~ PROGRAMME FOR 2010 ~

All meetings begin at 7:30 pm at the James Bay NewHorizons Centre, 234 Menzies Street except theDecember one.

25 February, 2010The Toponymy of Vancouver Island. Michael Laylandis a map historian and former president of VHS.He will describe how and when the place nameswere given and appeared on maps and charts.

25 March, 2010San Juan Island, its History and BC Connections. MikeVouri is the Chief of Interpretation for the San JuanIslands National Historic Park. He was the host ofthe trip of VHS members made to the island lastspring.

22 April, 2010Victoria Fire Department’s Fire Department. DaveParker is the author of the book First Water Tigers,and former curator of history at the RBCM. He hasdone research and knows the history of the VFDintimately.

27 May, 2010Victoria’s Royal Theatre. Ken Johnson has beenconnected with the Royal Theatre in many ways.He received a citation from the Hallmark Societyfor his work in restoration of the facade.

For more information, visit:www.victoriahistoricalsociety.bc.ca

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~ RARE COLLECTION OF ~

~ PHOTOGRAPHS NOW ONLINE ~

Saanich Archives is pleased to announce thatmore than 900 images by early 20th centurySaanich photographer Annie Girling can now

be searched online. Highlights of this uniquecollection are featured in a new web exhibit,“Developing Roots: Photographic Perspectives onHome and Nature”, on the Saanich Archives website

at: http://saanicharchives.ca

Anne Alice Girling was born in England in 1880and studied photography at Woolwich Polytechnicbefore coming to Saanich with her parents and tensiblings in 1912. During Annie’s lifetime sheexperimented with photographic methods,capturing images of her family and community aswell as nature scenes and still lifes. Her collectionof work, including many photographs of Saanichand Victoria taken from 1912 to the 1940s, consistsof 916 images (535 glass plate negatives, 357filmnegatives and 24 prints).

The collection was nearly destroyed when theGirling’s Finnerty Road house was demolished inthe 1960s, but was rescued and preserved for over30 years by Lindsay Lambert, a photographichistorian. In 2008, Mr. Lambert generouslydonated Annie’s 1901 field camera, plate holders,printing frames and negatives to Saanich Archives.Descendants of the Girling family have assisted inthe identification of the images.

In addition to the online exhibit, Annie Girling’scamera equipment is on display at the Saanich

Municipal Hall until February 23rd as part of anexhibit celebrating Heritage Week.

Victoria Historical

Society Publication

NUMBER 23 SPRING 2010

Saanich Archives is located in the SaanichCentennial Library at 3100 Tillicum Road and isopen Monday to Friday, 10:00am to 4:30pm. Forfurther information, please call 250-475-1775 or

visit our website at: http://saanicharchives.ca

For more information please contact: CarolineDuncanTel: 250-475-1775 ext. 3478E-mail: caroline.duncan@saanich.ca

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OUTING TO VICTORIA POLICE DEPT.

MUSEUM

The VPD marked its l50th anniversary in 2008.It began in the heady days of the Gold Rushera, when hundreds of would-be miners

crowded into the City. Many may not know thatwhen the Police Dept. moved to its present quartersat corner of Caledonia and Quadra Streets spacewas provided for a museum/archival area. Thevolunteer curator Bill Blore will host us for a tourand refreshments on Wednesday March 24 at 1-2:30pm. This is a most interesting aspect of Victoria’shistory. If you would like to join us, let me know:

Arnold Ranneris (250-598-3035)

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PROPOSED FORT RODD HILL TOUR ON

JUNE 13TH

The Hallmark Society and the VictoriaHistorical Society have tentatively booked aself-guided group tour of Fort Rodd Hill for

Sunday, June 13th at 2pm. This will be the dayfollowing the 150th anniversary celebration ofFisgard Lighthouse, which will have been restoredwith new exhibits. That Sunday also will be the lastday that the international fleet will be moored offRoyal Roads*.

