The Wises is a Post Office street directory, you paid to go in it so its not always conclusive that a person was in NZ
The Almanac a similar early list and there are other driectories by different companies
There are early directory rolls that wre usually dependent on a person owning property, so again not always a help
Many libraries in NZ and overseas such as Aus have fiche of these records and some pay per view sites have some early directories.
The quickest way would be to get the death certificate printout, although early and often lacking info, it may have more definite info on life in NZ, residence, etc
Someone who has had an early death cert may tell us how much info they got (1869)
Bye
Althea
there are lots of early wellington records on this iste
but can't spot John so far, your eyes may have more luck
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~babznz/Nzlinks.htmlhttp://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~babznz/electoral.html