How could a man who spent most of his life in England, Adelaide, and Sydney, and only a few years in Collingwood, become a notable? Because, as a builder, he constructed so many houses in the area in such a short time, and several of his impressive buildings remain standing, or feature in contemporary photographs. But he was seemingly unaware of a cloud on the horizon ...

William Chidzey was born in Somerset then moved to Bristol with his parents. As a boy he started his working life as a messenger boy, then became a carpenter or joiner. In 1869 he married and three children were born before the family migrated to South Australia, arriving on the Forfarshire in 1877. In Adelaide Chidzey worked energetically and apparently very successfully, constantly obtaining work from the government Architect-in-Chief’s Department  as well as private clients.  He also showed, at the Chamber of Manufactures’ Industrial Exhibition, devices for aiding tradesmen, such as a plasterer’s tub with movable sieve, and a grindstone with tool-holder attachment. He moved to Sydney by early 1883, but there became insolvent late in 1884, and had arrived in Melbourne by 1887. Here Chidzey was employed as foreman for Charles Abbott, a house, land and estate agent, and the family lived in a weatherboard house in Abbott Grove, Clifton Hill, where their last child would be born.  Abbott had owned land in Spensley and Fenwick Streets, apparently using this as a basis for creating Abbott Grove and subdividing it into building blocks; as well as acting as agent, he had moved into buying land and 'building cottages to suit all parties, no deposit, balance as per Queen's [sic] Building Society tables'. It seems probable that Chidzey was the builder of a number of the weatherboard houses still extant in Abbott Grove, including his own.

Chidzey was inspired to follow Abbott's suit, with the expectation of a ready market of working people without substantial capital to get a foothold in property and making extensive use of the Queen Building Society. Melbourne was at the late peak of the 1880s building boom and Chidzey became an enthusiastic participant, although at the lower end of the market and engaged in a few frenetic years of building houses in Abbotsford and Clifton Hill. He specialised in brick terraces and groups of houses and had the charming custom of naming terraces after his children; these included and Winniefred (sic) Terrace and Dorothy Terrace, at 34 - 48 Lulie Street, Abbotsford; Mildred Terrace and Marion Terrace in Rutland Street, Clifton Hill (numbers 1 to 27, since demolished); and Herbert Terrace in Maugie Street, comprising seven houses and a shop (north side, since demolished).

Another ambitious project was commenced in 1888. Chidzey bought a large triangle of land in Trenerry Crescent, running down to the Yarra. Here he built a two storey-terrace of four brick houses, extended Turner Street from Trenerry Crescent towards the river, created May Street where he built five free standing timber houses, and added six double storey double fronted timber houses facing the river and eventually named River Terrace. May was Winifred's first name.

The odd one out in Chidzey's portfolio was a stand-alone brick property in Bent Street with 12 rooms, stabling and coach house, built on over an acre of land which Chidzey had acquired from timber merchant Thomas Dally. This was eventually sold to wealthy financier Nathaniel Sloman who named it La Mascotte.

Winniefred and Dorothy Terraces remain, giving us the opportunity to observe Chidzey's building style. These polychrome brick terraces represent classic 1880s boom period speculative development near transport, facing Collingwood Railway Station, adjoining Victoria Park, and close to Johnston Street. The pediment proudly features the initials WTC: William Thomas Chidzey, the date 1888, and the names of Dorothy and Winniefred (May Winifred), then aged about 4 and 13. The four shops, located at each end of the two terraces, were occupied by grocers, butchers, greengrocers and bootmakers, conveniently providing residents with their daily needs, in a period when shopping was very localised prior to car ownership  and domestic refrigerators. Chidzey developed these sites in collaboration with Theodore Fink, a solicitor, director of The Herald newspaper, and property speculator. In The Age, 18 July 1888, Chidzey advertised one of the terraces as a splendid investment for £4,000. 

In April 1888 Chidzey began advertising the May Street/River Terrace houses under construction 'with balcony, verandah, bath and wash house ... will sell at a very nominal profit. Well built in every particular’.  Chidzey's enterprise walked a financial tightrope. Relying on building societies for financing, he needed to bring in sufficient capital from early sales to finance his new projects and pay his suppliers and what must have been an army of tradesmen. In December 1888 he advertised these houses but it seemed that sales were slow, as in June 1889 he advertised again: 'splendid five and eight room villas facing Studley Park, with lawns to the Yarra River'. Chidzey was starting to sound desperate. His timing was unfortunate as the building boom of the 1880s moved toward collapse and the disastrous economic downturn of the early 1890s. In September 1889 these properties were still for sale: ‘The whole of the above properties, which are well and faithfully built, are splendidly situated, in close proximity to the railway station and tram lines.’ Leaving Abbot Grove, the family moved into one of these houses.

