Herbert Humphreys Hunter (18 November 1881 – 8 May 1915), LDS (Licentiate of Dental Surgery), DDS (Doctor of Dental Surgery), MACD (Member of the Australian College of Dentistry), a champion athlete, and an expert dental surgeon, was an

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

er who played with

Essendon Essendon may refer to: Australia *Electoral district of Essendon *Electoral district of Essendon and Flemington *Essendon, Victoria **Essendon railway station **Essendon Airport *Essendon Football Club in the Australian Football League United King ...

in the

Victorian Football League The Victorian Football League (VFL) is an Australian rules football league in Australia serving as one of the second-tier regional semi-professional competitions which sit underneath the fully professional Australian Football League (AFL). It ...

(VFL). He died in action at Gallipoli on 8 May 1915.

Family

He was one of five sons and five daughters of George Frederick Hunter (1832–1907), an English civil engineer born at

Ramsgate Ramsgate is a seaside resort, seaside town in the district of Thanet District, Thanet in east Kent, England. It was one of the great English seaside towns of the 19th century. In 2001 it had a population of about 40,000. In 2011, according to t ...

, who took over the established Kent Brewery, in McRae street, Bendigo, and Elizabeth Humphreys, whom he married on 11 September 1862. He was born in

Bendigo Bendigo ( ) is a city in Victoria, Australia, located in the Bendigo Valley near the geographical centre of the state and approximately north-west of Melbourne, the state capital. As of 2019, Bendigo had an urban population of 100,991, makin ...

(then known as Sandhurst), on 18 November 1881.

Education

Educated at

Caulfield Grammar School Caulfield Grammar School is an Independent school, independent, co-educational, Anglican Church of Australia, Anglican, International Baccalaureate, day school, day and boarding school, located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1881 as ...

and

Melbourne Grammar School (Pray and Work) , established = 1849 (on present site since 1858 - the celebrated date of foundation) , type = Independent, co-educational primary, single-sex boys secondary, day and boarding , denominatio ...

, he studied dentistry whilst resident at

Trinity College Trinity College may refer to: Australia * Trinity Anglican College, an Anglican coeducational primary and secondary school in , New South Wales * Trinity Catholic College, Auburn, a coeducational school in the inner-western suburbs of Sydney, New ...

at the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb nor ...

, where he gained the diploma for L.D.S. (Licentiate of Dental Surgery) in December 1904. He went on to continue his studies at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, where he gained a D.D.S. (Doctor of Dental Surgery) in 1906. He became a member of the Australian College of Dentistry in 1906, and was registered to practise in the State of Victoria on 20 December 1907. Whilst at the University of Pennsylvania he was admitted to the Delta Sigma Delta (ΔΣΔ) dental fraternity.

Sportsman

A sportsman with multiple talents, he was awarded a double Blue in football and athletics whilst at the University of Melbourne.

Footballer

Whilst still at Melbourne Grammar, he played three senior matches for Essendon. He made his debut, playing at centre, against Collingwood on 23 May 1900. The match was postponed from the previous Saturday (19 May), and was rescheduled for Wednesday, 23 May; a public holiday celebrating the Relief of the Siege of Mafeking. ''The Age'' noted that "Hunter, centre, Groves and Hastings on the wing formed a splendid centre line or Essendon. He played his second match, at centre, against Carlton on 26 May 1900, on a very wet ground which he did not handle well. and played his last match, again at centre, on 2 June 1900 against St Kilda. He immediately resumed schoolboy football, and returned to playing with Melbourne Grammar's First XVIII.

