Bolton Sarah Knowles
Famous Givers and Their Gifts
THOMAS HOLLOWAY:
HIS SANATORIUM AND COLLEGE
Thomas Holloway, one of England's most munificent givers, was born in Devonport, England, Sept. 22, 1800. His father, who had been a warrant officer in a militia regiment, had become a baker in Devonport.
Finding that he could support his several children better by managing an inn, he removed to Penzance, and took charge of Turk's Head Inn on Chapel Street. His son Thomas went to school at Camborne and Penzance until he was sixteen.
He was a saving lad, for the family were obliged to be economical. He must also have been energetic, for this quality he displayed remarkably through life. After his father died, he and his mother and his brother Henry opened a grocery and bakery shop in the marketplace at Penzance. Mrs. Holloway, the mother, was the daughter of a farmer at Trelyon, Lelant Parish, Cornwall, and knew how to help her sons make a living in the Penzance shop.
When Thomas was twenty-eight he seems to have tired of this kind of work or of the town, for he went to London to struggle with its millions in making a fortune. It seemed extremely improbable that he would make money; but if he did not make, he was too poor to lose much.
For twelve years he worked in various situations, some of the time being "secretary to a gentleman," showing that he had improved his time while in school to be able to hold such a position. In 1836 he had established himself as "a merchant and foreign commercial agent" at 13 Broad Street Buildings.
One of the men for whom Mr. Holloway, then thirty-six years old, did business, was Felix Albinolo, an Italian from Turin, who sold leeches and the "St. Come et St. Damien Ointment." Mr. Holloway introduced the Italian to the doctors at St. Thomas's Hospital, who liked the ointment, and gave testimonials in its favor.
Mr. Holloway, hoping that he could make some money out of it, prepared an ointment somewhat similar, and announced it for sale, Oct. 15, 1837. He stated in his advertisement in the paper that "Holloway's Family Ointment" had received the commendation of Herbert Mayo, senior surgeon at Middlesex Hospital, Aug. 19, 1837.
Albinolo warned the people in the same paper that the surgeon's letter was given in connection with his ointment, the composition of which was a secret. Whether this was true or not, the surgeon made no denial of Mr. Holloway's statement. A year later, as Albinolo could not sell his wares, and was in debt, he was committed to the debtors' prison, and nothing more is known of him or his ointment.
There were various reports about the Holloway ointment, and the pills which he soon after added to his stock. It was said that for the making of one or both of these preparations an old German woman had confided her knowledge to Mr. Holloway's mother, and she in turn had told her son. Mr. Holloway as long as he lived had great faith in his medicines, and believed they would sell if they could be brought to the notice of the people.
Every day he took his pills and his ointment to the docks to try to interest the captains and passengers sailing to all parts of the world. People, as usual, were indifferent to an unknown man and unknown medicines, and Mr. Holloway went back to his rooms day after day with little money or success. He advertised in the press as much as he was able, indeed, more than he was able; for he got into debt, and, like Albinolo, was thrust into a debtors' prison on White Cross Street. He effected a release by arranging with his creditors, whom he afterwards paid in full, with ten per cent interest, it is said, to such as willingly granted his release.
Mr. Holloway had married an unassuming girl, Miss Jane Driver, soon after he came to London; and she was assisting in his daily work. Mr. Holloway used to labor from four o'clock in the morning till ten at night, living, with his wife, over his patent-medicine warehouse at 244 Strand. He told a friend years afterwards that the only recreation he and his wife had during the week was to take a walk in that crowded thoroughfare. Speaking of the great labor and anxiety in building up a business, he said, "If I had then offered the business to any one as a gift they would not have accepted it."
The constant advertising created a demand for the medicines. In 1842, five years after he began to make his pills and ointment, Mr. Holloway spent £5,000 in advertising; in 1845 he spent £10,000; in 1851, £20,000; in 1855, £30,000; in 1864, £40,000; in 1882, £45,000, and later £50,000, or $250,000, each year.
