Plants
of current interest Life and Achievements of Sir Harold Hillier (1905–1985)
Compiled and researched by the Education Service of the Gardens
Last year at the Gardens we celebrated the life and achievements of our founder
and one of the greatest plantsmen of the twentieth century, Sir Harold Hillier
CBE, FLS, VMH (1905-1985).
Harold George Hillier was born in Winchester on 2 January 1905. His grandfather was a Victorian entrepreneur who bought a small florist and nursery in Winchester in 1864. His father was a world authority on conifers. The young Harold showed a keen interest in plants and the family nursery business, which he joined in 1921.
He became a great collector of plants. His wife Barbara recalls that he would always have a plant catalogue in his pocket even when on family holidays in Devon. When on honeymoon in Majorca, he surprised his propagator by sending home a sample of the honeysuckle, Lonicera implexa.
Sir Harold bought Jermyn's House and the surrounding land in 1952. Gradually he cleared the land for nursery use, removing the stumps of some of the old parkland trees with the help of dynamite! He also began his 'home for plants', initially in areas unsuitable for nursery planting.
"While others are talking about conservation,
I'm doing it. I'm putting roots in the ground. I'm planting, planting,
planting."
Sir Harold Hillier
He planted his favourite plants close to the house where he could look out at them through the french windows of his office. He was forever trying to find more room for his plants and had the tennis court dug up to become his dwarf conifer bed. In 1964 he constructed Centenary Border to celebrate the centenary of the family nursery business.
"I for one take pleasure and satisfaction
in planting an eighteen inch high tree magnolia, which though I will never
see in flower, even now I can enjoy its invisible colour and latent fragrance."
Sir Harold Hillier
Sir Harold knew many renowned plantsmen and Jermyn's House became a popular place to visit. Lady Hillier would provide visitors with refreshments, homemade bread being a speciality.
Although he was reluctant to commit much to paper, his collection being his 'living catalogue', Sir Harold wrote his first catalogue for Hillier Nurseries in 1926. This evolved into the renowned Hillier Manual of Trees and Shrubs (1971), which was described by reviewers as 'the catalogue to end all catalogues' and 'a horticultural bible'.
Sir Harold travelled the world extensively and collected specimens from countries as botanically diverse as Korea, Australia, America and South Africa. In 1966 he and his wife were among the first non-political visitors to cross the Iron Curtain when they went to Czechoslovakia.
He gave the arboretum to Hampshire County Council in 1977, by which time he had increased the original acreage considerably. This event was commemorated in 1978 when the Queen Mother planted a weeping oak at the top of Magnolia Avenue. Sir Harold's connections with the Royal Family dated back to when he had visited Glamis Castle with his father as a teenager and Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon had served them tea. It was she, as the Queen Mother, who knighted Sir Harold in 1983.
"The arboretum brought together my great grandfather's, grandfather's
and father's plant collections. It is simply a home for plants."
John Hillier, eldest son of Sir Harold and the President of Hillier Nurseries Ltd
Sir Harold died at the age of 80 on 8 January 1985. He left behind an ever-expanding, important and diverse arboretum for our enjoyment. At his memorial service, Lord Aberconway (President of the RHS) echoed the words on Sir Christopher Wren's tomb in St Paul's Cathedral: "If you seek his memorial, look around you", a fitting tribute to a great plantsman.
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