HULL, ARTHUR FRANCIS BASSET (1862-1945)^1., public servant and naturalist, was born on 10 October 1862 at O'Brien's Bridge, Hobart Town, son of Hugh Munro Hull, coroner and later clerk of the House of Assembly, and his wife Margaret Basset, née Tremlett. Educated at the High School, Hobart, he was lamed by infantile paralysis at 15 and had to wear a surgical boot and use a walking-stick for the rest of his life.
From his boyhood Hull collected stamps and was an honorary fellow of the (Royal) Philatelic Society, London, from 1887. He published Stamps of Tasmania (London, 1890), The Postage Stamps … of New South Wales (London, 1911) and The Postage Stamps … of Queensland (1930). He contributed many articles on stamps, envelopes, wrappers, postcards and coins to journals, and edited the Australian Philatelist. In his later years he collected and annotated revenue stamps. He received many philatelic honours.
In 1883-89 Hull was a clerk in the registry of the Tasmanian Supreme Court. Secretary and treasurer of the Orpheus Club in the 1880s, he performed as a tenor and in plays; he worshipped and sang at St Andrew's Presbyterian Church. He also tried his hand at short stories and verse in A Strange Experience (1888).