Mr. Holloway published directions for the use of his medicines in nearly every known language, – Chinese, Turkish, Armenian, Arabic, and most of the vernaculars of India. He said he "believed he had advertised in every respectable newspaper in existence." The business had begun to pay well evidently in 1850, about twelve years after he started it; for in that year Mr. Holloway obtained an injunction against his brother, who had commenced selling "Holloway's Pills and Ointment at 210 Strand." Probably the brother thought a partnership in the bakery in their boyish days had fitted him for a partnership in the sale of the patent medicines.
In 1860 Mr. Holloway sent a physician to France to introduce his preparations; but the laws not being favorable to secret remedies, not much was accomplished. When the new Law Courts were built in London, Mr. Holloway moved his business to 533 New Oxford Street, since renumbered 78, where he employed one hundred persons, besides the scores in his branch offices.
"Of late years," says the Manchester Guardian, "his business became a vast banking-concern, to which the selling of patent medicines was allied; and he was understood to say some few years ago that his profits as a dealer in money approached the enormous sum of £100,000 a year… The ground-floor of his large establishment in Oxford Street was occupied with clerks engaged in bookkeeping. On the first and second floors one might gain a notion of the profits of pill-making by seeing young women filling boxes from small hillocks of pills containing a sufficient dose for a whole city. On the topmost floor were Mr. Holloway's private apartments."
Later in life Mr. Holloway moved to a country home, Tittenhurst, Sunninghill, which is about six miles from Windsor, and on the borders of the great park of eighteen hundred acres, where he lived without any display, and where his wife died, Sept. 25, 1871, at the age of seventy-one.
He never had any desire for title or public prominence, and when, after his gifts had made him known and honored, a baronetcy was suggested to him, he would not consent to it. Mr. Holloway had worked untiringly; he had not spent his money in extravagant living; and now, how should he use it for the best good of his country?
The noble Earl of Shaftesbury had been giving much of his early life to the amelioration of the insane. He had visited asylums in England, and seen lunatics chained to their beds, living on bread and water, or shut up in dark, filthy cells, neglected, and often abused. He ascertained that over seventy-five per cent may be cured if treatment is given in the first twelve months; only five per cent if given later. He was astonished to find that no one seemed to care about these unfortunates.
He longed to see an asylum built for the insane of the middle classes. He addressed public meetings in their behalf; and Mr. Holloway was in one of these meetings, and listened to Lord Shaftesbury's fervent appeal. His heart was greatly moved; and he visited Shaftesbury, and together they conferred about the great gift which was consummated later. It is said also that at Mr. Gladstone's breakfast-table, Mrs. Gladstone advised with Mr. Holloway about the need of convalescent homes.
In the year 1873 Mr. Holloway put aside nearly £300,000 ($1,500,000) for an institution for the insane of the middle classes, such as professional men, clerks, teachers, and governesses, as the lower classes were quite well provided for in public asylums.
A picturesque spot was chosen for the Holloway Sanatorium, – forty acres of ground near Virginia Water, which is six miles from Windsor, though within the royal domains. Virginia Water is a beautiful artificial lake, about seven miles in circumference, a mile and a half long, and one-third of a mile wide. The lake was formed in 1746, in order to drain the moorland, by William, Duke of Cumberland, uncle of George III. Near by is an obelisk with this inscription: "This obelisk was raised by the command of George II., after the battle of Culloden, in commemoration of the services of his son William, Duke of Cumberland, the success of his arms, and the gratitude of his father." This lake, with its adjacent gardens, pavilions, and cascades, was the favorite summer retreat of George IV., who built there a fishing-temple richly decorated. A royal barge, thirty-two feet long, for the use of royalty, is stationed on the lake.
In the midst of this attractive scenery Mr. Holloway caused his forty acres to be laid out with tasteful flower-beds, walks, and thousands of trees and shrubs. Occupied with his immense business, he yet had time to watch the growth of his great benevolent project.
