Joseph Dresser Tetley (1825 – 1878)[1] was a member of the New Zealand Legislative Council from 8 July 1867 to 19 June 1869. His family were from Clervaux, at Croft, in Yorkshire,[2] though he was born a little further south, at Topcliffe.[3]
Tetley represented the Picton electorate on the Marlborough Provincial Council from 5 January 1867 to 13 January 1869.[7] In July 1867, Tetley was—alongside John Hyde Harris—appointed to the Legislative Council.[8] He resigned from the Legislative Council in 1869,[9] upon fleeing the country to escape his creditors. One of them blamed another Parliamentarian, Nathaniel Levin, and a well-publicised defamation case followed.[5] Tetley may have gone to Paraguay.[3] There was a report that his wife died in Panama and that he returned to England.[10] More probably, he lived at Colonia, in Uruguay, and died there in 1878.[11]