Born on July 12, 1837, in Martinsburg to Martha Crawford Abell Hunter (1812-1890), the wife of Edmund P. Hunter (1809-1854) who was a prominent lawyer in what became the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia in Robert's lifetime, twice served as one of Berkeley County's delegates in the Virginia House of Delegates and owned the Martinsburg Gazette.
His first bride was his brother in law's sister, Mary Clifton Harrison Hunter (1839-1862); both mother and infant son died in 1862.
Residents of Berkeley County (generally those serving in the Confederate military such as Hunter, since West Virginians as a whole approved statehood despite the Jones-Imboden Raid) elected Hunter and re-elected veteran politician Israel Robinson to represent them in the Virginia House of Delegates in Richmond (though Robinson died during this term and was replaced by fellow Stonewall Brigade officer William B.
By 1866, he bought the Winchester Times (which Goldsborough & Clark had established the previous year), and transformed it into a weekly with marked Democratic views.
In February 1867 Hunter took Jefferson County native and Confederate 12th Virginia Cavalry veteran Henry D. Beall (1837-1902) as a partner.
Meanwhile, in 1874, Frederick County voters elected Hunter to serve as one of their two delegates, alongside veteran politician John F. Wall, but the following year neither won re-election.
[8] However, by 1900 he, his third wife and youngest son E. P. Hunter (whose occupation was listed as "clerk"), lived in Alexandria, Virginia, with easy train access to both Washington and Richmond.
[9] Meanwhile, on March 13, 1884, Virginia's General Assembly passed an act to compile a roster of Virginians who served in the Confederate military, but the project was neither funded, nor completed, so additional legislation was passed on January 25, 1898 and March 6, 1900 directing local Commissioners of Revenue (in each of Virginia's counties) to compile such lists.
[11] The Virginia General Assembly passed legislation expanding the small office and reappointing Hunter as secretary (with a salary) on February 20, 1906 and again on March 9, 1908.