Mr. W. H. Crossland, who had built the fine Town Hall at Rochdale, was chosen as the architect, and began at Virginia Water the stately and handsome Sanatorium in the English Renaissance style of architecture, of red brick with stone trimmings. There is a massive and lofty tower in the centre. The interior is finished in gray marble, which is enriched with cheerful colors and plentiful gilding. The great lecture or concert hall, adorned with portraits of distinguished persons by Mr. Girardot and other artists, has a very richly gilded roof. The refectory is decorated by a series of beautiful fancy groups after Watteau, forming a frieze.
The six hundred rooms of the building, great and small, on the four floors, are exquisitely finished and furnished, all made as attractive as possible, that those of both sexes who are weary and broken in mind may have much to interest them in their long days of absence from home and friends. Students of the National Art Training School, under Mr. Poynter, did much of the art work. There are no blank walls.
The Holloway Sanatorium, which is five hundred feet by two hundred feet in extent, has a model laundry in a separate building, pretty red brick houses for the staff and those who are not obliged to sleep in the building, a pleasure-house for rest and recreation for the inmates, and a handsome chapel.
Four hundred or more patients can be accommodated. A moderate charge is made for those who can afford to pay, and only those persons thought to be curable are received. As much freedom is allowed as possible, that the inmates may not unnecessarily feel the surveillance under which they are obliged to live.
The Sanatorium was opened June 15, 1885, by the Prince of Wales, accompanied by the Princess, their three daughters, and the Duke of Cambridge. Mr. Martin Holloway, the brother-in-law of Mr. Thomas Holloway, spoke of the uses of the Sanatorium, and the Prince of Wales replied in a happy manner.
Many inmates were received at once, and the institution has proved a great blessing.
To what other uses should Mr. Holloway put his large fortune? He and Mrs. Holloway had long thought of a college for women, and after her death he determined to build one as a memorial to her who had helped him through all those days of poverty and self-sacrifice.
In 1875 Mr. Holloway held a conference with the blind Professor Henry Fawcett, Member of Parliament, and his able wife, Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett, Mr. Samuel Morley, M.P., Sir James Kay-Shuttleworth, Bart., Mr. David Chadwick, M.P., Dr. Hague of New York, and others interested in the higher education of women. Mr. Holloway foresaw, with these educators, that in the future women would seek a university education like their brothers. "For many years," says Mr. Martin Holloway, "his mind was dominated by the idea that if a higher form of education would ennoble women, the sons of such mothers would be nobler men."
On May 8, 1876, Mr. Holloway purchased, and conveyed in trust to Mr. Henry Driver Holloway and Mr. George Martin Holloway, his brother-in-law, and Mr. David Chadwick, M.P., ninety-five acres on the southern slope of Egham Hill, Surrey, for his college for women. It is in the midst of most picturesque and beautiful scenery, rich in historical associations. Egham is five miles from Windsor, near the Thames, and on the borders of Runnymede, so called from the Saxon Runemede, or Council Meadow, where the barons, June 15, 1215, compelled King John to sign the Magna Charta. A building was erected to commemorate this important event, and the table on which the charter was signed is still preserved.
Near by is Windsor Great Park, with seven thousand fallow deer in its eighteen hundred acres, and its noted long walk, an avenue of elms three miles in length, extending from the gateway of George IV., the principal entrance to Windsor Castle, to Snow Hill, crowned by a statue of George III., by Westmacott. Not far away from Egham are lovely Virginia Water and Staines, from Stana, the Saxon for stone, where one sees the city boundary stone, on which is inscribed, "God preserve the city of London, A.D. 1280." This marks the limit of jurisdiction of the Lord Mayor of London over the Thames.
After Mr. Holloway had decided to build his college, he visited the chief cities of Europe with Mr. Martin Holloway to ascertain what was possible about the best institutions of learning, and the latter made a personal inspection of colleges in the United States. Mr. Holloway was seventy-six, and too old for a long journey to America.
Plans were prepared by Mr. W. H. Crossland of London, who spent much time in France studying the old French châteaux before he began his work on the college. The first brick was laid Sept. 12, 1879. Mr. Holloway wished this structure to be the best of its kind in England, if not in the world. The Annual Register says in regard to Mr. Holloway's two great gifts, "When their efficiency or adornment was concerned, his customary principle of economy failed to restrain him."
