Disabled Angler Fishes On Waimakariri River

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27565, 24 January 1955, Page 3

Disabled Angler Fishes On Waimakariri River

A man paralysed as the result of a war wound, who is now a prominent worker for the disabled in Britain and a very keen fisherman, arrived in Christchurch on Friday evening on a three months’ holiday in New Zealand. Since his arrival in Christchurch the Hon. Julian HollandHibbert, the <J4-year-old heir of Viscount Knutsford, has spent most of his time at the mouth of the Waimakariri river, trying, as he said, to catch a salmon.

Sitting in a wheelchair, tinkering with his hand-controlled motor-car outside his hotel yesterday, Mr Holland-Hibbert told of his interests. He had gone from Eton to Cambridge but had only had two terms studying modern languages when he went into the army—the Coldstream Guards. As a lieutenant he was gravely wounded in the spine during fighting in Tunisia on St. Patrick’s Day, 1943, becoming paralysed. A doctor who attended him in the 15th Scottish Hospital, where he was for four months before being evacuated to England, was Dr. Donald McKenzie, an Auckland neuro-surgeon. From his father’s home near Watford, Hertfordshire, he has worked for the disabled in Britain. He is vicechairman of Queen Elizabeth's Training College for the Disabled at Leatherhead which, since its institution in 1935, has trained more than 3000 men and women of all ages and successfully placed them in open industry, The school caters for any disability except the totally blind and active tuberculosis sufferers. With a friend also confined to a wheelchair as a result of war wounds, Mr Holland-Hibbert founded the National Association for the Paralysed, of which he is chairman, about six years ago. With doctors, a neurologist, physio-therapists and various technical

persons on its committee, the organisation has more than 3700 on its register whom it helps to solve their problems with advice on such things as the best way to get in and out of the bath, the most suitable gadgets and appliances, the best doctors and the best training. Most of the work is done by correspondence. One of the association’s finest works has been a holiday plan, begun in 1948, when it was found that many of the more seriously disabled could not go away because they could not find places suitable to go to. Recently 250 have had fortnight holidays in homes run by nurses at seaside resorts, paying what they could themselves, but costing another £4OOO, collected by the association from other sources. Mr Holland-Hibbert has also been associated with the building at Watford of bungalows specially designed and equipped to make life easier for cripples.

Arriving at Auckland by the Port Auckland on January 8, he was landed on the wharf in his wheelchair by crane to renew his frendship with Dr. McKenzie. Since then he has been driving slowly down New Zealand with his valet, Mr R. ~ Menzies, also wounded during the wa who has been with him for two yeas and a half. He consider? it probably easier to drive completely by hand than by using feet. On his leisurely way, Mr HollandHibbert has stopped at every opportunity to satisfy his desire to fish. This he usually carries out from a boat with a preference for lakes. It is a far cry from the lakes of Banffshire and Sutherland. in Scotland, where he frequently goes, to Rotorua, Queenstown, Taupo and the Bay of Islands, where he intends to go when he has toured the South Island. Yesterday morning he left again to continue his quest on the Waimakariri.