The late Mr. H.A. Simonds
Mr. H. A. Simonds was educated at Eton College and was Captain of the school in the year 1842. After leaving Eton, he spent some years abroad, and shortly after his return to England married, in 1851 the widow of the late Mr. George Mellish Simonds, a connection which led to his joining the firm of H. & G. Simonds, in which he afterwards took an active and continuing interest until the last, attending, as Chairman of the Directors, a Board meeting only a fortnight before his death. There was no issue of the marriage. Mr. Adolphus Simonds was a man of fine presence and courtly manner and had a very wide circle of friends. He enjoyed exceptionally good health until ten days before his death, which was due to bronchitis complicated by heart troubles. He was all his life a keen angler and shot. As an all-round fisherman he was unexcelled in his generation, but his special hobbies in the gentle art were the most difficult cult of the dry fly on the famed chalk streams of Hampshire, and fly fishing for salmon, which led him frequently to Ireland, and regularly for many seasons to Norway, where he had great sport.
He was for many years a member of the Corporation of Reading and served the office of Chief Magistrate with dignity and distinction in the year 1859-60. He was on more than one occasion asked to stand as Conservative candidate for the Borough, but having no political ambition, he always declined the proffered honour.
Mr. Adolphus Simonds, when he came to Reading, resided at Ivy Lodge, Whitley, and later at Cressingham Park, near Reading, and for a short time afterwards at Barton Court, Kintbury. He then removed to Red RIce, Andover, but after Mrs. Simonds' death he went to reside with his nephew, Mr. L. de L. Simonds, at Audleys Wood.