New Zealand politician, lawyer and unionist
Alfred Humphrey Hindmarsh (18 April 1860 – 13 November 1918) was a New Zealand politician, lawyer, and unionist. He died in the 1918 influenza epidemic. He served as the first leader of the modern New Zealand Labour Party.
Early life.
Hindmarsh was born in Port Elliot, Australia, and was the grandson of Rear-Admiral John Hindmarsh, the first Governor of South Australia. His grandfather was recalled to England in 1838, but his father, also named John Hindmarsh, returned to South Australia and worked as a lawyer. Alfred Hindmarsh lost his mother when he was ten, and his father remarried. He was educated at St Peter's College in Adelaide.
The family moved to Napier, New Zealand, in 1878. Hindmarsh trained as a lawyer in Dunedin and was admitted to the bar in 1891, when he briefly worked in Christchurch at the Supreme Court (since renamed the High Court). He settled in Wellington, living in Derwent Street, Island Bay. While living there, he married Winifred Taylor on 3 October 1892. 
Taylor was his Irish housekeeper and the decision raised eyebrows among his relatives, considering her "under his station". The two had a loving relationship and Hindmarsh regarded the decision as reaffirming the rejection of the class system he was fighting against.
Early career.
Politically, Hindmarsh was left-wing (though his contemporaries never described him as being a true socialist) and held a number of positions in the local labour movement. 
Most notably, he headed the Wellington branch of the Seamen's Union during the internal disputes of the 1890s. In this role, he argued against the traditional alignment of unions with the governing Liberal Party, instead advocating an independent labour voice in Parliament. 
In 1901, Hindmarsh himself stood for the Wellington City Council but was unsuccessful, coming in third to last with only 2,028 votes. 
However, in 1905, backed by the new Independent Political Labour League (IPLL), which he had helped found, he was elected. He remained a city councillor until 1915. Between 1906 and 1907, he served as the League's president. 
In 1911, he was first elected to the Wellington Harbour Board as a representative of the Wellington City constituency.