Baillie , William Hunter , 1797-1894 , barrister

William Hunter Baillie was born on 14 September 1797 in London, the son of Matthew Baillie, the morbid anatomist, and his wife Sophia, the daughter of Dr Thomas Denman, physician. His great-uncles were the celebrated anatomists William and John Hunter. He studied at Balliol College, Oxford, from 1815, becoming BA in 1819 and MA in 1823.

William Hunter Baillie was called to the Bar, but never practiced as a barrister. Instead he lived as a gentleman of leisure and Squire of the Manor of Duntisbourne Abbots, Gloucestershire.

He grew close to his aunt, Joanna Baillie, the poet and dramatist, after his father died in 1823, moving in the same literary circles. He was interested in the family history of the Hunter-Baillies, and spent a considerable amount of time and expense gathering together the family's papers, from correspondence to ancient title deeds and other legal instruments, in order to establish the pedigree of the family. William Hunter Baillie also encouraged his aunt, Joanna Baillie, to write her memoirs.

William Hunter Baillie married Henrietta Duff, daughter of the Revd. Dr Duff of St Andrews, in 1835. They had eight children, five of whom, three sons and two daughters, died before he did, the other son surviving for just three months after William Hunter Baillie's death. Henrietta died on 3 February 1857. William Hunter Baillie died on 24 December 1894, at the age of 97.