Dorchester Historical Society

Dorchester Illustration no. 2479    Henry W. Hunt

Henry Warren Hunt (1841- 1915?)

Hunt had a real estate office on Neponset Avenue not far from Neponset Circle.

The following is from American Series of Popular Biographies. Massachusetts Edition. Boston: Graves & Steinbarger, 1891.

Henry W. Hunt was educated in the Dorchester schools, graduating about the year 1859.

Subsequently, desiring to enter the navy, he studied at the Nautical School in Boston, and graduated in 1862 at the head of his class.  When the Civil War broke out, he was too young for a commission, although successfully passing examination; and accordingly he volunteered, and served on land and sea.  He participated in a number of spirited naval and land operations, and on one occasion received honorary mention from General Foster for daring work in helping to pick up torpedoes.  He also received a complimentary letter from Admiral Flusser.

Meanwhile his father had established stores in various parts of the interior of the South; and after the close of the war he went there to manage a number of these enterprises, penetrating into some of the roughest sections of the Southern country, then in an unsettled and turbulent condition.  After remaining South about two years, he returned to Massachusetts, and became interested in large business enterprises in company with prominent men of affairs, among them General Benjamin F. Butler, in which he was engaged for the next twenty years.

In 1875-76, when plans were forming for the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia, he was selected by the Massachusetts State Commissioners to arrange an exhibit representing the great marine interests of the State, a task for which he was exceptionally qualified, having an intimate acquaintance with their various features.  As a result of his efforts a most notable and unique collection was brought together, including models of the ocean and river craft used for purposes of commerce, the fisheries, war and pleasure, from the settlement of the colonies to modern times–models of a single-scull skiff to a ship of the line, of merchant vessels of a century ago and the swift clipper ships of  the forties an fifties, of historic warships, the old-style frigates, the ‘Constitution,’ the ‘Ohio,’ with an Ericsson monitor and the ‘Kearsage,’ of whaling-ships and ancient and modern fishing-vessels, of the first American steamer that ever weathered the passage of Cape Horn, of apparatus for life-saving, of a great variety of beautiful yachts–the whole constituting the most complete and extensive marine exhibit ever made at an international exhibition.

Captain Hunt had charge of the exhibit at Philadelphia, and he also took a leading part in the arrangement for the international regatta, introducing, among other striking features, a whale-boat race between crews composed of New Bedford whalers.  While in Philadelphia he became especially acquainted with the Russian and Brazilian commissioners; and at the close of the exhibition, during which he made himself useful to them in various ways, he accompanied the Russians on a tour through the principal cities of the country.  Subsequently the Emperor Dom Pedro offered him a position in the Brazilian navy, ans shortly after he received a similar offer from the Russian government.  Accepting the latter, he went to Russia towards the close of 1876, and, in recognition of the civilities he had shown the Russian commissioners in America, and services rendered by him, was decorated there by the czar with a gold medal representing the Order of Saint Stanislaus.  He remained in Russia several months, traveling extensively in the country, and then returned to the United States in May, 1878, as one of two special agents of the Russian government accredited with powers to assist in examining and selecting fast-sailing steam-craft to be fitted as cruisers for the Russian service in anticipation of war with England, at that time believed to be imminent.  Their advent and proceedings made a great commotion in American newspaper offices, and were the occasion of many sensational reports.”

During the Russian-Turkish War, Captain Hunt was chief-of-staff of the Russian admiral L.P. Semetschine.

Captain Hunt’s interest in marine matters has been constant, and this has been notably displayed in behalf of the National Museum at Washington, toward the upbuilding of which he has been a valued contributor.  He has in his possession letters expressing appreciation of his services in that direction, and requesting their continuance, from Professor Spencer Baird, of the Smithsonian Institution at Washington.  In 1885, when again abroad, he bore a letter from William E. Chandler, then Secretary of the Navy, under date of February 9, as follows:–

Captain Henry W. Hunt:

Sir,–During your proposed visit to Europe this department would be glad to receive from you any information which you may obtain concerning ships and all articles connected with their construction and use, also to receive your observations thereon.  At the time of the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, in 1876, your nautical exhibit in the Massachusetts section was highly commended; and further researches and efforts of yours in the same direction cannot fail to be of value.  Wishing you all possible success in your mission, I am

Very respectfully,

William E. Chandler,

Secretary of the Navy

In later years Captain Hunt has been engaged in large real estate operations.  During the period between 1890 and 1895 his conveyances included nearly a hundred valuable pieces of property in Norfolk County alone.  These were mainly to large investors and holders of trust funds.  In 1895, having acquired the interests of various owners of a tract of land in Squantum, with a deep-water front of two and a half miles and an area of over seven hundred and seventy acres, he carried through a deal with the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Company, by which this tract became a freight terminal for the system.  The same year he began the development of Harbor Bluffs, Hyannis, one of the largest and most beautiful tracts of shore property on the south shore of Cape Cod.  Captain Hunt is an experienced yachtsman, having been familiar with yachts from boyhood, and has long been prominently connected with local yacht clubs.  He now owns the fast schooner yacht “Breeze.”  He is a member of the Massachusetts Yacht Club, vice-president of the Hyannis Yacht Club, member of the Forty-fourth Regiment Association, of the Quincy Historical Society, of the Barnstable County Agricultural Society, and of the Society of Colonial Wars.  He also expects soon to become a member of the Sons of the Revolution.  In politics he is a Democrat.  He is unmarried.–Men of Progress, 1896.