He was born at Carlisle, the son of Robert Ferguson, Esq and his wife Anne daughter of John Wood Esq of Maryport, and was educated at Carlisle grammar school.
He was made President of the Chamber of Commerce in Carlisle in 1833 on the reform of the franchise.
He was "of decidedly liberal opinions; in favour of parliamentary reform, opposed to the Maynooth Grant".
The Maynooth Grant, to an Irish catholic seminary, had been rejected by Peel's Conservative government, but in 1847 post-famine was accepted by Lord John Russell's Whig government.
Ferguson voted for the ballot of 1853 during the Adullamite Cave crisis.