William Barnard Rhodes (1807 - 1878)

Born 4 May 1807 in Epworth, Lincolnshire, England

Ancestors

Husband of Sarah King — married 7 May 1852 in Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

Husband of Sarah Anne Moorhouse — married 29 Nov 1869 in Merivale, Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand

Descendants

Died 11 Feb 1878 at age 70 in Wadestown, Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

William Rhodes is Notable.

Biography

William was born in 1807. He was the son of William Rhodes and Theodosia Heaton. He passed away in 1878.

Extract from The Moorhouse Family Tree

William Barnard Rhodes, merchant of Te Arc House and the Grange, Highland Park, Wellington, and of Heaton Park, Rangitikei. The Hon. W.B. Rhodes represented Wellington City in the third and fourth Wellington Provincial Councils, from 22nd. April 1861 to 4th. May 1869, and was a member of the House of Representatives for Wellinton County in the first Parliament from 18th August 1853 to15th Sep. 1855, he also represent4d Wellington City in the 2nd. and 3rd. Parliaments from 27th. July 1858 to 27th. Jan. 1866. He was called to the Legislative Council in August 1871, and died 11th February 1878, and was buried in the Bolton St. Cemetery, Wellington

Sources

The Moorhouse Family Tree currently lodged in the Library of the Canterbury Museum, Christchurch, New Zealand compiled by Wm. D Ferguson in 1932.

England, Select Births and Christenings, 1538-1975

• William Barnard Rhodes, Gender Male, Baptism Date 09 May 1807, Baptism Place Epworth, Lincoln, England, Father William Rhodes,Mother Theodosia, FHL Film Number 1542186

Encyclopedia of New Zealand

• William Barnard, oldest of the family, led the way to New Zealand and encouraged his brothers to follow. To one brother he wrote this advice, and it seems to have been adopted as a pattern of behaviour by the others, judging by their success: “You must be enterprising, obliging, and not afraid of hard work, nor show any improper pride. Above all things avoid Public Houses and whores.” Before coming to New Zealand, William traded to various parts of the world in the brig Harriet, of which he was captain and part owner. In July 1836, on his first visit to New Zealand, he sailed into Port Cooper, now Lyttelton Harbour, in the barque Australian, a whaler belonging to a Sydney firm in which he became partner. During that visit he climbed the Port Hills and wrote the first recorded description of the Canterbury Plains. Rhodes returned to New Zealand in the barque Eleanor in November 1839, bringing 40 Durham cattle with which to establish the first cattle station in the South Island. The animals were swum ashore near Akaroa. Two early settlers, William Green and his wife, were brought from Sydney and left to tend the stock. Rhodes then sailed up the east coast of the North Island and established trading posts in Hawke's Bay and Poverty Bay, claiming the land in the trading posts in the name of his firm, Cooper, Holt, and Rhodes. Late in 1840 Rhodes established himself on the foreshore opposite what is now Courtenay Place, Wellington, and built the first wharf there, trading as W. B. Rhodes and Co., but he also continued to take up land in the North Island and, in partnership with two brothers, shared the South Island properties. His Wellington land included a sheep run on the hills of the present Wadestown and Highland Park, extending to Kaiwharawhara; another of 30,000 acres, Heaton Park, was near Bulls. Rhodes, whose interests were wide and diverse, built a large house known as “The Grange” at Wadestown and lived there until he died on 11 February 1878. W. B. Rhodes was twice married, but his only family was a daughter, Mary Ann, by a Maori woman. She contested her father's will, took it to the Privy Council, and was awarded “upwards of three-quarters of a million pounds”. This daughter married William Moorhouse in England, and their eldest son, William Barnard Rhodes Moorhouse, who legally adopted the name Rhodes Moorhouse, was the first airman to gain the Victoria Cross, which he won during the 1914–18 War. W. B. Rhodes was not distinguished as a public benefactor, despite his wealth, and was much criticised on that score. He was a member of the House of Representatives from 1853 to 1866, member of the Wellington Provincial Council, 1861–69, and of the Legislative Council, 1871–78. He was founder of the New Zealand Shipping Co., the New Zealand Insurance Co., and the Bank of New Zealand. He claimed for his firm an area of land estimated at 1,000,000 acres in Hawke's Bay, but these claims were disallowed.

Dictionary of New Zealand

• William Barnard Rhodes was baptised in Epworth, Lincolnshire, England, on 9 May 1807, the eldest son of Theodosia Maria Heaton and her husband, William Rhodes, a prosperous Yorkshire-born tenant farmer.

Dictionary of New Zealand

• On 7 May 1852 William Rhodes married Sarah King in Wellington. After her death in 1862 he married Sarah Anne Moorhouse on 29 November 1869 at Christchurch. No children were born from these marriages but Rhodes had one daughter, Mary Ann, with an unknown Maori woman.

Papers Past

• MARRIAGE. Rhodes-Moorhouse.— November 29, at St. Mary's Church, Merivale, by the Very Rev. the Dean of Christchurch, Wm. Bernard Rhodes, Esq., J.P., of Wellington, eldest son of William Rhodes, Esq, of Balby, Yorkshire, to Sarah Ann, second daughter of the late William Moorhouse, Esq, J.P., Knottingsley, Yorkshire.