world knoweth whome
I took w1* me: truly, in my opinion, a man not
any waie to be touched w*11 the rebellious hu-
mors of a popish spirit, nor blemished w^ ye
least suspicion of a factius Scismatick, whereof
I had spiall care" ("A Discourse of Virginia,"
Archaeologia Americana: Transactions and Col-
lections of the American Antiquarian Society,
vol. IV, 1860, p. 102). John Smith, however,
says that the position was offered to Richard
Hakluyt, prebend of Westminister, "who by his
authority sent master Robert Hunt, an honest,
religious, and couragious Divine" ("Adwtise-

39 *