Percy Louis Carroll

It was a subject on which he was called to give numerous talks – he was much in demand as an after-dinner speaker – and on which he wrote for the Yorkshire Post and other papers.

Louis, who never married and has died aged 94, was born in the family home at Baildon Green, Shipley, Bradford.

His father, also Percy Louis Carroll, was a chartered surveyor and auctioneer, a JP and chairman of Baildon Council. His mother, Annie Gladys, was the daughter of Isaac Waddington, a surgeon.

Louis went to Saltaire Grammar School and Bradford Grammar School, and he was a pupil there, aged 15, when his father died. Although he was offered a “County Continuation Scholarship” – the equivalent of going into the sixth form today – he decided to follow in the same profession as his father, and so took up the offer of being articled to a firm of auctioneers and valuers.

He took the various examinations of the profession and passed his finals with first class honours and the second highest marks in the country, winning a prize of eight guineas. He was now a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (FRICS) and Associate of the Auctioneers’ Institute (AAI).

Louis served in the Second World war as a sergeant in 2nd Royal Tank Corps. He had a difficult war and spoke little of it afterwards, but saw action in Italy, North Africa, the Western Desert and Burma, where he twice contracted malaria.

On his return home, he was appointed as a district valuer for the Inland Revenue in Bradford.

When the Town and Country Planning Act became law in 1947, Louis became an expert on its contents and gave many talks in Bradford and Leeds to professional bodies.

A meticulous record keeper, he had a scrapbook in which he pasted all the newspaper articles he wrote, and all the reports of the occasions which he attended as a speaker.

In 1950, he resigned from the District Valuers Office and became a partner in David Waterhouse & Nephews. Referred to in newspaper articles as a “property expert”, he continued his work with the Planning Act.

He was a member of Bradford and District Round Table, the Bradford and District Property and Ratepayers Association; he was president of the Auctioneers’ and Estate Agents Association, and served as a committee member of the Bradford Civic Society.

In 1967 Waterhouses merged with Eddison, Taylor and Booth of Huddersfield. Initially the two firms kept their separate identities but in March 1970 were amalgamated becoming known as Eddisons. At that time Louis retired. He was 53.

Two years later he decided to return to work and got a job with the property and estates division of the Department of the Environment at its offices in Headingley, Leeds, remaining there until retirement age.

Louis was an avid reader, he had an extensive classical musical collection and was very interested in wildlife, particularly birds. He spent many holidays in Wales and the Lake District pursuing these interests and would attend courses at university campuses to further his knowledge.

After his childhood in Baildon, he moved to Rawdon and then Horsforth. He was very close to his sister Sheila, who died in 2009, and to her children Susan and Martin who survive him.