Only two families have lived in Wentworth Villa, one of the oldest houses in Victoria.
The house at 1156 Fort St. was built in 1863, and was once one of the best-known and most gracious houses in the city.
Wentworth Villa was built by Capt. Henry Bailey Ella, who was born in Middlesex, England in 1826 and was granted his first-mate certificate on May 22, 1851.
Just six days later, Ella sailed on the Norman Morison, on its second of three voyages to Victoria from England. The ship arrived here on Oct. 30, 1851.
Ella remained with the Norman Morison, and obtained his master-mariner certificate in October 1853.
His wife-to-be, Martha Beeton Cheney, arrived in Victoria with her aunt and uncle, Thomas and Ann Beeton Blinkhorn, in May 1851, as passengers on the Tory. They were among the first independent white settlers in the province.
Thomas Blinkhorn died just five years later while serving as a justice of the peace.
It is not known when Ella and Martha Cheney met, but there are clues in Martha’s diary, which is preserved in the B.C. Archives.
On Jan. 20, 1855, she mentioned her future husband for the first time: “The steamer Otter sailed for San Francisco this morning, Mr. Ella, chief mate.”
On July 15 that year, she wrote: “I was married to Mr. Ella by the Rev. Mr. Cridge. We were married at home by special licence.
“It was a beautiful day, but very warm. We had a large dinner party, had a tent made out-of-doors, it being too warm in the house for so many.
“The governor and his family honoured us with their company and besides them were Mr. and Mrs. Langford and family, the two Miss Reids, Mrs. Muir and family, Mr. Newton, Mr. Pierce, Mr. Mackay and one or two others.
“Miss Mary Langford was bridesmaid and Mr. Thomas Cooper bridesman.
“The British man-of-war, Brisk, came into the harbour the same day. Mr. Tyne, one of the midshipmen, called here to report to the governor.”
The newlyweds set up a home in Metchosin. Ella was away at sea a great deal, but every time he got home he would get into a canoe and paddle to Metchosin. In one diary note, his wife said: “The Otter returned from California; my husband came down in the evening in a canoe.”
After that, the Ella family, including Ann Blinkhorn, moved to a home on Broad Street in Victoria.
Heritage consultant Stuart Stark says that in 1862, Blinkhorn bought a lot on Fort Street from the Hudson Bay Co. The next year, Ella bought the neighbouring lot.
“As the house straddles the two lots, it appears that the purchase of the second lot allowed the house to be constructed in 1863,” Stark says.
In the early 1860s, Ella started building a large home on the crest of the Fort Street hill. When it was ready, the Ellas moved there along with Ann Blinkhorn.
The house had many rooms with high ceilings and fireplaces. It had gingerbread in the eaves, and it served as the Ella family home for many years.
The entry hallway has rounded corners with the tall niches that were, in Victorian days, used for vases or statuary.
Historian and journalist James K. Nesbitt, whose aunt by marriage was an Ella, interviewed Eileen Ella Barnes, a granddaughter of Henry and Martha Ella, in the 1940s.
Barnes told Nesbitt that the home had 14 rooms — seven downstairs and seven more upstairs. Nine of the rooms had fireplaces, and over each fireplace was a mirror.
“On all mantels were china figures and crystal candlesticks and shells which my grandfather collected in his travels,” she said. “The windows in all the rooms were from floor to ceiling. And I remember all the dressers and washstands had marble tops.”
Henry Ella was not there to enjoy the home for long. In February 1873, he drowned in Burrard Inlet while trying to cross in a canoe. By that time, the Ellas had seven children.
The next year, the eldest Ella daughter died of tuberculosis. The Colonist described her as “a lovely and accomplished young lady endeared to all who knew her.”
She had been a Sunday school teacher for many years, and many of the students from her classes attended the funeral service.
“The coffin was profusely decorated with floral tributes,” the Colonist reported. “The pallbearers wore white and black scarfs.”
A large cortege followed the coffin to the cemetery at the conclusion of the service. At the cemetery, the Sunday school students took a last look at their dear teacher.
“The ceremony was one of the most affecting ever witnessed on the Island,” the Colonist said.
Ann Beeton Blinkhorn, Martha’s aunt, was born in Great Gidding, Huntingdonshire, England in 1804. In August 1884, she celebrated her 80th birthday, and the house witnessed a lively party.
“Both young and old assembled to do honour to the lady, who, notwithstanding her great age, took an active part in the pleasures of the evening,” the Colonist reported.
“Each guest was received with a warm welcome and the old lady passed about among her guests receiving congratulations and good wishes from all sides.”
A little more than two weeks later, she died.
“Little did the gay and happy throng who gathered at the residence of Mrs. Ella a few evenings ago to do honour to a pioneer lady whose span of life had exceeded the allotted period by 10 years, imagine within a very brief time, they would be called on to assemble about her bier and lay her away in the bosom of the land she had learned to love so well,” the Colonist said.
“Yet so it is.”
Along with the deaths, Wentworth Villa was the scene of several weddings. In 1887, Samuel Dickson Nesbitt married Marion Ella. In 1888, Robert E. Dodds married Louise Ella.
In 1903, Martha Ella transferred ownership of the house equally to her six surviving children. Shortly after, in 1904, indoor plumbing was added to the house.
Martha Ella, an ardent worker for Bishop Cridge’s Reformed Episcopal Church and for charitable causes, died in 1911 at 76 years of age. Three of her children, Henry, Frederick and Mary, continued to live at Wentworth Villa. Mary, a painter and craftswoman, died in 1918.
Thomas Richards Ella, another son of Henry and Martha, did not remain in the house, but claimed that he had had Christmas dinner there every year for 60 years. He died in 1926 at 64 years of age.
In 1922, the City of Victoria took ownership of Wentworth Villa for non-payment of property taxes, but Henry and Frederick remained in the house as tenants.
Heritage consultant Stark, who has done extensive research into the property, says that the city quickly took advantage of its ownership to take an eight-foot strip from the south side of the property to allow for the widening of Fort Street.
The house was still owned by the city in 1931, when Frederick died. Henry moved out in 1939 and died two years later in his room at the Pacific Club.
Stark says that in September 1940, Faith and George Grant paid “a quarter-century” of back taxes on Wentworth Villa and became the proud owners of the house. The Grants had operated an antique business at 1162 Fort St. since 1929.
They moved their store, The Connoisseurs Shop, into the house, and in 1956 added living quarters on the east side, set back from the street.
George Grant died soon after the expansion was completed, but Faith continued to operate the business until her death in 1985.
The original house survived the years intact, for the most part, and in 1977 Faith Grant was honoured by the Hallmark Society for her efforts in heritage preservation.
Her grandchildren, Forrest and Heather Graham, took over the business in 1979, and continued to operate it in Wentworth Villa until 2012, when they sold the building and moved to Oak Bay.
This feature draws from the work of historian James K. Nesbitt, who wrote about the Ellas and Wentworth Villa several times in the 1940s and 1950s in the Daily Colonist.
Credit also goes to Stark and Jennifer Nell Barr, whose research into the history of the house and its occupants appears on the Victoria Heritage Foundation website.
dobee@timescolonist.com
