Description of Historic Place

The McInerney Residence is a wood, brick and stone two-and-a-half storey Queen Anne Revival residence located on a large uphill lot in a residential area of Mount Pleasant Avenue adjacent to the top of Burpee Street.

Heritage Value

The McInerney Residence is designated a Local Historic Place for its architecture, for its association with past occupants and for its placement within the Mount Pleasant area.

This residence has architectural value as a fine example of a stately Queen Anne Revival home on a large, park-like lot. Its complicated arrangement of cross-gabling and multiple-gabled dormers is typical of asymmetrical Queen Anne Revival massing, as well as its use of multiple sheathing materials, colours and patterns. Its ornamental forms, typical of the High Queen Anne style, recall Old English architecture, with steep-pitched roof forms, Tudor-style brick chimneys, overhanging dormer windows with extended bargeboards ornamented with roundel pattern woodwork and vertical wood siding and woodwork tracery panels inset above several of the windows.

The McInerney Residence has heritage value for its use of stones from the first house in the area, the former tavern known as the Crow's Nest, which was demolished to make room for the current building. It is also recognized for its association with several prominent Saint John families during its first century.

The house was built in 1883 on the land of Issaac Burpee, one of Saint John’s most wealthy merchants, who died months after conveying this land to his newlywed daughter Jessie and her husband William Leavitt Busby. William Leavitt Busby was a member of the old Portland Council and was councillor in Saint John after the union with Portland. Mr. Busby was in the coal business and later left for New York City. The city was shocked and papers throughout the province reported on the divorce case of Busby vs Busby in which Mr. Busby’s unfaithfulness was proven in 1895. Mr. and Mrs. Busby sold this home in 1891, the year the adulterous actions were proven to have begun.

The home was occupied by various wealthy citizens for the remainder of the 19th century, including lumber manufacturer John Cutler and barrister Charles A. Stockton. Henry A. Austin, insurance agent and charter member of the Saint John Board of Trade obtained the home in 1899 and died here in 1911.

The longest association with this home is attributed to the large McInerney family, who resided here from 1916 to 1965. Judge of Probate, H. O. McInerney obtained this home in 1916 and raised a family of several daughters and sons here.

The McInerney Residence is also recognized for its placement in the Mount Pleasant area. Mount Pleasant is an early suburb of the city, known from the 1860's as a prestige address for wealthy residents. Originally part of the Village of Portland, the area experienced a boom of residential building throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including several of the region's stateliest homes for lawyers, politicians, and wealthy merchants.

Source: Planning and Development Department - City of Saint John

Character-Defining Elements

The character-defining elements of this Queen Anne Revival residence include:
- complex asymmetrical massing with pitched roofs and multiple cross-gables;
- hidden widow's walk on inner section of flat roof with rainwater collection system leading to basement;
- multiple sheathing materials, colours and patterns;
- stone foundation with picturesque mix of fieldstone and dressed stone;
- brick ground floor;
- wood siding on upper one-and-a-half storeys;
- dentillated and moulded cornice between brick and wood storeys;
- brick Tudor Revival style chimneys;
- shed roof veranda with slender square fluted columns with rosette ornamentation;
- overhanging gabled dormers with vertical wood siding;
- window placement and proportions;
- many segmental arch window openings with rectangular lights, wooden inset of tracery and rope moulding in the arch;
- ground floor cut-away bay windows with stained glass, tracery and rope moulding wooden panels above;
- elaborately supported second floor cut-away bay windows with stained glass and vertical-siding overhanging gabled dormers above with roundel woodwork decoration in bargeboards and modillion-supported overhangs above windows;
- entrance in veranda with paired wooden doors with moulded panels and a multi-light transom;
- landscaped, park-like grounds;
- evidence of the old Crow's Nest Tavern, including post foundations extant under ground level and stones from the walls now forming retaining wall.

The character-defining elements of the interior include:
- extensive mahogany panelling and built-in furniture with prominent whaler's lantern motif;
- 1874 cook stove;
- parquet floors;
- stained glass windows;
- brass doorknobs and fittings;
- original gas chandeliers;
- Art Nouveau and Arts and Crafts movement influenced tile and stained glass motifs and design;
- handsomely carved lion caryatids and mantel feature on library fireplace.