Athlete

On 4 January 1901, at a special "Commonwealth Celebration" championship competition, held at the

Sydney Cricket Ground The Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) is a sports stadium in Sydney, Australia. It is used for Test cricket, Test, One Day International and Twenty20 cricket, as well as, Australian rules football and occasionally for rugby league, rugby union and as ...

as part of the celebrations held to mark the proclamation of the

Federation of Australia The Federation of Australia was the process by which the six separate British self-governing colonies of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia (which also governed what is now the Northern Territory), and Western A ...

on 1 January 1901, competing for the Victorian Amateur Athletic Association, Hunter registered some outstanding performances, including: * First place: (Great Public Schools) Running Broad Jump Commonwealth Celebration Championship: 21 ft 11in (a world schoolboy's record) * First place: (Great Public Schools) 100 Yards Commonwealth Celebration Championship: 11sec. (Nigel Barker of N.S.W. came second). * First place: (Great Public Schools) 120 Yards Commonwealth Celebration Hurdles Championship: 17.6sec. * Second Place: (Open Age) 100 Yards Commonwealth Celebration Championship (winner's time 10.6 sec). * Second Place: (Open Age) Broad Jump Commonwealth Celebration Championship: 21 ft 4½in. Two days earlier, at the 33rd gathering of the Highland Society of New South Wales, also representing the V.A.A.A., and also at the Sydney Cricket Ground, he had taken the significant Open Age amateur sprinter's handicap "double": * First place (running off 5½ yards): "Hopetoun Sprint" 100 Yards Amateur Handicap (N.S.W.A.A.A.) Final: 9.8sec. * First place (running off 11½ yards): "Federation Plate" 200 Yards Amateur Handicap (N.S.W.A.A.A.) Final: 22.2sec.

Bendigo Hare and Hounds Club

In 1903, he was captain of the Bendigo Hare and Hounds athletics club.

Soldier

Prior to the Great War, Hunter had been a member of the 67th (Bendigo) Infantry Battalion, in the Citizens Military Forces. During his time with the Citizens Military Forces, he held the rank of

Second Lieutenant Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank. Australia The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until ...

(from 9 April 1908), Lieutenant (from 20 March 1911), and

Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

(from 1 July 1913). On 29 August 1914, he enlisted in the First A.I.F. His enlistment form was signed by

Lieutenant Colonel Lieutenant colonel ( , ) is a rank of commissioned officers in the armies, most marine forces and some air forces of the world, above a major and below a colonel. Several police forces in the United States use the rank of lieutenant colone ...

H. G. "Pompey" Elliott, who had raised the 7th Battalion in Bendigo, and had enlisted men from Western and Central Victoria. Elliot appointed Hunter a Captain in the 7th Battalion, First A.I.F., in charge of "G" Company; a company of men mainly enlisted from Bendigo and the wider Bendigo District. He was part of the Landing on Gallipoli on 25 April 1915; and was killed in action during the assault of Krithia, less than two weeks later, on 8 May 1915: "In the 7th, advancing precisely as they had been trained to do … Captain Hunter – a famous Victorian athlete – was wounded and then hit again and killed" (Bean, 1923, p. 29).

Remembered

Hunter has no known grave. He is commemorated amongst the 20,000 names at the

Helles Memorial The Helles Memorial is a Commonwealth War Graves Commission war memorial near Sedd el Bahr, in Turkey, on the headland at the tip of the Gallipoli peninsula overlooking the Dardanelles. It includes an obelisk which is over high. The memorial ...

University of Pennsylvania

In 1920, the following entry appeared in a supplement to the University of Pennsylvania's October 1920, Alumni Register:

H. H. Hunter Memorial Shield

In July 1920, a beautifully designed shield, now generally known as "the Hunter Shield", carved in

Australian blackwood ''Acacia melanoxylon'', commonly known as the Australian blackwood, is an ''Acacia'' species native in South eastern Australia. The species is also known as Blackwood, hickory, mudgerabah, Tasmanian blackwood, or blackwood acacia. The tree belon ...

