GIFT TO DOCTOR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 December 1938, Page 12

GIFT TO DOCTOR

PATENT MEDICINE SHARES. SOUTH AFRICAN FRIENDSHIP RECALLED. Dr. John William Dalgliesh, of Sidmouth, Devon, has inherited shares in a patent medicine firm under the will of a solicitor who was his friend for 45 years. The solicitor, Mr Charles Walker Holmes, of Capel House, New Broad Street, E.C., added in the will: “I hope that he will appreciate the humour of such a legacy.” Said Dr. Dalgliesh: ‘“I may accept this legacy, but I shall have to get rid of the shares at once. The British Medical Association do not allow us to have anything to do with patent medicines. ,

”It might appear strange that a solicitor should overlook this point, but it was just the sort of thing my friend would do. He would be quite amused at my position as a doctor having shares in a patent medicine concern.” Mr Holmes died at Priory Mill, Lechlade, Gloucestershire, last July, aged 68. His estate amounted to £ll,987, net ’personality, £11,901. “We met in South Africa,” Dr. Dalgliesh said. “He had dealings with gold and diamond mining companies out there, and knew men like Cecil Rhodes, the Rhodesian pioneer, and Dr. Jameson, of the Jameson raid.”

Memory of those South African days is the bequest to his daughter of a Kimberley diamond. Mr Holmes played a violin aboard ship on his trips to South Africa. He prized that violin, made by Gagliano, of Naples, greatly. He played it with a gold-mounted bow made by Charles Tomassin', of Paris.

In his will be gives Dr Harry Bowen Williams, another friend, the option 'to purchase it “for his personal use and enjoyment, but not for resale.” His latest direction was that his body should be cremated, his ashes scattered, and that his funeral should be as simple and inexpensive as possible.