Faithful Witness: The Confidential Diaries of Alan Don, Chaplain to the King, the Archbishop and the Speaker, 1931-1946
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
In May 1931, Alan Don travelled from Dundee to Lambeth Palace to become Chaplain to Cosmo Lang, Archbishop of Canterbury. During that journey he began a diary. He kept it faithfully for the next fifteen years, during which he also became Chaplain to the King and to the Speaker of the House of Commons. These positions afforded him a ringside view of some of the most momentous events in both British and world history – including the abdication of Edward VIII, the coronation of George VI, the rise of Hitler and the trauma of the Second World War. Now, for the first time, these fascinating Christian diaries are laid open in full by Robert Beaken. They offer a wealth of detailed insight into the ecclesiastical, royal, and parliamentary affairs of Britain and her élite during two historically significant decades. They also open a window on the history of the Church of England and its role in the social, political and military upheavals of the 1930s and 40s as well as the lives of Alan Don and Archbishop Lang. Much more than a memoir, Faithful Witness is a remarkable, real-time record of events that have shaped modern Britain. Anyone who wants to know more about the experience of living through those turbulent times, and how Great Britain and the Church of England survived, will be amply rewarded by this engaging, perceptive and revealing eye-witness account.
This is a Logos Reader Edition. Learn more.
- Has unbelievable interviews, and extraordinary political commentaries.
- Presents these journals and brings to life again a cast of remarkable figures.
- Explains the centrality of the Church in the British state in the run up to global conflict.
Robert Beaken has done a magnificent job of presenting these journals and bringing to life again a cast of remarkable figures during an eventful and traumatic era... A really valuable contribution to the history of twentieth century Britain.
--Rowan Williams, Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge
Alan Don’s diaries are a revelation, full of perceptive and lively comment on the leaders of the Church of England and aspects of public and social life during the difficult years of the 1930s and 1940s.
--Philip Williamson, Professor of Modern British History, Durham University
These wonderful diaries add hugely to our understanding of the centrality of the Church in the British state in the run up to global conflict.
--Mark Chapman, Professor of the History of Modern Theology, University of Oxford
- Title: Faithful Witness: The Confidential Diaries of Alan Don, Chaplain to the King, the Archbishop and the Speaker, 1931-1946
- Author: Robert Beaken
- Publisher: SPCK
- Print Publication Date: 2020
- Pages: 528
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
- ISBNs: 9780281083985, 0281083983, 0281083991, 9780281083992
- Resource ID: LLS:FTHFLWT19311946
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2023-01-02T18:32:05Z
Robert Beaken was born in London in 1962. He trained for ordination in the Church of England at Cuddesdon, and studied as an ecumenical student at the Venerable English College and Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He was ordained deacon in 1988 and priest in 1989 in Portsmouth Cathedral by Bishop Timothy Bavin and served curacies at Forton, Gosport, and Shepshed in Leicestershire. In 1994 he became the vicar of St Barnabas’ Church, Old Heath, Colchester, and since 2002 has been the priest-in-charge of Great and Little Bardfield in north-west Essex.
Robert Beaken holds a PhD from King’s College London, and is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Dr Beaken has served as an academic tutor on the Eastern Region Ministry Course at Cambridge and as a Fan the Flame parish missioner. He is a Police chaplain in Essex and also county chaplain and hospitaller of the Order of St John.
Dr Beaken is the author of eight books including Cosmo Lang, Archbishop in War and Crisis and The Church of England and the Home Front 1914–1918 and writes for the Church Times and the Church of England Newspaper.