Page 145 - Wish Stream Year of 2017

appeared in bigger and better roles until 1938. That year he was cast as the lead in Dawn Patrol and in Raffles the following year. By now a major star, Niven was part of a group of influential Brit- ish actors known as The Hollywood Raj, and was much in demand. However, upon the out- break of WW2, despite advice from the British Embassy to the contrary, he travelled to the UK to enlist, one of the few British Hollywood stars to do so. In early 1940 Winston Churchill said to him: ‘Young man. You did a fine thing giving up your film career to fight for your country. Mark you – had you not done so, it would have been despicable!’
Commissioned into the Rifle Brigade, Niven soon transferred to the Commandos but was given leave to star in two propaganda films, First of The Few (1942) and The Way Ahead (1944). He landed in Normandy a week after D Day, serving in the Phantom Signals Unit, a Commando for- ward Reconnaissance unit. Calming his soldiers’ nerves before an operation he said: ‘Look – you chaps only have to do this once – but I’ll have to do it all over again in Hollywood with Errol Flynn!’ Awarded the US Legion of Merit, Niven was demobbed as a Lt Col.
Returning to Hollywood he was never out of work, but the major roles eluded him as they had fellow pre-war British star and wartime officer Richard Greene. He also worked in Broadway and was spotted by Otto Preminger and cast in The Moon is Blue for which he won a Golden Globe. This bump-started his career and Niven starred in the huge hit, Around The World in Eighty Days and won an Oscar for Separate Tables (1958). After action hits such as The Guns of Navarone and comedy hits such as The Pink Panther Niven was cast as James Bond in the comedy spy caper Casino Royale, a spoof rival to the already popular Bond franchise starring Sean Connery. The film had a stellar cast includ- ing cameos from Peter O’Toole, Stirling Moss and a debut for Dave Prowse – better known as Darth Vader. Indeed, Niven had been Ian Flem- ing’s first choice to play Bond in Dr No.
Niven continued to star throughout the sixties and seventies, and his last film was a cameo role in Curse of The Pink Panther (1983). By now suffering from Motor Neurone Disease, his voice was dubbed for the film. He also published two novels and two highly successful autobiogra- phies the first of which, The Moon’s A Balloon, sold over five million copies. David Niven died on
29 July 1983. At his memorial service an enor- mous wreath was delivered from the Heathrow Airport porters with the inscription: ‘To the finest gentleman who ever walked through these halls. He made a porter feel like a king.’
Robert Runcie
1942 Scots Guards
Robert Runcie was born in Lancashire in 1921. He was commissioned from Sandhurst into the Scots Guards in 1942 and commanded a troop of Churchill tanks in the battle for Europe, win- ning the Military Cross in 1945. His citation states that he rescued two soldiers from a burning tank whilst under fire and the next day knocked out two enemy self-propelled guns and an 88mm gun. He was also amongst the first British troops to enter the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. After his demob, he studied Classics at Oxford University before being ordained into the Church of England in 1950, first working as a curate in Newcastle. Marked out as a rising star, Runcie was consecrated as Bishop of St Albans in 1970.
In 1979 Robert Runcie was selected as the Archbishop of Canterbury, the senior Bishop of the Church of England. During his tenure, he fre- quently clashed with the Prime Minister, Marga- ret Thatcher, over the Conservative Party policies of individualism and wealth creation. In 1981 he officiated at the marriage of Price Charles and Lady Diana Spencer. Despite considerable opposition, he sought to bring the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches together and, in a gesture of goodwill, prayed together with Pope John Paul II on the Papal visit to the UK in 1982. Unfortunately, the ‘honeymoon’ period ended soon afterwards when he preached penitence and reconciliation at the Falklands War Thanks- giving service against the triumphalist mood of
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