The cost of the self-guided group tour will be $3.40per person, paid at the gate, with free parking. Asign-up sheet will be available at upcoming VHSmeetings. Members who wish to go on theJune13th tour but cannot attend the regular VHSmeetings can register by mail to VHS, PO Box50001, Victoria. BC V8S 5L8

*To mark the Canadian Naval Centennial (CNC)there will be an International Fleet Review (IFR) inVictoria British Columbia over the period 9-14 June2010. More than 25 foreign nations from theIndo-Pacific Region have been invited to send ships

to gather with our Pacific Fleet in Victoria for theInternational Fleet Review. Further details can befound at the Maritime Forces Pacific Website.

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BLACK HISTORY MONTH AND THE

SOCIETY BEHIND IT

February has been designated as Black HistoryAwareness Month. In Victoria, we areprivileged to have an active society which has

prepared activities and events to become aware andcelebrate this part of our history.

On Sunday, Feb. 6, there was an event held at theJames Bay New Horizons Society in which variousgroups had displays and information. We alsoviewed a video “Go Do Some Great Thing”, whichdepicted aspects of this history, based on theresearch of Crawford Killian and the film producerAnthony Bailey. It told the story of several blackpioneers and told of how they came here in the latel850s at the encouragement of James Douglas andthe personal leadership of Mifflin Gibbs. The bookby Killian is available at the public library. A tourwith the theme Black History will be given in theRoss Bay Cemetery is this coming Sunday, 28February, 2010.

The British Columbia Black History AwarenessSociety is a non-profit Society formed in l994 topromote awareness and interest in the achievementsof Black people in arts, education, government,sports, science etc. They maintain a website at:www.bcblackhistory.ca.

Arnold Ranneris

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BOOK AND MAGAZINE NOTES OF

INTEREST

In November, we were informed and entertainedby Jeanette Taylor who spoke on her work andresearch into the history of Quadra Island. This

research is available in her book The Quadra Story;the History of Quadra Island. She has also writtenand previously published Tidal Passages; a Historyof the Discovery Islands. Both can be found in thepublic library at 971.12 TAY. (If the book is out ornot at the branch you use, you can place a hold onit.)

The Beaver is now published under the titleCanada’s History as of its next issue in April, 2010.

The magazine, for many years an internalpublication of the Hudson’s Bay Company, has aninteresting history. It has evolved into a bi-monthymagazine depicting many aspects of Canada’shistory. It is published by Canada’s NationalHistory Society, based in Winnipeg. Subscription tothis excellent magazine is available for $32.95, fromthe distributor The Beaver, Box l274, Station K,Toronto, M4P 3E5.

