FISHER, JAMES TEMPLE (1828-1905) was born at St Margaret's, Kent, and educated there. At the age of 16 he entered the Royal Navy, serving for some years on the China station. He was in Australia and is said to have visited New Zealand first in the Flying Childers in 1846. He was back in England in 1849 and his term of service having concluded, he emigrated with the Canterbury Pilgrims in the Charlotte Jane (1850). Fisher selected land in the Heathcote valley and farmed successfully for many years. There he first took a part in public life as a member of the Heathcote road board (of which he was chairman), the Waimakariri river board and later the Sydenham school committee. He represented Heathcote in the Provincial Council from 1870 until the abolition. In 1876 he was elected to Parliament for Heathcote, representing the agricultural electors as distinguished from the squatters. He sat until the end of 1881, when he was defeated by Wynn Williams. Fisher was Postmaster-general and Commissioner of Telegraphs in the Grey ministry (1877-79). In Parliament also he represented the agricultural settlers rather than the squatters and cast in his lot with Sir George Grey. He died on 3 Jan 1905.

Brett's Almanac, 1879; The Press and Lyttelton Times, 5 Jan 1905. Portrait: Parliament House

Reference: Volume 1, page 144

🌳 Further sources