Heritage Register
James Bay

638 Battery Street

Built 1910
Heritage-Designated 1986

For: Albert & Bertha Bostock

Designer/Builder: James Moggey

ARCHITECTURE:

This 1½-storey, Arts & Crafts Shingle-style Bungalow is unusual because of its heavy front dormer. It is a side-gabled house which has an extended cat slide roof on its front slope to accommodate the oversized, bellcast, hip-roofed dormer. The dormer has a sleeping porch, a projecting balcony and sawn A&C balusters in its solid shingled balustrade. On the left side of the house is a shallow box bay and on the right side, a cantilevered box bay, both with hipped roofs. The offset front entry door has one square side light on the right; an angled bay sits to the left of the door. The recessed verandah has a shingled balustrade and arched, shingled posts. There are stained glass windows in the front entry and on the side bays. There is a corbelled brick chimney.

ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:

James Moggey (1868-1938) bought the property in 1910; he obtained the building permit in September 1910 for $2,500, and the plumbing permit in October. James Moggey was born in Grey County, ON of Irish immigrant parents; his family were early pioneers of High Bluff, MB, in 1881. He married Sarah “Sadie” Jane Trimble (b. Huron County, ON, 1876-1949) and they had a daughter in Cypress, MB, in 1901, before coming to Victoria in 1907. He worked as a contractor on his own projects, purchasing the lots before building the houses. At least 30 of his houses have been identified so far, this being the only one in James Bay. The earliest house we have found was built in 1908 in the Gonzalez area, and the rest are in Fairfield. He built a row of eight houses between 1913 and 1917 at 1216 to 1240 Oxford St, and five houses at 320, 324 and 328 Moss St and around the corner at 1271 and 1273 McKenzie St, all in 1912. For many years 324 Moss St was the home of the City of Victoria’s now-retired, long-time Heritage Planner, Steve Barber. That house and another three, 1220 Oxford St, 1271 McKenzie St, and 1034 Sutlej St, all have the oversized front dormer similar to that on 638 Battery St. James and Sadie Moggey lived for many years in the house James built in 1912, 234 Vancouver St, until his death in 1938; Sadie left the house two years later.

Moggey sold the property to Albert Bostock, with its newly-completed house, in 1911. Albert Homan Bostock, a conductor with the E&N Railway, married Bertha Wood (sister of Marion Austin and Emily Lorenz, 230 Robert St, Vic West) in Victoria West in 1899. In 1906 Al built 529 Springfield St, Vic West, where they lived for five years, and which they rented out while they lived on Battery St. Albert died in 1939 and Bertha in 1960. Son Kenneth Albert Bostock (1908-1992) owned the house until 1973. A song and dance man, he appeared in six New York Broadway shows between 1933 and 1940. He was born and died in Victoria.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION & IMAGES:

• James Bay History

• James Bay Heritage Register



• This Old House, Victoria's Heritage Neighbourhoods,
Volume Two: James Bay