The college is a magnificent building in the style of the French Renaissance, reminding one of the Louvre in Paris, of red brick with Portland stone dressings, with much artistic sculpture.
"It covers," says a report prepared by the college authorities, "more ground than any other college in the world, and forms a double quadrangle, measuring 550 feet by 376 feet. The general design is that of two long, lofty blocks running parallel to each other, and connected in the middle and at either end by lower cross buildings… The quadrangles each measure about 256 feet by 182 feet. Cloisters run from east to west on two sides of each quadrangle, with roofs whose upper sides are constructed as terraces, the capitals being arranged as triplets."
No pains or expense have been spared to finish and furnish this college with every comfort, even luxury. There are over 1,000 rooms, and accommodations for about 300 students. Each person has two rooms, one for sleeping and one for study; and there is a sitting-room for every six persons. The dining-hall is 100 feet long, 30 wide, and 30 high. The semi-circular ceiling is richly ornamented. The recreation-hall, which is in reality a picture-gallery, is 100 feet long, 30 wide, and 50 high, with beautiful ceiling and floor of polished marquetry. The pictures here were collected by Mr. Martin Holloway, and cost about £100,000, or half a million dollars. Sir Edwin Landseer's famous picture, "Man proposes, God disposes," was purchased for £6,000. It was painted in 1864 by Landseer, who received £2,500 for it. It represents an arctic incident suggested by the finding of the relics of Sir John Franklin.
Here are "The Princes in the Tower" and "Princess Elizabeth in Prison at St. James," by Sir John Millais; "The Babylonian Marriage Market" and "The Suppliants," by Edwin Long; "The Railway Station," by W. P. Frith; and other noted works. The gallery is open to the public every Thursday afternoon, and in the summer months on Saturdays also. There are several thousand visitors each year.
The college has twelve rooms with deadened walls for practising music, a gymnasium, six tennis-courts (three of asphalt and three of grass), a large swimming-bath, a lecture theatre, museum, a library with carved oak bookcases reaching nearly to the ceiling, and an immense kitchen which serves for a school for cookery. Electric lights and steam heat are used throughout the buildings, and there are open fireplaces for the students' rooms.
The chapel, 130 feet long by 30 feet wide, says the London Graphic for July 10, 1886, "is a singularly elaborate building in the Renaissance style… In its decoration a strong tendency to the Italian school of the latter part of the sixteenth century is apparent. This is especially the case with the roof, which bears a kind of resemblance to that of the Sistine Chapel at Rome, though it cannot in any way be said to be a copy of that magnificent work… The choir, or nave, is seated with oak benches arranged stall-ways, as is usual in the college chapels of Oxford and Cambridge… The roof is formed of an elliptic barrel-vault, the lower portions of which are adorned with statues and candelabra in high relief, and the upper portion by painted enrichments. The former are a very remarkable series of works by the Italian sculpture Fucigna, who had learned his art in the studios of Tenerani and Rauch at Rome. These were his last works, and he did not live to complete them. The figures represent the prophets and other personages from the Old Testament on the left side, and apostles, evangelists, and saints from the New Testament on the right. The baldachino is constructed of walnut and oak, richly carved; and the organ front, at the opposite end of the chapel, is a beautiful example of wood-carving."
The building and furnishing of the college cost £600,000, the endowment £300,000, the pictures £100,000, making in all about one million sterling, or five million dollars. The deed of foundation states that "the college is founded by the advice and counsel of the founder's dear wife." When Mrs. Holloway was toiling with her husband over the shop in the Strand, with no recreation during the week except a walk, as he said, in that crowded thoroughfare, how little she could have realized that this beautiful monument would be built to her memory!
Mr. Holloway did not live to see his college completed; as he died, after a brief illness of bronchitis, at Tittenhurst, Wednesday, Dec. 26, 1883, aged eighty-three, and was buried in St. Michael's Churchyard, Sunninghill, Jan. 4, 1884.
