James Herriot Day of Prayer Back to Butlin’s English Travels
Sir: “Askrigg and the Yorkshire Dales” (“English Excursions”, Autumn 2017) brought back pleasant memories. In 1983 my wife and I started watching All Creatures Great and Small on our local public television channel. We loved the series and bought the books. We decided to visit Yorkshire to see if we could find Alf Wight. In Thirsk we found Skeldale House and saw Mr. Wight leaving, on his way to treat a sick cow, but he graciously waited while my wife took our picture. He also invited us to see him later after surgery. About a dozen of us — mainly Americans — waited for him and he invited us in where we had a pleasant time taking photographs and getting books signed. He was a very kind and unassuming man.
Two years later, we went back to Yorkshire and we returned to Skeldale House to see Mr. Wight. There were about 15 of us in his surgery, and when it came to my wife’s turn to have a book signed, he looked up at her and said: “You’ve been here before.” Wow!
We have made 15 trips to Britain, exploring your wonderful country from Land’s End to Inverness. As lovers of English literature, we have visited the former homes of Jane Austen, William Wordsworth, Beatrix Potter, Thomas Hardy and the Brontë sisters. For me, though, visiting “James Herriot” in his surgery in Thirsk was the biggest thrill of all. — Sir: The film Dunkirk is creating great interest. There is, however, one major fact not mentioned in the film. The situation was so desperate, King George VI called for a National Day of Prayer on 26th May 1940. In a broadcast he asked the people of Britain to pray for God’s help. Thousands of special services were held across the country. The fascinating photograph (below) shows the extraordinary scene outside Westminster Abbey as frightened people queued to pray, a scene replicated across the nation.
Two significant events followed. Firstly, a violent storm arose over the Dunkirk region grounding the Luftwaffe, which had been killing thousands on the beaches. Secondly, a great calm descended on the Channel, the like of which hadn’t occurred for a generation, enabling the hundreds of tiny boats to rescue 338,000 soldiers, rather than the estimated 30,000. It was the timing of these events immediately after the Prayer Day which led people to speak of “the Miracle of Dunkirk” and Sunday 9th June was officially appointed as a Day of National Thanksgiving.
Looking back at this and other events the Bishop of Chelmsford wrote: “If ever a great nation was on the point of supreme and final disaster, and yet was saved and reinstated it was ourselves…it does not require an exceptionally religious mind to detect in all this the Hand of God.”
At the end of 1942, after the tide had turned in the war, Churchill was moved to say, “I sometimes have a feeling of interference, I want to stress that. I have a feeling sometimes that some Guiding Hand has interfered.”
To coincide with the film, details of various Wartime Miracles are being sent to thousands of churches across the UK to give congregations hope and reassurance, much needed in our unsettling times. If anyone would like this uplifting information directly by email, then they are welcome to contact: strengthenthefaithful@ gmail.com, clearly putting Wartime Miracles in the subject box. Thank you. — Sir: I enjoyed “See You at Butlin’s” (Summer 2017). On 20th August 1966, my wife and I were married in Southampton and went to the new Chichester Motel en route to the Butlin’s Hotel in Brighton for our honeymoon. Driving my old Austin A35 with “Just married” painted upon it and dressed in our wedding outfits, I asked for directions from a local bobby on foot patrol. He gave us the directions to the motel and announced in a loud voice and with a smile on his face, “Good night, sir!”
Not sure what today’s married couples would make of a week at Butlin’s, but we did meet some really nice people from many parts of England and enjoyed all the activities while there. — Sir: I purchased the Summer 2017 issue to read the article on Poldark and I felt I had to write about my experiences in the south of England in the autumn of 2015. My mum and I were on a six-day tour of Devon and Cornwall. It was some of