‘I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplications…’ so starts Psalm 116, which has been a favourite quotation for many years. I was born in Bristol on 14 October 1929, the youngest of 3 children. My father Wilfrid had been wounded at the Battle of the Somme in 1916. He was the adjutant of an infantry battalion and was riding his horse in the regimental area between detachments. A shell landed nearby, which killed the horse and badly wounded his right arm with shrapnel in the arm and body. He was invalided back to hospital at Netley, near Southampton.
Wilfrid had a girlfriend, Di, whom he had met on a skiing holiday before the war. She was nursing at a hospital in Cheltenham but managed to be transferred to Netley to help care for her boyfriend with the shattered arm. Doctors feared the arm would possibly need to be amputated, but it was saved by the diligent care of Di and all the shrapnel was removed. Later that year Wilfrid was discharged from hospital and he and Di were married on 27 December 1916. They had a brief honeymoon in Cornwall, where they rode horses on the beach at Newquay.
Wilfrid’s right arm would never quite straighten. As a keen tennis player, the slightly bent serving arm enabled him to deliver a vicious spin to his service much to the delight of grandchildren playing with him. God must be thanked for the saving of his arm and for the unexpected benefit to his tennis skill. In relevant prayers I am inspired by the continuation of Psalm 116: ‘…because he hath inclined his ear unto me therefore will I call upon him as long as I live’.
Alastair Anson