Mr. Martin Holloway faithfully carried out his relative's wishes; and when the college was ready for occupancy, it was opened by Queen Victoria in person, on Wednesday, June 30, 1886. The day was fine; and Egham was gayly decorated for the event with flowers, banners, and arches. The Queen, with Princess Beatrice and her husband, the late Prince Henry of Battenberg, the Duke of Connaught, and other members of the royal family, drove over from Windsor through Frogmore, where Prince Albert is buried, and Runnymede to Egham, in open carriages, each carriage drawn by four gray horses ridden by postilions. Outriders in scarlet preceded the procession, which was accompanied by an escort of Life Guards.
Reaching the college at 5.30 P.M., the Queen and Princess Beatrice were each presented with a bouquet by Miss Driver Holloway, and were conducted to the chapel, where a throne had been prepared for her Majesty. Princess Beatrice, Prince Henry of Battenberg, and the Duke of Cambridge stood on her left, with the Duke of Connaught, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and others on her right. The choir sang an ode composed by Mr. Martin Holloway, and the Archbishop of Canterbury offered prayer.
The Queen then admired the decorations of the chapel, and proceeded to the picture gallery, where the architect presented to her an album with illustrations of the college, and the contractor, Mr. J. Thompson, offered her a beautiful key of gold. The top of the stem is encircled by two rows of diamonds; and the bow at the top is an elegant piece of gold, enamel, and diamonds. A laurel wreath of diamonds surrounds the words, "Opened by H. M. the Queen, June 30, 1886."
The Queen was then conducted to the upper quadrangle, where she seated herself in a chair of state on a dais, under a canopy of crimson velvet. A great concourse of people were gathered to witness the formal opening of the college. The lawn was also crowded, six hundred children being among the people. After the band of the Royal Artillery played to the singing of the national anthem, "God save the Queen," Mr. Martin Holloway presented an address to her Majesty in a beautiful casket of gold. "The casket rests on four pediments, on each of which is seated a female figure," says the London Times, "which are emblematical of education, science, music, and painting. On the front panel is a view of Royal Holloway College, on either side of which is a medallion containing the royal and imperial monogram, V.R.I., executed in colored enamel. Underneath the view is the monogram of the founder, Mr. Thomas Holloway, in enamel."
At one end of the casket are the royal arms, and at the opposite end the Holloway arms and motto, "Nil Desperandum," richly emblazoned in enamel. The casket is surmounted by a portrait model of Mr. Holloway, seated in a classic chair, being a reduction from the model from life taken by Signor Fucigna.
After the address in the casket was presented to Queen Victoria, the Earl of Kimberley, the minister in attendance, stepped forward, and said, "I am commanded by her Majesty to declare the college open." Trumpets were blown by the Royal Scots' Greys, cheers were given, the archbishop pronounced the benediction, and the choir sang "Rule Britannia." The Queen before her departure expressed her pleasure and satisfaction in the arrangement of the institution, and commanded that it be styled, "The Royal Holloway College."
More than a year later, on Friday, Dec. 16, 1887, a statue of the Queen was unveiled in the upper quadrangle of the college by Prince Christian. A group of the founder and his wife in the lower quadrangle was also unveiled. Both statues are of Tyrolese marble, and are the work of Prince Victor of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. The Rt. Hon. Earl Granville, K.G., made a very interesting address.
The college has done admirable work during the ten years since its opening. The founder desired that ultimately the college should confer degrees, but at present the students qualify for degrees at existing universities. In the report for 1895 of Miss Bishop, the principal, she says, "We have now among our students, past and present, fifty-one graduates of the University of London (twenty-one in honors), and twenty-one students who have obtained Oxford University honors… This is the second year that a Holloway student has won the Gilchrist medal, which is awarded to the first woman on the London B.A. list, provided she obtains two-thirds of the possible marks." In 1891 a Holloway student was graduated from the Royal University of Ireland with honors.
Students are received who do not wish to work for a university examination, "provided they are bona fide students, with a definite course of work in view," says the college report for 1895. They must be over seventeen, pass an entrance examination, and remain not less than one year. There are twelve entrance scholarships of the value of £50 to £75 a year, and twelve founder's scholarships of £30 a year, besides bursaries of the same value. The charge for board, lodging, and instruction is £90 or $450 a year.
