She was the wife of surgeon and anatomist John Hunter, whose anatomical collections in their home eventually formed the basis for the Hunterian Museum.

[4] Her son-in-law, Sir James Campbell of Inverneill, provided her with a small annuity, and in 1799 Parliament voted to give her £15,000 for her husband's collections, which finally placed her in fair circumstances.

As a young woman she had gained some note as a lyrical poet, her "Flower of the Forest" appearing in The Lark, an Edinburgh periodical, in 1765.

The conservative magazine British Critic suggests that her poems show no depth of thought, but have a natural feeling and simplicity of expression, which make many of them worth reading.

[6] Haydn set a number of her songs to music, including "My Mother bids me bind my Hair," originally written to an air of Pleyel's.