George Ward Hunt

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The Rt Hon. George Ward Hunt

George Ward Hunt (30 July 1825 – 29 July 1877) was a British Conservative Party politician and statesman, Chancellor of the Exchequer and First Lord of the Admiralty in 1st and 2nd ministries of Benjamin Disraeli.

He was born at Buckhurst in Berkshire, the only surviving son of a minister, and graduated from Christ Church, Oxford, in 1851, and 21 November of that year was called to the bar at the Inner Temple. He married Alice Eden, daughter of a bishop, in 1857, and finally entered the House of Commons as Member of Parliament for Northamptonshire North, at the end of the year, having made several unsuccessful attempts previously.

He was a Secretary to the Treasury from 1866 to 1868, in the ministry of the 14th Earl of Derby. He was then appointed to the Exchequer when Disraeli took office.

By repute, when he presented his one and only Budget speech to parliament he discovered that he had left the ministerial "Red Box" containing it at home. This is said to be the start of the tradition that, when a Chancellor leaves for the House of Commons on Budget Day, he shows the assembled crowd the box by holding it aloft.

Hunt was appointed to the Admiralty for Disraeli's second ministry, serving from 1874 until his death from gout in 1877.

Although he was considered competent at finance, his turn at the Admiralty was not much admired. A very heavy-set person, he is said to have been responsible for the semicircle that is cut out from the end of the table in the Admiralty Board Room.

His residence was Wadenhoe House in Northamptonshire.

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Augustus Stafford William Cecil	Member of Parliament for Northamptonshire North 2-seat constituency (with William Cecil, to 1867 Sackville George Stopford-Sackville, from 1867) 1857–1877	Succeeded by Sackville George Stopford-Sackville Brownlow Cecil
Political offices
Preceded by Benjamin Disraeli	Chancellor of the Exchequer 1868	Succeeded by Robert Lowe
Preceded by George Joachim Goschen	First Lord of the Admiralty 1874–1877	Succeeded by William Henry Smith