Address: 727 Princess Avenue
Built: c. 1895
1912 householder: William Russell, cabinet makerThis building has been badly comprompised with industrial additions and its original character is hard to discern. But here is a description of building in 2012, for the record:
This attractive, wood-frame cottage was one of four identical buildings erected on this block, on the south side of Princess Avenue, in the 1890s. Its exact date of construction is uncertain.*
The houses on these lots were originally known as 41, 43, 45 and 47 Princes Avenue. In 1907, when Victoria City streets were renumbered, the civic addresses changed to 715, 719, 723, and 727 Princess Avenue. The companion cottages have been torn down. (Most recently, 715 Princess was demolished in 2015.) This charming little cottage at 727 Princess Avenue has special significance as the last survivor of a Victorian quartet.
The four-room cottage has a hipped roof and recessed porch. It is a fairly basic structure, but has some endearing Queen Anne-style decorative elements, such as spindles and fretwork around the porch and coloured art glass over the bay window. It was built, along with its companions, as an investment by Jeremiah Madden, a foreman at Albion Iron Works.
Madden was a long-time resident of Victoria. He came to the city from California in 1862, when he was just 17 years old, as an apprentice to Joseph Spratt, who operated a foundry and cannery. Madden helped Spratt organize Albion Iron Works, which became the largest foundry north of San Francisco. [The decorative cast iron pillars on the Janion building on Store Street and Mountain Equipment Co-op (ex-Hotel Victoria) on Government Street were manufactured by the Albion Iron Works.] Madden was foreman machinist at Albion Iron Works for over forty years.
In June 1870, Madden married Sierra Nevada Ziegler, the daughter of Louis Ziegler, a Victoria cooper (barrel maker). The bride's unusual Christian name was the result of her having been born in a silver mining camp in the Sierra Nevada mountains in California. The Maddens had two sons, who were born in Victoria in 1871 and 1877.
The Madden family was living on Princess Avenue (at an undetermined address) when Mrs. Madden died on 8 September 1885. She was only 30 years old. Her funeral procession on 10 September 1885 went from the family home on Princess Avenue to the Roman Catholic Cathedral on View Street, thence to Ross Bay Cemetery.
Jeremiah Madden and his sons subsequently boarded with a woodworker friend, Robert Davidson, and his family. They lived on Chatham Street between Blanchard Street and Quadra Street. Madden owned the two lots on Princess Avenue until 1911 and the four cottages were rented to many tenants over the years.
From 1898 to 1902, this cottage was the home of Charles Alexander, a member of one of Victoria's pioneer black families. His father, Thomas Alexander, came to Victoria from California in 1858. Charles was born in Victoria in 1862 and was living in this cottage with his family in 1901 when they were enumerated. He was 38 years old and his wife Ada was 25 years old. Their son, Herbert, was 7 years old and attending school. Their 6-year-old daughter, Maud, was not yet in school, and their youngest child -- a boy called Wallace -- was only 2 years old.
Charles Alexander was a teamster and worked for Peter Hansen, a Danish building contractor and teamster. Hansen was also the “City Scavenger,” meaning that he was authorized by the Corporation to pick up refuse and clean up public health and safety hazards within the city limits. Hansen's yard was located on the corner of Discovery Street and Store Street, on the edge of our Burnside Gorge neighbourhood.
In 1912 the house was owned by William Byrne, an Irish-American cigar manufacturer. He and his brother owned the Monarch Cigar Factory on Yates Street. The house was rented to 30-year-old William Russell, a cabinet maker, and 25-year-old Jessie Russell, a homemaker. They had immigrated to Canada from Scotland in 1901. Their 6-year-old daughter, Eleanor, was born in British Columbia and was enrolled in school when the 1911 census was taken. She probably went to North Ward School, which was not far away. The school stood on the north-east corner of Douglas Street and Kings Road, where the former Times-Colonist press building was located at 2621 Douglas Street.
*The legal description of this property is Block A, Lot 9. It was formerly part of the Finlayson Estate. According to property tax assessment records and fire insurance maps, there were two houses on this lot in 1891, and two houses on the adjacent property to the west, Lot 7. On the 1891 fire map, the dwellings are shown as narrow, 2 storey-buildings. The buildings may have been replaced sometime after the map was revised in 1894, because later fire maps show the outline of four, 1-storey buildings on these two lots.