-
Period: Jan 1, 1000 to
First Inhabitants
The first people to live in the place now known as Christchurch were moa hunters, who probably arrived there as early as AD 1000. The hunters cleared large areas of mataī and tōtara forest by fire and by about 1450 the moa had been killed off.
North Island Māori (Ngati Māmoe and later Ngāi Tahu) arrived in Canterbury between 1500 and 1700. The remaining moa hunters were killed or taken into the tribes. -
Early European contact
On 16 February 1770 Captain James Cook in his ship the Endeavour first sighted the Canterbury peninsula. It was probably not until 1815 when sailors from the sealing ship Governor Bligh landed that Europeans first set foot on Banks Peninsula. -
The first European settlements
Captain William Rhodes first visited in 1836. He came back in 1839 and landed a herd of 50 cattle near Akaroa. The first attempt at settling on the plains was made by James Herriot of Sydney. He arrived with two small groups of farmers in April 1840. Their first crop was successful, but a plague of rats made them decide to leave. -
First Canterbury Settlement
In November 1847 John Robert Godley and Edward Gibbon Wakefield met to plan the Canterbury settlement. Wakefield believed that colonisation of countries like New Zealand could be organised in such a way that towns could be planned before settlers arrived. These towns would be like a community back in England, with landowners, small farmers and workers, and with churches, shops and schools. -
Kemp's deed
Governor Grey sent the land commissioner Henry Kemp to the South Island in 1848 to buy land for the new settlement. Sixteen Ngāi Tahu chiefs signed ‘Kemp’s Deed’, selling the larger part of their land for £2,000, but keeping some land for settlements and reserves, and those places where they gathered food (mahinga kai). This was signed at Akaroa on 12 June 1848. -
New Arrivals
In December Captain Joseph Thomas, a surveyor, was sent to Canterbury to choose a site for the Canterbury settlement, and prepare for the first settlers. By the time that John Robert Godley, leader of the Canterbury settlement arrived with his family on the Lady Nugent on 12 April 1850, Captain Thomas had built a jetty, customs house and barracks accommodation for the newly arrived settlers. -
Settling in
The ships stayed in the port at Lyttelton for several weeks while goods were unloaded. The passengers from the ships stayed in the Immigration Barracks, in tents, or V-huts (basic huts built quickly and simply).
The Deans brothers at Riccarton and the Rhodes brothers at Purau supplied goods (vegetables, dairy produce and mutton). -
Towards Independence
Within a year eight chartered Canterbury Association ships and another seven privately backed ships had arrived, bringing the population of the settlement to three thousand. Many new arrivals did not stay in town, but moved out onto the plains, where the land was good for sheep and cattle farming. Already Wakefield’s plan for a small farming community was no longer possible, and Godley managed to get the rules for leases of rural land changed so that larger blocks could be turned into ‘runs’. -
Canterbury: Now a province
Under the new provincial system, Canterbury’s first superintendent was James Edward Fitzgerald, elected on 20 July 1853. During the time he was superintendent, the sale of the back-country runs gave the Provincial Council a regular source of money. Canterbury prospered in these years, with wool exports steadily increasing the amount of money available in the province. -
Period: to
The Boom Years
Canterbury’s growing wealth and prosperity during the boom years of 1857-64 had a big effect on the city. More banks opened Christchurch branches (Bank of New South Wales in 1861, Bank of New Zealand in 1862, and the Bank of Australasia in 1864). New Zealand’s first telegraph opened in July 1863 between Christchurch and Lyttelton.