Hunt, the second child of Thomas William Hunt and Hannah Soper, was born in Lockport, New York. His parents were strict disciplinarians, but their punishments had little effect on him; as he later recalled, he "took pleasure in disobeying their commands." For example, he loved swimming and had an uncommon ability for it. Of his frequent excursions, many of them would be to go swimming. His mother soon forbade him to and sewed up the collars and sleeves of his clothes so that he could not strip for swimming, but that did not stop him; he would just swim with his clothes on and run in the sun until he was dry or rip open his clothes and get some older girls to sew them up for him again.