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During the 1880s James Hassall and his sons bought various sections of Portion 113 at Corinda from Robert Donaldson, a farmer and later owner/manager of his own butchery business who serves on the Sherwood Divisional Board from 1884 to 1888. He profited from the subdiviosn of his land during this period when James Samuel Hassall, Robert Francis Hassall and James Charles Hassall together bought 5 acres for £20 per acre. Robert Francis Hassall bought 5 acres in 1882 and 5 acres in 1885. James Charles Hassall bought 9 acres in 1884 and James Samuel Hassall bought 5 acres in 1884 and 2 acres in 1885. The land was along Oxley Creek and had substantial grass and water which had made it excellent for the grazing of dairy herds.

At Corinda James Samuel Hassall built his house called Matavai after the bay in Tahiti where his grandparents and father had landed in 1791. A diary kept by him in 1881 showed that he took great pleasure in his garden planting a wide variety of vegetables and many types of fruit trees. His family at this time were very active with a social life involving visits to many friends both locally and just outside Brisbane. The children often took the long journey to visit their relatives in Parramatta and Camden and from there wrote letters to their parents full of news of the family. Here he wrote his book of memories. In Old Australia, which were published after his retirement. He died in a rented house nearby callend Bungonia on 25 September 1904 aged 80. An obituary in The Church Chronicle of 1 November 1904 summed up his character in two words "simplicity and faithfulness". It also said "He was a man without the slightest shadow of unreality or pretence, and everyone who knew him gave him reverence and love for his intrinsic goodness". His widow, Frances, died on 12 September 1907 aged 81. They were buried in the Sherwood Cemetery. He left an estate valued only at £131 which probably indicates that his real estate property including his acres in Portion 112 had been transferred to his wife.

James and Frances Hassall had the following children: Emily Isabella (born 1851 who married Sidney Tooth), Catherine Elizabeth (born in 1853 who married William Gordon Brown), Robert Francis (born in 1855 who married Helena Hannah Ransom), James Charles (born in 1857 who married Sarah Moorhead Coxen), Thomas Frederic (born in 1859 who married Florence Macdonald), William Henry (born in 1861 who married Ethel Pratten), Mary (born in 1863 who married Frank Pratten) and Arthur Marsden (1869-1903). Many of their descendants live in Brisbane.

James Samuel Hassall is significant in a number of ways. Not only does he provide and important link with the early religous and pastoral life of the colony by his heritage, but he also gives us a wonderful insight into the lives of many people during those early years in his In Old Australia. His own work, both in his chaplaincy and visitations to gaols in Berrima and Brisbane and his ministry in Bungonia and Berrime as well as in the northern circuit of Brisbane and later in Sherwood carried on the work started by his father and both his grandfathers. It forms a significant chain and demonstrates the qualities of humanity and warmth by which he was known in his lifetime.