By December 1889 Chidzey had become insolvent; his causes of insolvency were summarised as: pressure of creditors, who refused to be bound by a deed of assignment; inability to realise real estate; compulsory sequestration. Liabilities: £30,061 2s Id; assets: £43,658; of the assets, £42,160 consisted of real property, £31,500 representing the value of about 50 cottages in Turner, Lulie, Maugie, Rutland, and Bent streets: and £10,760, the value of 5¾ acres in Yarra Street, Alphington. Theodore Fink also suffered from the collapse in property prices from 1889 and the ensuing bank failures and economic depression of the 1890s. However as a man of the law with contacts in high places Fink was able to make use of a procedure known as  a ‘secret composition’ which involved a private meeting with creditors, who were paid only a risible proportion of the debt owed, to avoid public ignominy and bankruptcy, whereas the details of Chidzey’s insolvency, like that of many other small businessmen and tradesmen, were published in the Melbourne newspapers for all the world to see. On the other hand Fink’s dealings eventually became public knowledge and Punch joked that a new verb ‘to fink’ had enriched the English language. By the 1890s both Dorothy and Winniefred Terraces were owned by the building societies which had held mortgages over the properties. 

Leaving his wife to continue attempting to sell or let the River Terrace and May Street houses, around 1890 Chidzey went to Tasmania where he turned his hand to hotel-keeping in Argenton (did he build the 15-room hotel himself?). He involved himself with civic affairs and the hotel business appeared moderately successful. He travelled back and forth to Melbourne from time to time and Mrs Chidzey visited Tasmania at least once.

The May Street/River Terrace houses, all timber, probably were well-built, given Chidzey’s extensive carpentry experience, look very attractive in the several photos available, and would have had lovely views. What they were not was well-sited in relation to the propensity of the Yarra to overflow its banks with alarming regularity (not to mention the propensity for young men to bathe naked

in the river, evoking rage on Chidzey's part at this affront to ladies' modesty). In 1891 there was a massive flood which devastated much of Melbourne. A report on local flood damage by H E Tolhurst, City of Collingwood surveyor, was described in The Argus 21 July 1891:

About 30ft of a newly-constructed portion of Turner-street, extending towards the river, has been completely washed away; and he recommends one of two things-either that the length of the street should be curtailed or, if not, that it should have a concrete foundation. The Riverside terrace, he thought, should be condemned, and occupation of it prohibited.

Debate continued in the Collingwood Council with the Health Inspector also saying they should be condemned, as reported in the Mercury and Weekly Courier 20 August 1891. In 1892 May Street remained tenanted, but all the River Terrace houses were vacant. However the houses were reprieved and continued to be inhabited for many years, and continued to be flooded and photographed. See the notes on the 2019 CHS History Walk for more about the Floods

The Chidzeys returned to Sydney in 1892. Thanks to some family descendants we can see a delightful photo of the Chidzey family in the late 1890s. We don’t have much information about the remaining twenty-five or so years of Chidzey’s life in Sydney, apart from the fact that he continued his interest in breeding and showing dogs, and that daughter Kate named her two daughters Winifred and Dorothy. Was this purely in honour of their aunts or a reference to the heady Abbotsford times of the 1880s when the children must have been excited to see their names immortalised in their father’s buildings?

The Queen Building Society struggled through the 1890s and survived until around 1903 after many attempts to sell its properties. As for Chidzey's buildings:

• River Terrace and May Street eventually demolished after the 1934 flood.
• La Mascotte auctioned for removal around 1913, probably for expansion of the brewery.
• Rutland Street demolished for construction of Housing Commission flats.
• Maugie Street demolished for freeway.
• Trenerry Crescent demolished around 1937 for construction of BYFAS factory.
• Charles Street houses not identified.
• The two Lulie Street terraces remain, rare and distinctive examples of six dwellings flanked by corner shops, unusual compared to the typical pattern of a terrace of houses with a shop incorporated at one end, or small groups of shops dotted along residential streets.  They are of historical and architectural significance to the State of Victoria and Dorothy Terrace is on the Victorian Heritage Register  (H1034 - H1040)

Back row l to r: William Edward, May Winifred, John, Dorothy Front row: Mildred, Chidzey, Kate with baby Winifred, Mary, Marion

4 Abbott Grove

Trove list William Chidzey: https://trove.nla.gov.au/list/137828

Evening Journal (Adelaide); South Australian Register; Evening News (Sydney); Sydney Morning Herald; NSW Government Gazette; Mercury and Weekly Courier; The Age; The Argus; Advocate; The Herald; Zeehan and Dundas Herald (Tasmania); The Mercury (Hobart); Melbourne Punch; Camperdown Chronicle; Daily Telegraph (Sydney).

Cannon, The land boomers

Building societies in Melbourne

Fink cartoon

Flooded houses 1901 Note this shows River Terrace, May Street and the backs of the four Trenerry Crescent houses.