Brigadier Henry Cecil John Hunt, Baron Hunt KG, CBE, DSO, PC (22 June 1910 - 8 November 1998) was a British military officer who is best known as the leader of the 1953 expedition to Mount Everest. Hunt was born in Marlborough, Wiltshire, England and was educated at Marlborough College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he was awarded the King's Gold Medal and the Anson Memorial Sword.

As a child, Hunt spent much holiday time in the Alps, learning some of the mountaineering skills he would later hone while taking part in several expeditions in the Himalaya while serving in India.

In 1931, Hunt returned to India as an officer in the King's Royal Rifle Corps. Upon returning to England in 1940, Hunt became chief instructor at the Commando Mountain and Snow Warfare School. In 1944, Hunt received the Distinguished Service Order after he rejoined the King's Royal Rifle Corps.

Hunt may have had an encounter with the alleged Abominable Snowman or Yeti of the Himalaya. One night, while camping in the Himalaya, he sensed the presence of a large animal near his tent. When he went out to investigate, he vaguely saw a large creature scurrying away. When later asked why he had not shot at it, he replied, "that would have been murder." On another occasion, in 1951, Hunt's team found and photographed mysterious footprints in the mountain snow allegedly made by the yeti.

In 1953, Hunt was chosen as the leader of the ninth British expedition to Mount Everest and the first to make a successful ascent. Hunt selected two climbing pairs to attempt to reach the summit. The first pair (Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans) turned back after becoming exhausted high on the mountain. The next day, the expedition made its second and final assault on the summit with second climbing pair. The summit was eventually reached at 11:30 am on 29 May 1953 by the New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay from Nepal climbing the South Col Route. News of the expedition's success reached London on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation.

Returning to Kathmandu a few days later, they discovered that Hillary was made a KBE, and Hunt a Knight Bachelor for their efforts.

Following his retirement from the army. Sir John Hunt became the first Director of the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. In 1966 he was made a life peer as Baron Hunt, of Llanfair Waterdine in Shropshire. He also became the first Chairman of the Parole Board.

He was created a Knight of the Garter in 1979.

Lord Hunt died in Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire aged 88 of natural causes.

* Hunt, John. The Ascent of Everest. Mountaineers' Books. ISBN 0-89886-361-9

In 1944, Hunt's mother Ethel engaged the suspected serial killer John Bodkin Adams as her doctor. The second time he visited her he enquired whether her affairs were "in good hands". She answered that she wasn't wealthy and decided not to call him again. Adams visited her however uninvited a day or two later and told her she was a most unsatisfactory patient and that she was slightly mentally deranged. Mrs Hunt asked him to leave at which he "became furious, bounded out of the house and slammed the gate".

Herbert Hannam, who investigated Adams' methods, considered this typical behaviour of the accused. Adams was found not guilty of murder in 1957, though pathologist Francis Camps suspected Adams of killing at least 163 patients. Of these, 132 had included Adams in their will.

Hunt House is a Primary Wing House at St Paul's School, Darjeeling in India, named in his honor.

* Brief biography of Lord Hunt * Brief biography on Imaging Everest * George Band, ‘Hunt, (Henry Cecil) John, Baron Hunt (1910–1998)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006, accessed 18 May 2007 *Cullen, Pamela V., "A Stranger in Blood: The Case Files on Dr John Bodkin Adams", London, Elliott & Thompson, 2006, ISBN 1-904027-19-9