Larger-than-life ladies' man

A passionate affair played out in former Otago Daily Times editor Geoff Adams' house. Now he has written the book.

Nobody remembers Judge Ward. When told I was writing a book on him, friends often asked if he was the man "blown up by a parcel bomb" in a Stuart St office in 1962. That was solicitor James Ward - and the judge was not related to Sir Joseph Ward.

My Ward was a courageous, bearded giant, famous in his time, with a reputation of being very much a "ladies' man". And he figured in national courtroom and political sensations.

Arriving in Wellington in 1854, Charles Dudley Robert Ward ("Dudley" to friends) started to practise law, and in the following year became MP for Wellington Country in New Zealand's Second Parliament.

He worked closely with his friend, William Fox, but ended his political career in 1858 and soon was acting as a magistrate, moving his bulky 17-stone (108kg) frame round a North Island circuit on horseback. Later he rose to become a District Court judge in various southern districts.

By 1869 Ward was acting in Dunedin as Supreme Court judge and had risen to sufficient standing in the town to figure prominently in the huge funeral procession for Johnny Jones, whaler, early settler and entrepreneur. In that year he became chairman of the committee to organise a major fine arts exhibition, was elected first president of the Otago Institute (forerunner of the Royal Society) and appointed as a member of the first Otago University Council.

His wife, Anne, was also welcomed into the city, the Otago Daily Times publishing this tribute from the Wellington Independent newspaper: "Mrs Ward's benevolence has been of the most active kind, and many a poor family will miss her when she is gone".

Later she achieved celebrity status as first national president of the Women's Christian Temperance Union, travelling round the country to set up branches and as an ardent suffragist with campaigner Kate Sheppard. Anne died in Christchurch in 1896, three years after women were granted the vote.

Researching the judge began back in 1984 when my wife and I moved into our house. A neighbour passed on a rumour that the residence was the oldest in that part of Maori Hill and had been "bought by a judge for his mistress". Amused by this, I began delving into records and became amazed as facts slowly emerged.

I am not a historian, but was twice a proud winner of national awards for investigative journalism in my early days as a reporter and my enthusiasm for determined sleuthing returned. I kept finding great stories about Judge Ward, a colossal "Viking" figure of a man - six and a-half feet (2m) tall, with bulky build and rugged visage fringed by reddish locks and beard - and his two wives.

In 1869 Ward received verbatim coverage in the ODT delivering the inaugural lecture for the Otago Institute. It included a long discussion of spiritualism and associated phenomena, all the rage at the time, along with discussion of Darwin's new theories. The reporter observed that Ward's audience "included a considerable number of ladies who appeared to take a lively interest in proceedings".

Responding to a vote of thanks, the Judge stated "so fair an audience might have led me into most unphilosophical digressions". He added that of all forms of prayer "that which springs most naturally to my lips is the old Arab formula 'Praise Allah for beautiful women'."

His mistress could have been one of that fair audience. This was Francis Ellen Talbot, born in Yorkshire. She went to Australia with her mother as a 3-year-old and migrated solo to New Zealand aged 16 in 1867.

Talbot was to become famous as the writer, Thorpe Talbot, in both countries, and then England and the US when she won a rich prize in an Australian newspaper's novel-writing competition with her book Philiberta in 1881. It was taken up by a London publisher and listed with bestsellers by Dickens, Trollope, Mark Twain and others - including Mrs Beeton, of cookery fame.