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.