Greenbrier County, West Virginia Biography of JOHN ANDERSON HUNTER, M. D. This file was submitted by Valerie Crook, E-mail address: The submitter does not have a connection to the subject of this sketch. This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. All other rights reserved. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the WVGenWeb Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/wv/wvfiles.htm The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 617-618 JOHN ANDERSON HUNTER, M. D. A life marked by ex- alted personal and professional stewardship and by able, generous and kindly service in behalf of his fellow men was that of the honored pioneer physician and surgeon to whom this brief memoir is dedicated and who was a resi- dent of Lewisburg, Greenbrier County, at the time of his death, April 17, 1873. Doctor Hunter was born in what is now Greenbrier County, West Virginia, and the date of his nativity was April 15, 1818. He was a son of Henry B. and Elizabeth Gratton (Anderson) Hunter, whose marriage was solemnized January 31, 1810, other publications of standard order giv- ing adequate record of the life of Henry B. Hunter and of the family history. Doctor Hunter was of staunch Scotch- Irish ancestry. His maternal grandfather, John Anderson, was one of the first elders in the historic old stone Presby- terian Church at Lewisburg, he having settled on land granted to him, on Greenbrier RBiver, for services rendered as a patriot soldier in the war of the Revolution, in which he won the rank of captain. Captain Anderson wedded Elizabeth Turpin Davis on the 7th of January, 1761, and their daughter Elizabeth Gratton (Mrs. Henry B. Hunter), was born September 11, 1778. Captain John Anderson gave to his daughter, Elizabeth, a part of his fine old estate on the Greenbrier River, and at the death of the daughter the property passed to her sons, John Anderson (subject of this memoir) and Henry Fielding. Much of the preliminary education of Dr. John A. Hunter was received under the able preceptorship of Doctor Mc- Elhenny at the Lewisburg Academy, one of the historic old institutions of what is now West Virginia. Later he received from Washington College (now Washington and Lee University), at Lexington, Virginia, his degree of Bachelor of Arts, and after his return home he read medicine under the direction of Dr. Moorman for three years. He then entered the celebrated old Jefferson Medical College in the City of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and in the same he was graduated, with high honors, on the 26th of March, 1842. After thus receiving his degree of Doctor of Medicine he engaged in the practice of his profession at Blue Sulphur Springs, in the present Greenbrier County, West Virginia, that place having been at that time a famous resort for representative people of Virginia and other Southern states. After several years of successful prac- tice at that point Doctor Hunter established his residence and professional headquarters at Lewisburg, where he con- tinued his benignant ministrations in his profession during the remainder of his active career, save for the period of his service in connection with the Civil war. Doctor Hunter was a loyal and ardent supporter of the policies and attitude of Virginia in the climacteric period leading up to the Civil war, and when secession of the Southern states finally resulted and the war between the North and the South was instituted, he forthwith tendered his services to the Confederate government. He went forth as surgeon with Capt. Robert F. Dennis in the Twenty- estimtae has been written: " In the long list of distinguished were his services in this connection that he was advanced to the responsible office of medical director of the Army of Virginia. Of his record in this connection the following estimate has been wrtten [sic]: "In the long list of distinguished surgeons in the Confederate Army none contribued [sic] more indefatigably than he to the improvement and completion of the system of medical and hospital discipline instituted by the surgeon general-a system which for order and symmetry and judicious arrangement has no parallel in the annals of war." Faithful and effective service was given by Doctor Hunter in this connection, and upon the close of the war he accepted with characteristic poise and potent equinimity the changed order of affairs and girded himself for further helpfulness to his home community and state and his loved Southland. He returned to Lewisburg, and here he con- tinued his humane mission in the service of those in affliction and distress, never failing to heed the call of suffering and ever standing ready to give his professional aid to the most lowly as well as to those of high estate. Gentle, tolerant, unselfish, benevolent and kindly, his heart was attuned to that fine chord of sympathy which expresses it- self in human helpfulness, and he was guide, counselor and friend in the community, as well as the faithful and efficient physician and surgeon whose stewardship took slight thought of the emolument that might attend his ministrations. The poor found him always ready to aid and succor, and his personal and civic ideals were of the highest. He was the courteous, urbane and dignified gentleman of the fine old Southern regime, was a devout churchman, was affiliated prominently with the Masonic fraternity, and as a citizen was liberal and public-spirited. To him was accorded the affection, regard and the high esteem of the community in which he long lived and wrought to goodly ends, and it is pleasing to offer in this volume a tribute to the memory of this noble man and distinguished physician. On the 3d of January, 1859, was solemnized the marriage of Doctor Hunter and Miss Rebecca Agnes Dickson, whose old home, near White Sulphur Springs, is known as Moun- tain Home and is now owned by her brother, Henry Feazier Dickson. Mrs. Hunter long survived her husband and was eighty-seven years of age at the time of her death, which occurred at the home of her son, Henry Feazier Hunter, at Lewisburg, on the 24th of April, 1917, her memory being revered by all who came within the compass of her gentle and gracious influence. Of the four children the eldest, Sarah R., became the wife of Henderson Bell, she being deceased; John C. was the elder son; Bettie G. is the wife of Robert W. Cabell, and they have two children. Henry F., the surviving son, is individually mentioned in appending paragraphs.