Heritage Register
Hillside-Quadra
1290 Topaz Avenue
Built
1920
Heritage-Designated 2012
For: James T. & Bella McHattie
ARCHITECTURE:
This is an Edwardian 1½-storey house with a front-facing
gable on Topaz, but the main entrance is on the
right side on The Rise (formerly Jones St). Houses at
intersections were sometimes given important façades on
both aspects. In the gable of the Topaz façade are three
windows in a shallow box bay. A full-width verandah sits
below the gable. There is an angled bay on the right and a
pair of French doors on the left. The verandah has square
balusters and a centrally-located, bracketed overhang off
the balustrade. The arches and battered posts are similar to
those on The Rise.
There is a full-width
gable on the left
side of the house,
and on the main
floor, a shallow,
cantilevered box
bay with a small
window just below
its shed roof.
The Rise façade
has a pair of gabled
dormers separated
by a shed roof. The gabled porch, offset below the dormers,
has flattened arches and two tapered wooden posts on
stone piers; the alustrades are also of stone. On the right
side of the front door are small vertical windows, and on
the left, on either side of the exterior chimney, are two
small, horizontal, leaded art glass windows. The tall brick
chimney is shouldered and corbelled. There is a second
chimney towards the centre rear. There is a shed-roofed
extension at the rear of the house.
The property includes a granite garden wall and a
period garage on The Rise.
The house has been stuccoed.
Much of the considerable Arts & Crafts interior
woodwork is intact and retains its original finishes. This includes a living-dining area divided by an open arch with
built-in bookcases, sideboards and cupboards with leaded
glass, fireplaces, box-beams and wainscoting. One room
was “papered” with leather or snake-skin in the panels.
The small entry hall has wainscoting and pierced decoration
in the stair balusters.
ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:
1920-32: The 1920 Building Permit shows James
McHattie building at this address for $3,000. A 1922
Plumbing
Permit bears the
same name. This
is confirmed
by the City
Assessment
Rolls, which
record McHattie
making
$3,000-worth of
improvements
to the property
(i.e. the house),
in 1920/21. Although
the style
of the house is
pre-WWI, the
pre-WWI Street
Directories do
not show houses on this block of Topaz or of The Rise. This
address first appears in the 1924 Directory, occupied by
James McHattie, foreman of the Pacific Construction Co on
Admirals Rd, and later foreman for Baker Brick & Tile Co
at Douglas and Tolmie. As McHattie was in construction, he
may have had access to architect’s plans, and conceivably
held over plans from the 1910s until after the war. James
Touch McHattie (b. SCT 1887-1952) and Bella Fraser (née
Sheret, b. SCT 1887-1973) arrived in Canada in 1906 and
1913 respectively, and were married in Victoria in 1914.
Bella was working as a saleswoman when they married.
Later they lived at 1681 Keating Cross Rd until their deaths.
OTHER OCCUPANTS:
1933-39: Owners/renters included: Henry and Jane
Jones; Henry was a Victoria City policeman. Music teacher
Alma Beryle (née Hayton) and Cecil Merrit Bradley, manager
for Prudential Life Assurance, married in Vancouver
in 1933. Dr. William J. Endicott, his wife Viola M., and
daughter Mary, who was a school teacher. Inga (née Steffanson)
and Leo Eugene Evenden, credit manager for HBC.
Blanche (née Sampson) and Harry Skellett Bentham, a
meatcutter at Cross’s Stores Ltd and later a butcher at James
Bay Meat Market.
1940-44: John Trevelyan Gawthrop (b. London,
ENG 1894-1955) and Marie Josephine (née Costigan, b.
Calgary, AB 1893-1965). John was a Relief Investigator
for the BC Government and then business manager
for Colquitz Mental Home until his death.
1945: Ann
and John J. Jamison, who was employed at VMD during
WWII.
1946-2010: Sydney Robert Lewis Ernest Alfred Tribe Knott (b. Calgary, AB 1908-1982) and Muriel Clarice (née
Rogers, b. Sudbury, ON 1914-2010) married in Victoria in
1930. The Knotts had four children: Lewis, Clarice, Sylvia
and Helene. Sydney operated and worked in several gas
stations including Knott & Elford Service Gas & Oil at 2664 Douglas, later the Humber Green BA station. He had
retired by 1968. Muriel continued to live in the house until
shortly before her death in 2010.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION & IMAGES:
• Map of Victoria Heritage Register Properties
• Hillside-Quadra History
• Hillside-Quadra Heritage Register
• This Old House, Victoria's Heritage Neighbourhoods,
Volume Three: Rockland, Burnside, Harris Green,
Hillside-Quadra,
North Park & Oaklands