Thomas William Hislop (8 April 1850 – 2 October 1925) was the Mayor of Wellington from 1905 to 1908, and had represented two South Island electorates in the New Zealand Parliament. Early life He was born in Kirknewton, West Lothian in 1850. His father, John Hislop, was the first secretary for Education in New Zealand. The family left Scotland in 1856 on the Strathmore and landed in Port Chalmers. They settled in East Taieri. He was educated by his father until the age of twelve, and then attended John Shaw's Grammar School (Albany Street, Dunedin), Dunedin High School and University of Otago, where he studied law. He was admitted as a barrister and solicitor in 1871, only a few months after his teacher from Shaw's Grammar, Robert Stout (who later became Premier and then Chief Justice). He practised as a lawyer in Oamaru (in a firm where he was a colleague of Stout ), in which town he resided until 1890. After the 1890 election defeat, he moved to Wellington, where he became a partner in the legal firm of Brandon and Hislop (later Brandon, Hislop and Johnston) with Alfred Brandon. Political career He was first elected for the Waitaki electorate in the 1876 general election, and was re-elected in 1879. He resigned on 28 April 1880 "for private reasons". He then represented Oamaru from an 1885 by-election to 1889, when he resigned from his two ministerial portfolios (effective 10 September 1889) and his parliamentary seat (effective 4 September 1889) over the Ward–Hislop Affair. He won the resulting 1889 by-election, but was defeated by Thomas Young Duncan at the next general election in 1890. He contested the 1896 general election in the Wellington Suburbs electorate, but was defeated by Thomas Wilford, with 2194 to 1942 votes. An election petition was filed one month after the election, accusing Wilford of bribery, illegal practices and not being properly registered as a voter himself. Therefore, it was argued, that only Hislop was properly registered, and should thus be returned. Wilford's election was declared invalid, but a by-election was called. Hislop declared that he would not stand in the by-election in favour of the opposition candidate Arthur Atkinson, who had come forth in the three-member Wellington electorate. Charles Wilson from the Liberal Party narrowly defeated Atkinson in the 1897 by-election, though. He was a member of the Atkinson Ministry from 1887 to 1891, holding