Town Sections

Edward Ward chose all the town sections, to which he was entitled by Land Orders, in Christchurch. They were as follows:

• No.23. E. R. Ward. Christchurch. Sections 505 and 507. These were both quarter acre sections in Barbadoes Street between Oxford Terrace and Kilmore Street. In the early days when river communication was important land near this part of the Avon was eagerly sought.
• No. 47. E. R. Ward. Christchurch. Sections 577 and 578. These two quarter acre sections were on the corner of Armagh Street and Oxford Terrace, facing Market Place (now Victoria Square).
• No. 53. E. R. Ward. Christchurch. Sections 315, 316, 317 and 318. These four quarter acres sections comprised nearly all the block on the west side of the Avon, between Chester, Durham and Armagh Streets, now the site of the Supreme Court buildings.

Town sections were also auctioned, and at such a sale on April 16th, 1851, Edward Ward bought for £26 a quarter acre section, No. 274, at Lyttelton. This was on Godley Quay, between Voelas Road and Simeon Street and faced the waterfront of what was then called Dampier's Bay.

Records do not show what happened to Edward Ward's land on Quail Island although it was farmed by Crosbie and Hamilton Ward for about three years. It is recorded as a Crown grant to Mark Pringle Stoddart in April, 1858. He sold it to Thomas Henry Potts in 1874 and two years later it again became Crown land when the stock quarantine station was moved to the island from Camp Bay.