Leslie Charles Holland

Extract from the memoirs of Kenneth Barns:

He was a character too: not unlike his father in many ways. And as with his father he wasn't very much liked in the family. He was abrupt and rude in his manner and indeed quite unfriendly. When we went to their home at Christmas he never took part in the jollity but sulked and often went off to his own room. He never apologised nor did his parents for him. His behaviour was just ignored on both sides, and that was that, full stop.

He was given a good, paid for, education and qualified as an analytical chemist and was employed as such by a branch of ICI in Bristol where he was working in their laboratories when I first knew him. Then he got tired of that job and decided he wanted to be a Doctor -a medical practitioner. So he asked his father to pay for him to go to medical college to qualify for as many years as required. Uncle said "no: I've spent enough on your education already; get on with it." But Leslie was not so easily put down. He thought about it and came up with a winning idea. "But Dad I want to be a Missionary Doctor." That did the trick and he went to college and duly qualified. Now the hard bit. How do I get out of becoming a Missionary Doctor? Well all the candidates for the Mission Field have to be accepted by the Missionary Society and he made sure he was turned down - on the excuse I was told that he couldn't learn the required language. Hey presto, objective achieved! The next I heard of him was that he had married a nurse he had met in his hospital training (by then I was married myself and away from home) and had set up in practice in Salisbury.

While I was away from Bristol - 45 years in all - I missed a great deal of what was going on in the family and, though I came down to Bristol on visits and Mum and Dad came to see use from time to time, I never saw many members of the family all that time. However, in my work I travelled all over the country on business and on one occasion, when I was on a visit to one of the Army Camps on Salisbury Plain I mentioned to the local Ministry of Works Surveyor I was with that my cousin Dr Leslie Holland was in practice in Salisbury. "Ho yes I know him," he said "He's my Doctor, and a damn good Doctor too: He dispenses all the medicines he prescribes himself." Well having qualified as an industrial chemist and a medical doctor I don't suppose it was difficult to obtain a certificate in pharmacy also.

Some years later when I was again in the Salisbury area on business and had a little time to spare before I returned home I took the opportunity to call on him., By this time Uncle Will and Aunty Popsie had died and Cousin Leslie had retired. No doubt he had inherited a lot of money and he had build a private housing complex for himself and his family. It comprised three or four lovely bungalows built in a secluded country situation on the outskirts of Salisbury. The development was in a close off the public road. The bungalows were well designed and built to a high standard and were detached but had no garden gates or fences between them or separate gardens but were in a communal garden, though no doubt the residents had their own private parts of the garden. Anyway I found the bungalow that Leslie and his wife occupied and rang the bell. Leslie came to the door but I was shocked at the sight of him. He was bent right over and supported on two sticks. However, he asked me in and we had a long chat before I departed - his wife was not at home at the time.

Again I was in Salisbury a few years later so I called again. Surprise, surprise: Leslie answered the door again, but this time he was erect and looking very well. He had had two hip replacements and was his own self again.

The next time I met him was at Gladys Stevens' funeral (their first cousin). As mentioned earlier, Gladys was a Quaker, so it was a Quaker's funeral. It was the only time I have ever been to a Society of Friends meeting and I didn't know quite what to expect. I did know that they only prayed "when the Spirit moved them", but did not anticipate the amount of silence there was. We went into the crematorium chapel at the appointed time; the coffin bearers duly arrived and we all stood up and sat down again when they departed. There was then no sound as I remember; the coffin then automatically disappeared into the furnace chamber: still no one spoke but everybody bowed their heads. About ten minutes later - or so it seemed - someone got up and prayed. Another long silence and someone else got up and prayed. Three or four brothers and sisters prayed with similar long silences between, then at some signal, we all filed out. I walked out beside Leslie and as we got outside he turned to me and said "I DON'T THINK MUCH OF THAT." I agreed. That was the last time I saw him but, incidentally, I remember Mum and Dad saying that he was a different man after he married. I never met his wife but she was said to be a very nice person and that she took Leslie in hand and made a gentleman of him. So there's something to be said for marriage after all! (says he on the authority of two happy marriages).