Government Building Worcester Street – Building for the Future

The construction of government buildings have long attracted opinion and criticism and the Italian Renaissance style Government Buildings on the corner of Worcester street and Cathedral Square were no different. Cabinet passed the plans for the construction of the new Government Buildings on 28 June 1910. They would be built on the site of the…

An Extraordinary Accident

Excitement at Lyttelton The ordinary routine of running the express train on the No. 2 wharf at Lyttelton and transferring the passengers to the waiting ferry steamer was disturbed on the evening of the 26th March, 1907 by a startling incident at about a few minutes past six o’clock.   The Southern Express which arrives…

Quid non pro patria: Bridge of Remembrance, 1924

“The most historic bridge in Christchurch” The iconic stone arch which spans over Cashel Street bridge – linking Cambridge with Oxford Terrace is “a visible symbol” which expresses the gratitude and enshrines the memory of those from Canterbury who took part in the Great War 1914-1918.” [1] The idea for a bridge was first suggested by a lady in…

John Peacock and his Controversial Fountain

A Tale of Convicts, Ship Wrecks, Strange Family Relations and a £500 Bequest. Before the Canterbury Settlement was inaugurated, a young Australian lad landed at Port Cooper in the company of his father. It was 1844, and 17 year old John Thomas Peacock had arrived from Sydney on board his father’s brig ‘Guide‘, an ageing…

A Poor Joke! A Premonition of What Was Yet to Come.

This photographically produced postcard of Christchurch’s Provincial Government buildings, appearing twisted and warped, was a semi-humorous card sent out at Christmas after the Murchison earthquake in 1929. Titled “The Camera doesn’t lie”,  it was the Commissioner of Crown Lands, Mr J. L. Martin’s idea of a joke, from him and his staff who occupied the Canterbury Provincial Buildings…

Built with earthquakes in mind – St. Michael and All the Angels Church c.1871

The Anglican church of St. Michael and All the Angels, at 84 Oxford Terrace, stands on the site of the first church the Canterbury Association’s settlers built in 1851.   Perhaps there are few buildings in Canterbury around which the early associations of many amongst us – the pioneers of settlement in Canterbury  – entwine…

Human Bones Under the Public Library

A large collection of human bones were uncovered on the corner of Cambridge Terrace and Hereford Street during the 1850s. They belonged to the early Waitaha inhabitants (1000 – 1500 AD) who had buried their dead in their ‘urupa’ (cemetery) on this site. Although the land was ‘tapu’ (sacred), the colonial surveyors were not put off…

Quakes Haunt Christchurch Since Settlement Began

The underlying geological issues hidden beneath Christchurch’s swampy plains meant that the city’s founders and their surveyors who chose this site for their planned city, knew nothing of the dangers. The tranquil flat expanses provided no clues to the benign faults which shook the province with more than just an alarming regularity. Between 1869 –…

Steam and Speed, Christchurch’s Railway Station in 1878

Tiny British-made locomotive engines first began chugging between Ferrymead’s Wharf on the estuary and the city on December 1st, 1863. This was New Zealand’s first public railway line, offering the early settlers an easier way to haul their luggage and furniture as well as providing an efficient transport system across the seven kilometres to Christchurch’s…

From Hotel to Hospital – St. Helen’s Maternity, Durham Street, Sydenham, 1907

In 1907, a former public house on the corner of Durham and Battersea Street, Sydenham, was opened as the first women’s maternity hospital in Christchurch. Founded by the Right Honorable Richard Seddon, his passion to improve the general health and child mortality saw a string of St. Helen’s Homes being built across New Zealand at this…

The Tepid Bath, Manchester Street, 1908

For nearly forty years, the Municipal Tepid Baths provided the Christchurch public with heated swimming facilities from 1908 – 1947. The site on Manchester Street was formerly occupied by James Troup’s Crown Iron Works but when the city council took over the site, the original building was demolished and the site cleared. The council commissioned Henry St. Aubyn Murray (1886-1943)…

Dead Bodies Stored in Hotel Cellars

Before Christchurch had a morgue, the gruesome task of storing a dead body was left to Christchurch’s public hotels. On practical terms, they had the space to hold a coroner’s inquest and the basement cellars to keep the bodies cool. For two years, c. 1858-60, there was a public morgue at the Lyttelton Gaol which…