Henry Walter (antiquary)

Henry Walter (1785–1859) was an English cleric and antiquary.

Born at Louth, Lincolnshire on 28 January 1785, he was the eldest son of James Walter, master of Louth grammar school and later rector of Market Rasen. The Walter family was connected to the Austens: James Walter's father William-Hampson Walter was step-brother to George Austen, father of Jane Austen.

Henry Walter was admitted to St John's College, Cambridge, on 1 March 1802, and graduated B.A. in 1806, classed as second wrangler in the Mathematical Tripos, behind Frederick Pollock. He was also junior Smith's prizeman. He was elected fellow and tutor of his college, retaining his fellowship until his marriage in 1824; commenced M. A. in 1809; and proceeded to the degree of B.D. in 1816.

In 1810 Walter visited Hawkstone Park, and much later (1852) published an account of the celebrated "hermit of Hawkstone". This revealed that a paid poor man, who acted the part, had at some point been replaced by a stuffed dummy.

Walter was appointed professor of natural philosophy at the East India Company College in 1816. He travelled in 1817 with Hugh Percy, 3rd Duke of Northumberland, who had been one of his pupils at Cambridge. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on 11 November 1819.

On 7 May 1821 Walter was instituted as rector of Hazelbury Bryan in Dorset, on the presentation of the Duke of Northumberland. He held his two positions together until 1830. Michael Pakenham Edgeworth, a pupil at the College right at the end of Walter's time there, reported home in letters that Walter had the nickname "Bobby". He also found him anti-Catholic, as were colleagues including Joseph Batten and Charles Webb Le Bas.

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