The land on which this pair of houses sits was part of a three acre plot originally granted to the Church of England. The land was put up for sale on 7 Feb 1863 and was described as ‘ … very eligible piece of building land, adjoining the episcopal residence, Hotham-Street, East Melbourne, having 36ft. frontage thereto, by 150ft. deep. Note.-There can be no doubt of the importance of this situation, which will be unquestionably always more or less sought after for its healthiness and its respectability.”

The purchaser was Robert Richardson, a contractor, who notified the City of Melbourne on 15 October the same year that he would build for himself 2 two-storey houses. The houses were built as an investment and he sold them soon afterwards.  The houses were then owned and occupied by a regularly changing list of investors and tenants until 1935 when they were bought by the Presbyterian Church.  No 170, known as Cleveland, continued to be rented, but No 168 became a hostel for retired deaconesses. Its earlier name of Seymour was changed to Crawford House. 

One of the occupants of the hostel was Amy Gertrude Maud Skinner.  She graduated from the University of Melbourne with a Bachelor of Arts in 1911 and became a teacher in Beechworth, where she was born.  But after a year she resigned to become a missionary in Korea where she taught kindergarten children for many years. Later she taught at a boys’ school in the New Hebrides. 

In the early 1960s the church sold the two houses and for the first time the titles were split and they became under separate ownership.  No 168 was converted to two flats, one up and one down. In 1968 Daryl Jackson, architect, and his wife Kay, bought No 170. 

In 1975 the Jacksons opened their house, along with others, as a fund-raiser.  They wrote and printed the story of their renovation of the house for visitors to read. It read as follows:-

"This house dates from about 1865 when it was initially occupied by Charles Umphelby, a wine merchant of 60 Collins Street. For the intervening years the house and its pair (168 Hotham Street) were occupied by a variety of owners until after a short period as let accomodation it was sold, still with its original character undisturbed, but in need of extensive maintenance. The current owners purchased the house in 1968 and commenced alterations in 1970. The front section of the terrace was maintained and restored with minor alterations made to form the openings to the living and dining room. Details of the cast iron to the balconies at the front are described in E. Graeme Robertson's book "Ornamental Cast Iron in Melbourne". At the rear of the house considerable rebuilding has taken place with the removal of the laundry and external toilet and the construction of a family room/kitchen and children's bedroom facing the back garden. Prior to this work the rear of the house was identical to that existing next door at 168 Hotham Street. All service areas such as bathrooms on the upper level and laundry/W.C. on the ground floor are retained in a central core, lit and ventilated from a completely enclosed and landscaped courtyard. The alterations use a limited number of traditional materials and include bagged and painted brickwork for all walls, hawthorn brick floors, and pine boarding to upper floor and ceilings. Behind several layers of plaster and wall board a bluestone party wall was discovered and retained as a link between the old and the new."