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New Plymouth, Taranaki's only city, was the region’s first Pākehā settlement and has always been the largest. Originally called Ngāmotu (the islands), the site of New Plymouth was occupied for hundreds of years by Māori. Pākehā traders set up a trading station at Ngāmotu in 1828, but it was not until 1841–42 that planned settlement by the Plymouth Company brought 868 immigrants from Devon and Cornwall in England to the ‘New‘ Plymouth.
Early Traders
John (Jacky) Love, master of the trading ship Adventure, and his first mate Richard (Dicky) Barrett arrived off Ngamotu (later New Plymouth) from Sydney, in February, 1828. They quickly formed good relationships with local hapu and iwi, and set up a trading post, trading muskets, ironware and trinkets for flax, maize, wheat and vegetables grown by local Te Atiawa. Both men married women from prominent Te Atiawa families. Love married Mereruru Te Hikanui from Ngati Te Whiti hapu. Barrett married Wakaiwa or Rawinia, also of Ngati Te Whiti hapu.
The First Settlers
The first of the town’s settlers arrived on the William Bryan, which anchored off the coast on 31 March 1841. In steerage were 21 married couples, 22 single adults and 70 children.
The second ship, Amelia Thompson, arrived off the Taranaki coast on 3 September and sat off shore for five weeks because its captain feared Ngamotu's reputation as a dangerous shipping area. Its 187 passengers were helped ashore by Barrett and his men over the course of two weeks, each small boatload taking five hours to row from the vessel to the shore.
As summer arrived, buildings began to be erected, gardens planted and wheat sown. Other ships soon arrived to provide more labour and food supplies: the Oriental (130 passengers) on 7 November 1841; the Timandra (202 passengers) on 23 February 1842; the Blenheim (138 passengers) on 19 November 1842; and the Essex (115 passengers) on 25 January 1843, by which time the town was described as a collection of raupo and pitsawn timber huts housing almost 1000 Europeans.
Mayors of New Plymouth
- Arthur Standish 1876–1878
- Albert Cracroft Fookes 1878–1879
- James Davidson 1879–1881
- William Bayly 1881–1884
- James Paul 1884–1886
- William Bayly 1886–1888
- John Barton Roy 1888–1889
- James Bellringer 1889–1893
- John Barton Roy 1893–1897
- Edward Dockrill 1897–1903
- Richard Cock 1903–1906
- Edward Dockrill 1906–1908
- Gustave Tisch 1908–1911
- G. W. Browne 1911–1914
- John Edward Wilson 1914–1915
- Charles Hayward Burgess 1915–1919
- James Clarke 1919–1920
- Frank Edwin Wilson 1920–1927
- H. Victor S. Griffiths 1927-1933
- Everard Robert Cranston Gilmour 1933–1953 New Plymouth's longest serving mayor
- Edward Hill 1953–1956
- Alfred Honnor 1956–1968
- Denis Sutherland 1968–1980
- David Lean 1980–1992
- Claire Stewart 1992–2001
- Peter Tennent 2001–2010
- Harry Duynhoven 2010–2013
- Andrew Judd 2013–