John Bevan (politician)

Bevan was born in Jersey on the Channel Islands in 1837[1] into a Welsh family.[2] He received his education at Jersey Grammar School and emigrated to Victoria in Australia in 1857 before moving to Hokitika in New Zealand in circa 1865.[1][2] He entered a partnership with Michael Pollock and they traded as auctioneers and merchants under the banner of Pollock and Bevan in Hokitika's Revell Street.[2][3] He remained in Hokitika for the rest of his life.[4]

Bevan belonged to many organisations. He was a longstanding member of the Westland Board of Education and for some time was the board's chairman. He was a member of the High School Board. He was a member of the Westland Land Board and got voted onto the Hokitika Borough Council. He was president of the Westland Hospital Board of Trustees. He was a Visiting Justice to Hokitika Prison and an official visitor to the local mental hospital.[4]

Bevan contested the 1884 election in the Hokitika electorate against the incumbent, Gerard George Fitzgerald, and James Clarke. Fitzgerald, a brother of prominent politician James FitzGerald, had lived in Hokitika until 1880 but was a newspaper editor in Wanganui by the time he was elected in 1881 and remained a North Island resident. Bevan had a 4 percentage point margin over Fitzgerald, with Clarke coming a distant third.[5] He represented the Hokitika electorate until 1887, when he was defeated by Joseph Grimmond 830 votes to 610.[6][7]

Bevan was a District Grand Master of Freemasons in Westland.[8]

On 7 May 1900, Bevan married the widow Anne Clery (née Handley) at All Saints' Church.[9] Bevan suffered a long and serious illness in 1909 and never fully recovered from it.[4] He died at Hokitika on 16 July 1911[10] aged 74.[4] He was survived by his wife Anne[11] and two stepchildren.[4] His funeral at Hokitika Cemetery was an Anglican service with Masonic ceremony, largely attended by Freemasons from throughout Westland.[12] Anne Bevan died in Dunedin in 1928.[13]