ARCHITECTURE:
Ridgway-Wilson’s 2½-storey British Arts & Crafts house combines elements of the Queen Anne and Tudor Revival styles. The asymmetrical design has a deep, side-ridged, hipped roof and a dormer between two front-facing gables on either side of the main entrance. On the left is a jettied, pedimented gable over an angled bay; on the right the gable is above a three-storey rectangular bay. A small oriel bay on long brackets capped by an angled roof is located on the far right. Maclure added a flat-roofed “Coach Porch” with plain brick pillars in front of the main entrance. The chunky eave brackets are a continuation of the original brackets on the right bay. There are gables on the other three sides and a dormer on the left. The bargeboards on the front and rear gables have appliquéd decoration. An elaborate verandah which begins at the entrance wraps around the left side of the house; it has multiple brackets, clusters of ornate, square, reverse-tapered columns, and sawn balusters. Originally three sets of double-doors led out onto the verandah; only one set remains.
The foundation and main floor are brick, the upper storeys are half-timbered. There are two styles of decorative shingles on the oriel wall, the wall above the entrance and the bay below the left front gable. There are many elaborate corbelled Queen Anne chimneys. There are now attached buildings on the right side and at the rear. The house cost the Bostocks $15,000.
ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:
1894-1900: Hewitt Bostock (b. Surrey, ENG 1864-1930) and Lizzie Jean McCrombie (née Cowie, b. Marylebone, London, ENG 1867-1942). He graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1885, came to Canada in 1886 and bought a ranch at Monte Creek near Kamloops, BC. [Schuhum comes from sts’xwum, literally ‘peel bark off bush’ the Shuswap name applied to Monte Creek.*] He returned to ENG to marry in 1890. He came back to Canada, came here in 1893 and built Schuhum. He and Walter Nichol (1759 Rockland Av) founded The Province in 1894, a weekly Victoria paper, moving it to Vancouver in 1898 as a daily. In 1896 Bostock was elected MP for Yale-Cariboo and in 1904 appointed Senator for Victoria although he had already sold Schuhum and was living on his Monte Creek ranch. He was Speaker of the House from 1922 until his death. Daughter Marion Noel (b. ENG 1891-1975) obtained her MD at London, England School of Medicine, and in 1922 went to India as a medical missionary. She married banker Victor Sherman (b. ENG 1882-1960) in 1928 and in 1936 they retired to Miramar, 2901 Seaview Rd (Designated Heritage) on Ten Mile Point in Saanich.
*Bouchard & Kennedy, 1995
OTHER OCCUPANTS:
Tenants: 1898-1901: H. Hirschel Cohen of the Cassiar Central Railway Co, and managing director of the African-BC Corp Ltd of London, a large shareholder in CCRC. The CCRC was built in 1898 to carry gold out of Cassiar.
1900-01: Arthur Philip Luxton (b. Brushford, ENG 1863-1924) of Davie, Pooley & Luxton, Barristers & Solicitors. He later lived at 1663 Rockland Av.
Owners: 1901-11: Hon. James Douglas Prentice (b. Lanarkshire, SCT 1861-1911) married Mabel Clare (née Galpin, b. Datchet, Bucks, ENG 1868-1930) here in 1897. [Her brother was Walter Galpin, her sister was Beatrice Holland]. He was educated in Edinburgh and came to Canada c.1888. Abank clerk, then a rancher in Lillooet, BC, he was elected MLA for Lillooet in 1898 and 1900. When here the family lived at Braeside, 1731 Rockland Av. They moved to Schuhum after he became Prov. Sec. in the Dunsmuir administration in 1900, then Min. Fin. in 1901. Son Cmdr. James Douglas Prentice, DSO, RN (b. Victoria 1899-1979) was cited for for bravery at sea in 1942 on Canadian corvette, Chambly after a successful encounter with a Nazi submarine.
1912-50: William Agnew (b. Co. Down, IRL 1848-1922) and Emma Johnson (née Waterous, b. Brantford, ON 1849-1917 [William hired Samuel Maclure to design her tombstone]) retired here in 1912. He came to Canada in 1856 and lived in ON, where he and Emma married. They moving to Montréal where he was a wholesale silk importer. Their only son, Major Augustus Waterous Agnew (b. Montréal 1884-1916) served with 3rd Pioneer Btn, CEF, WWI, and was KIAin Battle of the Somme, FR, September 1916. He is buried in Contay British Cemetery near Amiens. Daughter Martha Clara “Kathleen” (b. Montréal 1880-1967) remained in the house. Educated in Germany and France, she was fluent in both languages.A noted philanthropist, she was named Victoria’s Good Citizen in 1957. She supported the YWCA, YMCA, Girl Guides and Boy Scouts. Apatron of the arts, she willed her entire library to University of Victoria, and many paintings to Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (AGGV, 1040 Moss St).
1950-2004: Kathleen donated Schuhum to the Anglican Church as Caroline Macklem Home for Anglican Women. It closed in 1999. Controversy ensued when so-called Baron George von Bothmer zu Schwegerhoff, aka George C. Davis, signed a 99-year lease with Anglican Church Women’s Society for $1 a year in 2000. An out-of-court settlement was reached, George left Canada and the house was sold in 2004.