Author: Caunter, Richard McDonald
Biography:
CAUNTER, Richard McDonald (or MacDonald) (1798-1879: Caunter)
A younger brother of John Hobart Caunter (q.v.), he was born on 22 Mar. 1798 at Prince of Wales Island (Penang), the son of George Caunter (1758-1811) the chief magistrate and sometime superintendent, and his wife Harriet Georgina Hutchings (1769-1798), who died in childbirth. His father drowned off Penang in 1811. He was baptised along with his twin sister Sarah Sparke Caunter (1798-1826) on 22 Nov. 1816 at St. Margaret’s, Westminster. In the same year he enlisted and travelled to India as Ensign in the 16th Lancers. He returned to England in 1820 and entered Sidney Sussex, Cambridge, where he prepared for the church. He went to Mauritius as chaplain to the Governor 1824-9 and on his return took the LLB degree. Thereafter he held various clerical positions in England, eventually holding the living of Drayton, Oxfordshire, 1862-78. He married Ann Harrison on 21 Mar. 1840 at Amberley, Sussex. They went on to have at least nine children. He died on 10 Mar. 1879 at Patcham, Brighton, and left an estate of under £100. His verse tragedy Attila (1832) also included "Cities" on the iniquities of city life and "Stanzas . . . after a Hurricane off the Cape of Good Hope." (findmypast.co.uk 7 Feb. 2021; CCEd; London Daily News 15 Mar. 1879; F. Lyde Caunter, Caunter Family History [1930] 78-79) AA
Other Names:
- the Rev. McDonald Caunter