Early Life
Richmond was born in London, England, the son of Christopher Richmond, barrister and his wife, Maria Wilson. He was educated at Hackney Grammar School, at Hove House, Brighton and at the school attached to University College London. He was apprenticed to the engineer Samuel Clegg and from 1845 served on the staff of Isambard Kingdom Brunel for three years working on the Great Western Railway in southern England.
Richmond emigrated to New Zealand with his younger brother Henry Richmond on the Victory on 3 October 1850. The ship arrived in Auckland in February 1851 and the two walked south to Taranaki where they purchased a few acres near the home of their aunt Helen, who had married John Hursthouse and had also settled in Taranaki. Eventually members of the Richmond, Hursthouse, Atkinson and Ronald families, who were related by marriage, all settled near one another in the area.
Richmond returned to England in 1854 and married Mary Smith on 21 August 1856 before returning to New Zealand on the Kenilworth, which arrived in New Plymouth on 8 July 1857.
Read more about this topic: James Crowe Richmond
Famous quotes related to early life:
“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)