FAO any ONs out of off of on here who are from the 70s/80s

And who remember Philip Stibbe, our headmaster

Two things: the first is that his son, Mark, was one of the victims of John Smyth QC and has written movingly about it. The second is that in the course of reading about that, I read Mark saying he’d learned a lot about forgiveness from his father, because Philip had been a Chindit and had spent years as a POW of the Japanese, suffering in the way that all such did but deciding after the war to forgive them.

He wrote a book about it when he got back (“Return via Rangoon”), which I’ve just read. (Not the best written to be honest! But still quite a story.)

I had absolutely no idea that he’d had such an extraordinary, life-forming experience. I wish I’d known. The incuriosity of youth.

Posted By: Old Git, Nov 26, 17:35:10