If you would like to see a copy, please phone me(Arnold Ranneris) at 250-598-3035, or by E-mail atWL545@shaw.ca)

~~~

No Tame Cat - Fur Trade Daughter, her Cape HornCaptain, and the Chilean Courtesan by local authorand VHS member Robert Harvey

Captain James Gaudin from the Channel Islandsmarried Agnes Anderson whose father, BC PioneerA.C. Anderson, a chief trader with the HBC, gavehis name to Anderson Hill in Oak Bay.

600-pages of Captain Gaudin’s the logbook onmicrofilm gave authenticity for the sea story part ofthe book. The author’s grandmother Mabel Harvey,was the daughter of Captain James Gaudin. As ababe she rounded the Horn in 1875 on a passagefrom Victoria to London; and she did it again inreverse in 1881 on the occasion of her fatherbringing his family from Jersey to settle in Victoria.

Western Mariner magazine January 2010 issuelisted No Tame Cat with other books of interest tomariners, commenting that the book sets forth in“incredible detail” the description of the passagesunder sail around Cape Horn.

No Tame Cat, recently published by PtarmiganBooks is available from local bookstores.

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THOMAS PLIMLEY LTD.

I'm sure that many members of the VHS whohave lived in the city more than thirty years willrecall the English car dealers, Thomas Plimley

Ltd., and their red tiled roof at Yates andVancouver Street.

Thomas John Plimley and his wife left England in1892 intending to locate in Winnipeg. However,when they arrived there the weather was so cold thatthey returned to the train and continued on toVictoria. The following year, 1893, Plimley entered

business, dealing in bicycles, but the first directorylisting for Plimley, either business or personal, wasthe 1897-1898 city directory which listed Onionsand Plimley, Central Cycle Depot at 42 BroadStreet. Under the old numbering system in use inthe city until 1907/1908 this address was betweenTrounce Alley and Yates St. Onions was gone by1901 and Plimley had expanded his product line toinclude gas buggies. The Central Cycle Depot,Practical Cycle Maker and Agent next occupied40-42 Broad Street. By 1905 the company was inthe Metropolitan Block at 21 Government Street,opposite the then Post Office. The MetropolitanBuilding became 813 Government Street whenrenumbered.

By 1907 the Plimley Automobile Company wasoperating at 606 Government Street (at Superior),which today is a government parking lot, and theCentral Cycle Depot was at 1110 GovernmentStreet. W.M. Ritchie was the manager of the bicycledepartment. In 1911 the bicycle department movedto 1205 Langley Street. In 1923 the companymoved to 1010 Yates Street at Vancouver Street.

Thomas Plimley died in 1929, having handledautomobiles made by and bearing the namesRussell, Daimler, Overland, Detroit Electric,Hupmobile, Cadillac, Packard, Chrysler and Austin.After Thomas’death, his son, Horace Plimley1, tookover the business and in 1936 expanded toVancouver. Basil Plimley, in turn, took over fromhis father, Horace, in 1953.

On the occasion of the firm’s 70th anniversary thetwo newspapers, the Daily Colonist2 and the VictoriaDaily Times carried a sketch of the firm’s historywith several photographs including their 1907 salesrooms, the 1963 sales room on Yates Street. Thearticle noted that there was a house at Cordova Baybuilt from the crates used to ship cars early in thecentury. The crates were built from tongue andgroove lumber and some thrifty person collectedenough to build the house.

The company closed its Victoria operation in mid1982, a reported victim of the recession. Thecompany closed in Vancouver a few years later. Oneexperience I had with Plimley’s was in 1957 whenmy car, in for servicing at the West 4th address, wasstolen from their lot. It was recovered several dayslater, with only minor damage which Plimley’s fixed,but I was under the minimum age to rent areplacement vehicle so I was without a vehicle for atime.

The token, a good luck pocket piece, had to beissued between 1907 and 1911. Note the Swastika,which, until the Nazis adopted a reversed version ofit, had been a symbol of good luck or fair fortunefor thousands of years.

The advertisement heading this article appeared inthe Daily Colonist July 14, 1907, p. 11.

1Thomas Horace Plimley was born in Victoria, March 25, 1895.

He died 4 days short of his 90th

birthday in March 1985.

Thomas John Plimley died at age 58 on December 18, 1929.2

Daily Colonist, Sunday, April 28, 1963

Ronald Greene

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CAPTAIN JAMES GAUDIN

Captain James Gaudin was born in Jersey, C.I.in 1838, and served his apprenticeship onEnglish merchantmen. His first voyages were

in the East India and Australian trade until 1865,

when he began running between London andVictoria, continuing on that route until 1881. Hearrived for the first time in Victoria in themid-1860s as the chief officer of the HBC barquePrince of Wales. Respect for his seamanship was suchthat in 1869 he was appointed master of thenewly-built Lady Lampson. The vessel was employedin the HBC service between England and the PacificNorthwest.

During one of his visits to Victoria he met AgnesAnderson, daughter of Alexander Anderson, aretired HBC employee living on the SaanichPeninsula. Their home, Rosebank, soon became thefirst stop for James Gaudin after tying-up inVictoria, and the couple were married 1873.