by the prominent South Yarra artist, Mr Robert Prenzel, was presented to the Victorian Amateur Athletic Association (now known as Athletics Victoria) by Mr. M. P. (Marmion Percy) Adams, the author of ''The Rich Uncle from Fiji: and Some of his Relatives'' (1911), on behalf of a group of subscribers, to be a perpetual challenge trophy for the Association's annual track championship competition. The shield's carving depicts Hunter beating the (later) Olympian athlete Nigel Barker by six inches in the 1901 national championship 100 yards race. Beneath the carving is a copper representation of an open book, upon which the names of the annual winners could be displayed. Since 2001, when the

Victorian Athletic League The Victorian Athletic League organises professional footrunning events ranging from 70 to 3200 metres. The most famous of these events is the Stawell Gift which has been run since 1878 and hosts the richest footrace in Australia. Many other gifts a ...

was discontinued, the Hunter Shield represented the best performing male club in Victoria; and, since 2009, the winner is based on female and male performances at the open Victorian Championships.

H. H. Hunter Athlete of the Year

In 2008, Athletics Bendigo renamed its athlete of the year trophy "the H. H. Hunter Athlete of the Year" in Hunter's memory.'Chook' Caps Great Season, ''Bendigo Advertiser'', Wednesday, 24 September 2008.
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Footnotes

Sources

*
Essendon Football Club profile

Presentations to Bendigo Soldiers: Captain Hunter Honored, ''The Bendigonian'', (Tuesday, 8 September 1914), p.14.

Careers of the Fallen: Captain Herbert Humphreys Hunter, ''The Age'', (Monday, 24 May 1915), p.11.

Men of the Dardanelles: Captain H. H. Hunter, ''The Sydney Morning Herald'', (Tuesday, 25 May 1915), p.10.

Anon, "Bendigo Officer Killed: Captain H. H. Hunter: A Brilliant Athlete", ''The Bendigonian'', (Thursday, 27 May 1915), p.4.

Freeman, G.H., "In Memoriam: Captain H. H. Hunter", ''The Bendigonian'', (Thursday, 27 May 1915), p.4.

Anon, "Late Captain Hunter: Football League's Tribute", ''Bendigo Advertiser'', (Wednesday, 2 June 1915), p.7.

Anon, "Caulfield Grammar School: Roll of Honour", ''The Argus'', (Tuesday, 27 July 1915), p.8.

National Archives of Australia: World War I Service Record: Captain Herbert Humphreys Hunter

First World War Nominal Roll (26-066)

First World War Embarkation Roll

Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour: Herbert Humphreys Hunter
* Allen, H.W., "Hunter, Herbert Humphreys", p.lxv in Allen, H.W., ''Record of Active Service of Teachers, Graduates, Undergraduates, Officers and Servants in the European War, 1914–1918'', H.J. Green, Government Printer, (Melbourne), 1926. * Austin, R., "The Evolution of an AIF Battalion: the 7th Battalion at the Battles of Krithia (8 May 1915) and Lihons (10 August 1918)", ''Sabretache'', Vol.46, No.1, (March 2005), pp. 11–18. * Bean, C.E.W., ''The Story of Anzac: From 4 May 1915, to the evacuation of the Gallipoli Peninsula'', Angus and Robertson, (Sydney), 1923. * Holmesby, Russell & Main, Jim (2007). ''The Encyclopedia of AFL Footballers''. 7th ed. Melbourne: Bas Publishing. * Main, J. & Allen, D., "Hunter, Herbert", pp. 86–87 in Main, J. & Allen, D., ''Fallen – The Ultimate Heroes: Footballers Who Never Returned From War'', Crown Content, (Melbourne), 2002. * Maplestone, M., ''Flying Higher: History of the Essendon Football Club 1872–1996'', Essendon Football Club, (Melbourne), 1996. * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hunter, Herb 1881 births 1915 deaths Australian rules footballers from Bendigo Essendon Football Club players Australian military personnel killed in World War I People educated at Caulfield Grammar School People educated at Melbourne Grammar School People educated at Trinity College (University of Melbourne) Australian dentists University of Melbourne alumni University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine alumni 20th-century dentists 19th-century dentists Australian people of English descent