HUNT, John II, of Barnstaple, Devon.

There were at this time two inhabitants of Barnstaple called John Hunt, they being father and son. It is most likely to have been the father who served the borough in Parliament.But the contrary opinion is given in Trans. Devon Assoc. lxxi. 260. John Hunt senior, who traded in wine and was also a clothier, was a member of the merchant guild of St. Nicholas. He had been one of 11 burgesses who in 1378 had joined the mayor in granting a lease of the town’s bakery, and it was with an equally select group that he served as a trustee of property granted to meet the cost of repairs to the long bridge. Although he was a collector of dues for the town and occasionally witnessed deeds there, he is not known to have occupied any of the more important local offices. However, at Whitsun 1390 he rode with John Bidewell and another Barnstaple man to the sessions of the peace at Exeter on a matter concerning the commonalty.E101/338/11, 122/40/23; C146/10042; North Devon Athenaeum, Barnstaple, deeds 629, 834, 928, 931, 3972 f. 2; A7. On 12 Oct. 1407, eight days before Parliament assembled at Gloucester, and probably after Hunt’s election as representative for Barnstaple, he was appointed by Sir John Tiptoft, the chief butler, as his deputy in the river mouth of the Taw and at Ilfracombe; and only two months after the Parliament was dissolved he was given a similar post at Dartmouth.

He died before June 1415, when his widow and his son purchased, for £8, a house opposite the guildhall and backing on to North Street. Hunt’s other property was later given by his grandson, Henry, to Master John Holman, as a benefaction to St. Anne’s chapel.Barnstaple deeds 474, 475, 477, 489, 492, 496; Trans. Devon Assoc. lxxx. 155.