Fifield Terrace in the suburb of Opawa, Christchurch

Fifield Terrace – Formerly River road. Named because it runs along the northern side of the River Heathcote between Wilson’s Bridge and the Railway. Re-named Fifield Terrace. Named after Fifield, the home of William Bayley Bray (1812?-1885). Bray was consulting engineer to the Canterbury Provincial Council. An advertisement for a general servant for “a family up country” appears in the Star in 1880. Mrs Bray, Fifield, Opawa, “near railway station” is the advertiser. Re-named in 1917. First appears in street directories in 1924.

A reasonable amount of information from the library website. Article in Papers Past said that there were too many River Roads which was confusing which is why this one was renamed Fifield Tce. Sounds like William Bray was an interesting man and he was described as eccentric in his obituary. William was an engineer and worked with Moorhouse on the Railway Tunnel. There was a story about William being mocked for his views on the risk of the Waimakariri River flooding Christchurch as he wanted flood protection barriers built. They weren’t laughing after the big flood of 1868 when he was proved correct.He died of pleurisy on 26th May 1885.

William and his wife Harriet are buried at Rutherford cemetery and on the headstone it has his birth date as 31/01/1812.

I walked this street last night and it has the Heathcote River one side and houses on the other side. Yes there was a geocache nearby. The houses are on the high side of the river. Houses are a mixture of old and new. Still a few empty sections where houses have been demolished. A wide variety of building materials have been used. A couple of houses I couldn’t tell if they were original cottages or rebuilt in the original style. One house had the most wonderful little playhouse for children and I wish I could have got a photo of it. When I was a little girl it would have been my dream to have a playhouse like this. The children at this property were having a great time playing.
Some of the new houses were huge and I would love to know what the original houses looked like as I suspect that there would have been lovely old villas here.