Elizabeth Fairburn Colenso

Elizabeth Fairburn Colenso (29 August 1821 – 2 September 1904) was a missionary, teacher and Bible translator in New Zealand.

Elizabeth Fairburn was born at the Church Missionary Society (CMS) station at Kerikeri, New Zealand, in 1821. She was the daughter of Sarah Tuckwell and her husband, William Fairburn.

In 1834 William Fairburn and his wife open a mission station at Puriri in the Thames district. Their five children, Richard (aged 15), Elizabeth (13), John (11), Edwin (7), and Esther (5), remained at Paihia where they attended the CMS school conducted by Marianne Williams.

Elizabeth became fluent in Māori, and in 1840, aged 19 years, was teaching the Maori children and young people at her father's mission station at Maraetai. When Bishop Selwyn visited the mission, he engaged Elizabeth to teach at St. John's College, which was then at the Waimate Mission. Here she met missionary and printer William Colenso. The pair married on 27 April 1843. Following Colenso's ordination as a deacon in September 1844 the couple, with their infant daughter Frances Mary (Fanny), established the Waitangi Mission at Ahuriri, Napier. In September 1845 Elizabeth went overland to the Rev. William Williams' mission station at Tūranga, Poverty Bay for the birth of her son Ridley Latimer (Latty).

After several unhappy years of marriage, Elizabeth became aware that William was the father of Wiremu, a child born in 1850 to Ripeka Meretene, a member of the household. In November 1851 her husband was suspended as a deacon, and in 1852 was dismissed from the mission as the consequence of his adultery. Only after William’s adultery became public knowledge in 1853 did the couple separate, though they never divorced. After her separation the CMS engaged Elizabeth to work as a teacher at the Kaitotehe Mission near Mount Taupiri in the Waikato.

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