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The first people to live in the place now known as Christchurch were Moa hunters.
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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.
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Captain James Cook in his ship the Endeavour first sighted the Canterbury peninsula.
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Captain William Wiseman, a flax trader, named the harbour (now known as Lyttelton Harbour) Port Cooper, after one of the owners of the Sydney trading firm, Cooper & Levy.
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1830 to 1832, the impact of European diseases, especially measles and influenza, killed hundreds of Maori
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The first attempt at settling on the plains was made by James Herriot of Sydney. He arrived with two small groups of farmers.
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Captain Owen Stanley of the Britomart raised the British flag at Akaroa, just before the arrival of sixty-three French colonists on the Comte de Paris.
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The first house on the Canterbury Plains, Riccarton. In 1843 the Deans brothers built this house.
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In November 1847 John Robert Godley and Edward Gibbon Wakefield met to plan the Canterbury settlement.
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The Canterbury Association was formed, and it was decided to name the capital city Christchurch after the college John Godley had gone to at Oxford University.
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The first of the ships, the Charlotte Jane, arrived in Lyttelton on the morning of December 16, 1850, and was met by Godley and Sir George and Lady Grey. The first ashore of the travellers, known as the Pilgrims, was James Edward Fitzgerald, who leapfrogged over Dr Alfred Barker, sitting in the prow of the rowing boat.
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The first ‘selection days’ to ballot sections of land in the new towns were held in February 1851. The most popular town sections at first were those in Lyttelton. Gradually the new arrivals moved over the Port Hills to Christchurch, and the town there grew.
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Under the new provincial system, Canterbury’s first superintendent was James Edward Fitzgerald. 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.
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The increase in the number of people living in the city led to serious public health problems. From 1872-75 there were epidemics of diptheria and whooping cough every year, and in the typhoid epidemic of 1875-76 152 people died in Christchurch. These diseases are all diseases of poverty - poor food and unhealthy living conditions.
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The new Christchurch Drainage Board decided to install a system of sewers in the central city. Building began in 1879, and the system started pumping in 1882.
