Page:The Dictionary of Australasian Biography.djvu/268

 a visit paid to the Mount Brown diggings in 1880.

Johnston, Andrew, Commissioner of Railways, Queensland, was born in 1852. He was engaged in the construction of the Settle and Carlisle and Shipley and Guiseley railways from 1869 to 1877, and from 1877 to 1881 he had the entire supervision of the Ely and Haddenham and St. Ives railway, and the Gottenburg tramways in Sweden. He was appointed engineer of the eastern division of the Great Eastern Railway in 1881, and in that position supervised the construction of many important works. In 1889 he was appointed to his present post.

Johnston, Alexander James, late Judge of the Supreme Court, New Zealand, eldest son of James S. Johnston, of Wood Hill, Kinnellar, co. Aberdeen, was born at Aberdeen on Jan. 15th, 1820, and educated at Marischal College, at King's College, London, and in Paris. He entered at Lincoln's Inn on Nov. 12th, 1838, and went to the Middle Temple on Dec 21st, 1842, being called to the bar on Jan. 27th, 1848. From 1843 to 1858 he practised on the northern circuit, and was Deputy-Recorder of Leeds in 1857. In 1855 he was selected as Puisne Judge of New Zealand, and arrived in the colony in the same year. Till 1875 he lived at Wellington, but subsequently in Christchurch. In 1867 and in 1884 he acted as Chief Justice. He was a member of the Statute Law Consolidation Commission in 1879. Judge Johnston was the author of "New Zealand Justice of the Peace," 1863; "Treatise on Powers, etc., and Magistrates, etc., in the Colony of New Zealand," and of "Notes on Native Affairs," published at the instance of (q.v.). He died on June 6th, 1888, whilst on a visit to London.

Johnston, Hon. James Stewart, was the only son of James Johnston, of the Paper Mills, Midcalder, near Edinburgh, and was born at that city in Feb. 1811. He studied for the medical profession at the university, but ultimately abandoned it, and went to the West Indies, where, after two years, his health broke down, and he returned to Scotland. In 1838 he went to Tasmania, where he received a Government appointment in the office of the Superintendent of Convicts. In 1840 Mr. Johnston left for Port Phillip (Victoria), and acting in a mercantile capacity, started an hotel in Melbourne, where he became a member of the City Council, and ultimately an alderman. He gave up hotel-keeping about 1846, and was elected one of the first representatives of the city of Melbourne in the Legislative Council, then the only chamber, Mr. (afterwards Sir John) and the late Mr. being his colleagues. About this time he went into partnership with the late Mr. (q.v.) in a cattle station near Dandenong, but the venture did not pay, and the partnership was dissolved, Mr. Johnston persuading Mr. Wilson to take to literary pursuits. Subsequently the two purchased the Melbourne Argus in equal co-partnership. The new venture did not at first pay better than the cattle station, and in 1852 Mr. Johnston sold his share to Mr. Gill, who resold it to Mr. Lauchlan Mackinnon, whose interests Mr. Johnston subsequently represented in the management of the Argus when Mr. Mackinnon went to Europe. In 1853 Mr. Johnston resigned his seat in the Legislative Council, and went to England, returning to Victoria in July 1858. Twelve months later he was elected a member of the Legislative Assembly under the new Constitution for the district of St. Kilda, and was re-elected on taking office in Nov. 1860 in the administration as Vice-President of the Board of Lands and Works and Commissioner of Public Works. Mr. Johnston and Mr. R. S. Anderson, then Commissioner of Customs, resigned simultaneously In Feb. 1861, and both joined the O'Shanassy Government in the same capacities in Nov. 1861, and held office till the latter Ministry retired in June 1863.

Johnston, Hon. John, M.L.C., was appointed a member of the Legislative Council of New Zealand in 1858. He was Minister without portfolio and a member of the Executive Council in the Stafford Administration from May 14th, 1866, to April 5th, 1867, Mr. Johnston, who was head of the firm of Johnston & Co., of Wellington, married Miss Charlotte Henrietta Hatton, and died on Nov. 16th, 1887.

Johnston, Robert Mackenzie, F.L.S., son of Lachlan Johnston, was born at Petty, near Inverness, in the north Highlands of Scotland, on Nov. 27th, 1844. His earlier years were spent in the railway service 352