Following a short honeymoon he returned to hisship and recommenced his sailing. However, he wasdetermined to settle down in Victoria and asked hisnew bride to search for an appropriate property onwhich to build a house. In due course a propertywas found on Craigflower, facing the Gorge, and ahouse built there. The pull of the sea remainedhowever, and in 1878 Capt. Gaudin bought his ownvessel, the Rover of the Seas. It was not uncommonduring this period for ship’s masters to take theirfamily to sea with them, and on more than oneoccasion the family embarked with their father for aseafaring adventure, making the trip from Victoriato UK and return. Between voyages, his time athome was devoted to his family and his gardenwhich became a showplace, renowned for its varietyand exuberance.

He was finally persuade to abandon his deep-seacareer, and from 1881 to 1888 he was a governmentpilot based in Victoria. This appointment gave himmore time with his family and to tend his belovedgarden. He retained ownership of the Rover of theSeas, appointing Captain Dolbell as master. In 1885the vessel caught fire in the harbour but was savedfrom destruction by the speedy response of the firedepartment.

In 1889 Capt. Gaudin succeeded Capt Olaholme ascommander of the steamship Sir James Douglas,engaged in aids to navigation work around thecoast, and he retained this position until 1892 whenhe transferred as master to the much largernewly-built Quadra, recently delivered by CaptainWalbran from her builders, Fleming and Fergusonof Paisley, Scotland.

Later that year Captain Walbran resumed commandof Quadra and Capt. Gaudin abandoned hisseafaring altogether and was appointed Victoriaagent for the federal Department of Marine with

responsibility for navigational aids. He later becamereceiver of wrecks and examiner for masters andmates.

The Gaudins had seven children; four daughtersMarie, Beatrice, Kate and Mabel, and three sonsonly one of whom, James, survived infancy.

The family played an active part in the social life ofthe city, one of his daughters, Mabel, marryingJames Harvey, grandson of Robert Dunsmuir.

In later years, with the family grown and gone, theGaudins moved from the Gorge to Hampshire Roadand Capt. Gaudin lived there until his death in1913. His widow died in 1929 at the age of eighty.

For a more complete story on Captain Gaudin andhis family refer to an article by J.K. Nesbitt in theDaily Colonist dated Sunday August 13, 1950.

Mike Harrison

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OLD CEMETERIES SOCIETY - 2010

SCHEDULE

Unless otherwise noted, all tours begin at 2pm infront of Starbucks, Fairfield Plaza. $5 reservationsnot needed. Info. 250-598-8870 orwww.oldcem.bc.ca

February 28. Black History. In the 1850s and 1860sVictoria was a haven for blacks escaping racism inCalifornia and many are buried at Ross BayCemetery. A joint tour by the Old CemeteriesSociety and BC Black History Awareness Society.

March 7. At Death’s Door. Popular storyteller GlennPerlstrom has dug into his macabre files for some ofthe most amazing stories of sudden and unexpecteddeaths and deadly epidemics. Not for thesqueamish!

March 14. Travels in the Interior. A brand new tourwill look at the fascinating methods oftransportation in BC’s Interior during the gold-rushand colonial eras. Stories to be told on the graves ofsuch transportation pioneers as the Barnard family,famous for stages to Cariboo.

March 21. Vandalized Stones. This is a topic wewould prefer not to be including, but vandalism in2009 was high at Ross Bay Cemetery. This teamtour will visit many of the damaged graves and tellthe history of the families buried in them.

March 28. San Juan Island Connections. Thefamous Pig War was occupying the minds ofVictorians 150 years ago. Ross Bay Cemetery hasmany people linked to that unusual skirmish and toSan Juan Island in general.

April 4. Chinese Cemetery. In honour of ChingMing (grave sweeping day), Victoria City CouncillorCharlayne Thornton-Joe leads a tour of thisNational Historic Site. Meet at the cemetery, foot ofCrescent Road, off King George Terrace. Tourbegins 2pm. $5 - no reservations needed.

April 11. Family Connections. The Parker family ofRocky Point Farm in Metchosin was a large andwell-known one in early Victoria. In this new tourDr. Sylvia Van Kirk will weave the tales of thevarious branches of the family who are buried atRoss Bay Cemetery into a captivating story.

April 18. Royal Oak Burial Park. Under the rollinglawns of Royal Oak lie many famous andnot-so-famous Victorians with life stories that will berecounted in today’s tour by retired Englishprofessor, Dr. Bill Magee. Meet inside the maingates at 4673 Falaise Drive. Tour begins 2pm.

April 25. Royal Canadian Navy Centennial. Inhonour of the 100th anniversary of the RCN'sfounding, Tom Pound has gathered manyincredible accounts to illustrate Victoria’s close linksto the Maritime Command.

May 2. Permanent Architects. Victoria has beenhome to many talented architects and Ross BayCemetery has become the final resting place for agood number of them. Strangely enough, few haveelaborate memorials and some have none at all.Joyce Mackie will tell their stories.

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