HOLMES & FAMILY FUNERAL DIRECTORS

Award Winning Funeral Directors 

Oliver and David Holmes, together with our small team of dedicated and compassionate staff make Holmes and Family your local highly respected and trusted funeral director.  The Holmes family have over 40 years of experience, acquired through building trust and relationships with people in our community.  As a family business, we will take time to listen to your wishes and personalise the funeral to your exact preference. 

Oliver, David, and the team are supported by Madeleine and Laurence Holmes, while other family members contribute too, helping with bookkeeping, marketing, maintenance and attending funerals during busy periods.  Our whole family is committed to the business, taking great pride in our premises, vehicles, clothes, and equipment.  Most importantly, we promise to take exceptionally good care of the person who has died, treating them and you as if you really were a part of our family. We feel honoured and privileged that you choose to place your trust in us and strive to reach the highest standards.

Oliver Holmes - Then and Now

THE HOLMES FAMILY HISTORY

Brothers David, Andrew and John Holmes were the original family members who set up as funeral directors, first in Hounslow then Ashford, Feltham, Twickenham, Teddington, Surbiton, East Sheen, Richmond and Chessington. The original business name was Holmes & Sons, which prompted the girls to say, ‘but what about the daughters?’ So, when Andrew and David agreed to operate as separate businesses, David, who had two daughters, settled on the business name ‘Holmes and Daughters,’ while Andrew renamed his Hounslow based firm, Andrew Holmes & Son.  Sadly, following Andrew’s death in 1998, the firm became a part of the Co-op Funeralcare brand, while Holmes and Daughters was also sold to the Ford-Mears Group and trades under that umbrella brand.  These days, no Holmes family members are involved with either of the old businesses, so if you really want a Holmes family funeral, you must choose Holmes and Family.  We regularly look after former clients in all of the local areas listed and beyond.

Our new firm, Holmes and Family was created in 2006, with the first branch opening in Fleet Hampshire.  There are now modern well-equipped Holmes funeral homes in Sandhurst, Aldershot, Farnborough, Staines, and Ashford Surrey.  These days Oliver Holmes is in day-to-day charge; he is assisted by Alex and the team who between them have won coveted funeral awards and gained an enviable reputation for the high standards we set ourselves.  This is not our job, it’s a vocation and every person we look after receives the same high level of care.  

David Holmes regularly appears on TV and radio, speaking passionately about funerals. Recent programmes have included ‘The Fixer’ on BBC1, a documentary for Radio 4 and the Jeremy Vine show, on Radio 2, as well as various LBC programmes.  Holmes and Family is a small firm with a national reputation, we are modern, open, progressive funeral directors working towards giving everyone a better funeral experience.

INVESTING IN OUR VEHICLES

Since first starting in business, we always wanted to provide the very best funeral vehicles available to our client families. Originally, we hired the classic Daimler hearse and limousine, which were in fact the last funeral cars actually made in the Jaguar factory on the production line. Eventually, we managed to buy our own pair. Production of the Daimler DS420 model ceased in 1992 and the only option was to remanufacture saloon cars for funeral use, which as you may imagine, is easier said than done.

Our trusted supplier, Wilcox limousines - working in close partnership with Jaguar cars Ltd invested huge sums in order to continue building and supplying funeral cars long into the future. In the 90's, we started buying these new Jaguar/Wilcox models, which (then) cost around £60,000. We kept them until Jaguar updated and modernised the XJ shape. Our current fleet is the latest Euro 6 Jaguar XJ and with a purchase price of £150,000 each, they represent a considerable investment for the benefit of the families who entrust us with funeral arrangements.

When our current Jaguar’s need to be replaced, hopefully not for a few years yet, we expect to operate electric or Hybrid powered funeral cars. Alongside the Jaguar hearse and limousine seen in the pictures, is our 1934 registered Austin 20 model hearse, it was built by Alpe and Saunders in Kew, Richmond upon Thames. Now aged just 87 years young, she's still working in Wanganui New Zealand.

Not all funeral directors invest in their ceremonial vehicles, many we see regularly are 10-20 years old.

We stick with our only the best policy when it comes to the ambulance we use to bring someone into our care. Our latest Euro 6 Mercedes funeral ambulance is custom made and carefully specified for our use. All of our vehicles are cleaned at least once daily, we all take a real pride in them.

OUR TIME IN TV & FILM

In years gone by, we were often asked to appear in TV and film productions. For a long time, we were the funeral directors in ITV’s ‘The Bill’ where in one episode, on arrival at the location we discovered David’s sister-in-law’s Mum, actor Helen Blatch was the murderer. It was our job to remove her intended victim, but as is often the case, the action was filmed out of sequence. We actually did our job, removing the deceased, before the murder had been committed by Helen, actually even before the accident ambulance had arrived to see if first aid were possible.

Other TV shows included ‘Oh Dr Beeching’ and ‘The Last Salute’ – both comedy dramas where inevitably our old hearse broke down or crashed as part of the fun. Several other dramas were filmed, often using our beautifully restored 1934 Austin hearse. Producers usually wanted it to crash or breakdown, and in one film ‘Before you go’ featuring Julie Walters, it had to be towed to her mother’s funeral behind an ice cream van after failing to proceed under its own steam.

While filming an episode of ‘Kavanagh QC’ with John Thaw, ‘Innocency of Life’ David fell into conversation (as he often does) with the producer, Chris Kelly. He was bemoaning the fact that he enjoyed the film work but strangely seemed typecast as a funeral director. Overnight, Chris came up with a solution, and David was featured in the opening scene - driving the hearse, and through the magic of film, passing himself driving a horse drawn brewers dray - going in the opposite direction. The measured dramatic wave of the ‘two’ David’s is a fine piece of acting, insists David.

Also fun, was another comedy, ‘Class Act’ featuring Joanna Lumley, she was very taken with our beautiful old hearse. David got to drive with actor Keith Allen playing the part of a crooked undertaker. Thankfully, the police rumbled Keith’s contraband in coffin smuggling operation, and both were apprehended in Kensal Green cemetery.

All good things come to an end, and the Holmes family eventually decided that film and TV funeral directing was taking up too much time and reluctantly stopped doing it. The vintage Austin hearse sat unused for a couple of years and to our (now) huge regret was eventually sold. Aged just 87 years, the lovely old girl is working again, this time in New Zealand, at Dempsey and Forrest family funeral directors in Wanganui.