The first registered owner was Mrs. Ethel Herchmer, the adjacent property owner who used the lot as part of her extensive garden. The lot’s distinctive arched arbutus tree, now overhanging the Chettleburgh cottage, is visible in early photos taken from the wharf.
The arched arbutus tree to the right of photo
In 1925, according to information available from the Land Title office, ownership changed to Emma and Ruth Roberts, sisters from Jamaica who were friends of the Herchmers and early owners of the old Savary Inn. The women built two wooden tent platforms, one for themselves and one which they rented. They had rowboats for hire and kept goats. Emma was also the schoolteacher.
There were two owners after the Roberts sisters, including Mrs. George Walkem, but it’s unclear as to how long each owner held onto the property.
Terry and Kay Chettleburgh purchased the lot in 1960. Prior to buying the Savary property, Terry had spent several years building summer homes on the island. The first was for Jack West who was an early guest at the Chettleburghs' fishing resort across Georgia Strait, at Oyster River on Vancouver Island. It was Jack who introduced Terry to Savary, hiring him to renovate the old schoolhouse which Jack had bought from the Lang family in 1955.
This was the beginning of numerous Savary construction projects for Terry — he operated the fishing resort at Oyster River during the summer months and built cottages on Savary in the off-season. During this time he built or renovated cottages for the Wests, Woodwards, Nichols and Whittalls, among others. To get back and forth between Oyster River and Savary, he bumped his way across Georgia Strait in his 18 foot home-built runabout, the Sea Louse.
When Terry bought the Savary property in 1960, he also purchased two small cabins owned by Phyllis Landale, situated on a neighbouring lot to the west. He moved them to his lot where they became the nucleus of the family’s current cottage. Over the next ten years Terry added a living room to the front of the cabin and three bedrooms and a bathroom to the back. A workshop and generator shed were built behind the cottage. Terry’s son, Peter, turned a small attic space above the workshop into a “Pad” where friends regularly gathered to spend lively evenings out of earshot from family along the Front. (Interestingly, years later, Peter’s father reported finding dozens of empty beer bottles in the woods behind the Pad).
The cottage passed on to Peter and Deirdre Chettleburgh on Terry’s death in 2001 and a second 550 square foot guest cabin, the Aft Cabin, was built at the back of the lot by Peter and Deirdre in 2020-2021. Both cabins continue to be visited each summer by their daughter Sarah and husband Paul (with children Henry and Ben), and son Simon and wife Krystal (with daughter Autumn).
Chettleburgh home with the Aft Cabin behind the arbutus tree