Birth : Alaine HUNT. Marriage : SA Biograph Dir.
Death: SA Biograph Dir; Alaine HUNT. SA Biograph Dir gives birth 1863.

Before leaving England, Matthew had worked with his father as a tenant farmer on the estate of the Duke of Westminster. When he sailed for SA on the 'Malcolm David' in 1848, he had great hopes that the new colony would afford a good living fo a man with a knowledge of agriculture; but he soon discovered that farming in this unfamiliar land was very different from farming in the lush English countryside. Initially Hunt was forced to make a scant living from growing wheat and stripping wattle bark, which had to be carried over the steep hills to Myponga Beach to be taken off by ship. Farmland was cultivated by bullock drawn single furrow ploughs, and with the hard labour of turning virgin soil into arable, there was little time left for recreation except for the occasional foot or hurdle race, or a picnic sports day. Despite their initial poverty, the couple raised a family of eight on a Myponga property, Retreat Farm. Over the years the farm prospered and diversified to include sheep and cattle. On retirement, Matthew left the management of Retreat Farm to his son George, and went to live at Inman Valley. [Yankalilla & District Sketchbook – Ken Whitford]