Courses of practical instruction are given in cookery, ambulance-work, sick-nursing, wood-carving, and dressmaking. Mr. Holloway states in his deed: "The curriculum of the college shall not be such as to discourage students who desire a liberal education apart from the Greek and Latin languages; and proficiency in classics shall not entitle students to rewards of merit over others equally proficient in other branches of knowledge." While the governors, some of whom rightly must always be women, may provide instruction in subjects which seem most suitable, Mr. Holloway expresses his sensible belief that "the education of women should not be exclusively regulated by the traditions and methods of former ages."
The students at Holloway, according to an article in Harper's Bazar, March 10, 1894, by Miss Elizabeth C. Barney, have a happy as well as busy life. She says, "The girls have a running-club, which requires an entrance examination of each candidate for election, the test being a rousing sprint around the college – one-third of a mile – within three minutes, or fail. After this has been successfully passed, the condition of continued membership is a repetition of this performance eight times every two weeks, on pain of a penny fine for every run neglected. On stormy days the interior corridors are not a bad course, inasmuch as each one measures one-tenth of a mile in length."
"Nor are in-door amusements less in vogue than out-door sports. There are the 'Shakespeare Evenings' and the 'French Evenings,' the 'Fire Brigade' and the 'Debating Society,' and a host of other more or less social events… The Debating Society is an august body, which holds its sittings in the lecture theatre, and deals with all the questions of the United Kingdom in the most irreproachable Parliamentary style. They divide into Government and Opposition, and pass and reject bills in a way which would do credit to the nation in Parliament assembled."
The girls also, she says, "have a string orchestra of violins and 'celli, numbering about fifteen performers. The girls meet one evening a week in the library for practice, and enter into it more as recreation before study than as serious work. They play very well indeed together, and sometimes give concerts for the rest of the college."
A writer in the Atlanta Constitution for April 3, 1892, thus describes the drill of the fair fire brigade: "'The Holloway Volunteer Brigade' formed in three sections of ten students each, representing the occupants of different floors. They were drawn up in line at 'Right turn! Quick march! Position!' Then each section went quite through with two full drills.
"A fire in sitting-room No. 10 was supposed. At command 'Get to work!' the engine was run down to the doorway, a 'chain' of recruits was formed to the nearest source of water-supply, and the buckets were handed in line that the engine might be kept in full play. The pump was vigorously applied by two girls, while another worked the small hose quickly and ingeniously, so that the engine was at full speed in less than a minute. When the drill was concluded with the orders 'Knock off!' and 'Make up!' everything had been put in its own place.
"Then came the 'Hydrant Drill,' which was conducted at the hydrant nearest the point of a supposed outbreak of fire. In this six students from each section took part. Directly the alarm was given one hundred feet of canvas hose was run out, and an additional length (regulated, of course, by the distance) was joined to it. At the words 'Turn on!' by the officer known as 'branch hoseman,' the hose was directed so that, had there been water in it, it must have streamed onto the supposed fire. This drill was also accomplished in only a minute; and at the commands 'Knock off!' and 'Make up!' the hose-pipes were promptly disconnected, the pipe that is always kept attached to the hydrant was 'flaked down,' and an extra one hundred feet 'coiled up' on the bight with astonishing rapidity. The drills are genuine realities, and the students thoroughly enjoy them."
There is also a way of escape for the students in case of fire. The "Merryweather Chute," a large tube of specially woven fire-proof canvas, is attached to a wrought-iron frame that fits the window opening. There is also a drill with this chute. When the word is given, "Make ready to go down chute," the young woman draws her dress around her, steps feet foremost into the tube, and regulates her speed by means of a rope made fast to the frame, and running through the chute to the ground. Fifty students can descend from a window in five minutes with no fear after they have practised.
Mr. Holloway and his wife worked hard to accumulate their fortune, but they placed it where it will do great good for centuries to come. In so doing they made for themselves an honored name and lasting remembrance.
