William Henry Hunt (diplomat)

William Henry Hunt (1869–1951) was an African-American diplomat, one of the few black people in the United States diplomatic corps (foreign service) during the 19th century.

William Henry Hunt, Jr.
Born	June 29, 1869 Nashville, Tennessee
Died	December 19, 1951 Washington, D.C.
Resting place	Lincoln Memorial Cemetery (Suitland, Maryland, USA)
Education	Williams College
Occupation	Diplomat
Spouse(s)	Ida Alexander Gibbs
Relatives	Father-in-law, Mifflin Wistar Gibbs

Born in Tennessee, Hunt moved north where he was educated at Williams College. He was befriended by Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, who hired him as an aide for his 1897 consular posting in Madagascar. Hunt was appointed to succeed Gibbs there, and went on to serve at posts in France, Portugal, Guadeloupe and Liberia, retiring in 1932. He settled in Arkansas, where he became active in law and politics.

Life

William Hunt was born in 1869 in Tennessee. He was of mixed heritage, as was his mother, whose father is believed to be a white planter who served as vice president.[1] Through a series of lucky encounters, he acquired a patron and was educated at Lawrence Academy in Massachusetts. He enrolled as one of three African-American students at Williams College in Massachusetts in the 1880s.[2]

During this period he met his future wife, Ida Alexander Gibbs about 1889.[1] She introduced him to her father, Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, a judge who was appointed as United States Consul to Madagascar in 1897 and hired Hunt as his aide.[2]

In 1904, Hunt married Ida Alexander Gibbs (1862-1957) at #14 N Street, NW in Washington, D.C.[2][3] She had been educated at Oberlin College and was a friend and colleague of W. E. B. Du Bois. Ida Gibbs Hunt and Du Bois worked together on the Pan-African Congresses held in Europe in the 1910s and 1920s. In 1923 in London, she gave a talk on "The Colored Races and the League of Nations." [2]

Hunt served in the United States diplomatic corps in Madagascar, France (in Saint-Etienne from 1906 to 1927), Portugal, Guadeloupe and Liberia, retiring in 1932. His later career included law and politics in Arkansas.[2]

Claude McKay refers in his Harlem Renaissance novel Banjo (1929) to a "Negroid" consul working at an American consulate in a "town near Lyon," France (likely intended to refer to Hunt).[4]

References

1. Joel Dreyfuss, "A Black Power Couple in the Early 20th Century", The Root, 28 May 2010, accessed 5 January 2015
2. Martha A. Sandweiss, "Book review: 'Parallel Worlds: The Remarkable Gibbs-Hunt and the Enduring (In)significance of Melanin' by Adele Logan Alexander", Washington Post, 16 May 2010, accessed 5 January 2015
3. "Hunt, Ida Alexander Gibbs (1862-1957)", BlackPast.org.
4. Roberts, Brian (2013). Artistic Ambassadors: Literary and International Representation of the New Negro Era. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press. pp. 66–67.

Further reading

• "A Black Power Couple in the Early 20th Century", The Root
• BlackPast.org - Ida Alexander Gibbs Hunt
• Oberlin College Archives - photograph of Ida Alexander Gibbs Hunt
• William Henry Hunt Papers, Howard University Archives
• Mixed Race Studies - Adele Logan Alexander, Parallel Worlds: The Remarkable Gibbs-Hunts and the Enduring (In)significance of Melanin, University of Virginia Press, February 2010.
• "Husband and Wife Duo Paved the Way for Blacks in Diplomacy", NPR, 10 February 2010