THE FULL SERVICE CAN BE VIEWED HERE https://youtu.be/PDRb_BeYFFg?t=1

Eulogy for Peter Wright (either read or watch extracts from Peter's Thanksgiving Service below)
10.05.2022

Kay Poulton- Peter's Stepdaughter and God-daughter

Hello, I would like to thank you all for coming and for those on the internet welcome to friends and family from the UK, Sweden, New Zealand, America, Canada, Switzerland and brother Howard and family in Cairns. Australia. I am representing the whole family as I try and give you a glimpse into Peter’s life. Jo, as you know, was a great friend of Peters and she is going to tell you about Peter’s life in Warnham. Then I will read an extract from an exercise book when he did ‘SHOW AND TELL’ to the school children in Warnham about St Peter


Peter was born the 3rd son on the 22nd April 1932 and died 3 weeks before his 90th birthday. To us he was known as
Godfather Peter, Uncle Peter, Uncle Peter 2 cars then for 33 years he was Grandpa to 6 grandchildren as Grandpa in Horsham and then Grandpa in Warnham and Great Grandpa Peter to 3 great-grandchildren.

Peter was born in Ilford, Essex, the youngest of 3 boys with Michael and David before him
Their parents owned a greengrocers shop in Ilford, but their home was in Hutton, nr Shenfield and he went to Brentwood school
The family were very involved in the Church and their strong Christian faith grew there, where they formed the Church youth club and lifelong friendships were made. There was a big group of them who loved point to point amateur horse racing and cycled to weekend meetings as often as they could, often 40 miles each way.

As they grew older Michael and Peter went on a couple of long cycling holidays. Michael, now 93, recalls the trip which saw them cycling from home in Essex to Borrowdale in the Lake District via the Midlands and York and then back down from the Lakes via the Peak District, back to Shenfield and straight back to work on Monday. They had cycled a minimum of 665 miles, averaging 74 miles per day.. they must have been very fit.

Peter went to Oxford University where he got a degree in French and Spanish
He then started teaching, first at Bickley Hall, which he adored, and after it closed led him to his longest-serving post at Carn Brea School (near Bromley) which he loved. His pupils for some reason called him ‘Varooka’.  The boys thought he lived for them and that when term time finished and they went home for the holidays, Mr. Wright went back to his room and just waited for them to return at the start of the next term. They were very surprised when they met up with Mr. Wright last year, 50 plus years on, to find out that he had actually left his room traveled extensively, and done so many other things in his life, including getting married to our mum, Hazel, the Old Boys were completely enthralled and amazed.

He was very happy at Carn Brea - and was very involved in the school plays/musicals each year. He worked with the Head's wife - she wrote the scripts whilst he wrote the music, a skill he had developed with David when writing the reviews in Hutton
When Carn Brea closed in 1973,

Peter returned to his house in Billericay. Overnight he was offered 4 things: an invitation to New Zealand to see his beloved cousins with a bit of sheep shearing thrown in, a trip to see his friends Eileen and Duncan and to see his Goddaughter, Rachel, in Canada and of course his annual visit to brother David, Irma and family in Sweden culminating in a new teaching job at Christs Hospital in a years’ time. He booked his passage to New Zealand on a container ship and off he went, writing his story as he went, calling it Around the world in 280 days.

In 1974 he took up the post at Christ's Hospital – and loved it there, he was a house master until he retired in 1992
In 1980 I wrote to him and asked him to my 21st birthday party but he said he had to decline as it was near the end of term and we lived in Manchester at the time, but he said he would write to my Mum. They had been friends for over 25 years and so the love story began and soon our Mum (that’s Keith, mine and Howard’s Mum), Hazel, took a giant leap and moved from Manchester to Horsham to be with Peter and moved into Christ Hospital with her beloved dog, Tigger.

As his Goddaughter he had always been my Uncle Peter and suddenly I was having to share him with Mum and 2 brothers. At first, I was a little grumpy about it but soon realised that Peter’s capacity to love everyone was phenomenal and there was still enough room for ‘me’ and all of ‘them’.

Mum got a Health visiting job in Horsham and they married in 1983 and ‘Pete and Haze were born
They were inseparable and went everywhere together. They bought a gorgeous static caravan in Brittany and took us all out to stay. Peter was the best husband ever and they loved each other unconditionally.

Then sadly just 8 ½ years later 1992 came which was Peter’s annus horribilis
In April Peter was 60
In May, Hazel died suddenly of cancer
In June; Peter retired and
In July he moved into Warnham into the house they had bought several years before with a view to a long and happy retirement….and he received the yellow pamphlet
‘Welcome to Warnham’

Over to you Jo ……………Jo Browse’s tribute

When I took on running the church choir in the early 2000s, Peter and I were given the task of selecting a new hymn book by the Vicar to replace the church’s old Ancient and Modern Revised. This was the first time we got to know each other properly, and we soon found we had similar tastes in hymns. He knew all the Bass lines by heart and loved many of the same tunes that I did, and also relished their poetry. But it wasn’t just a musical or theological appreciation of hymns - in choir practice, I would announce that we were going to rehearse hymn number ‘such-and-such’ and Peter would instantly comment on the mathematical properties of that number, in a quietly musing kind of way, something along the lines of “the square of each of the digits when added together make up the date of Shergar winning the Epsom Derby.”

When Peter was planning one of his famous fund-raising Greyhound Races (a board game he invented) he asked me to find names for the 6 dogs running the “Hymn Book Stakes” hidden within the texts of hymns in Common Praise. These were usually a play on words, something that always made him chuckle, for instance Faithful Ness, Bright Raymond and Lowly Wee Neil.
Peter was very close to Christopher Loveless, our Vicar from 1998 to 2015, and it was Christopher’s intervention that gave Peter the ‘license to preach’, which he thereafter did often at Evensong. Whenever Peter stepped into the pulpit there was an expectant atmosphere among the congregation, a contented settling in for a good yarn. Because his sermons were very entertaining. He would generally begin with an amusing anecdote, pertinent to the subject matter, and he had a delightfully light touch when it came to the theology. He referred to the bible as it were to an absorbing book that we had all read and enjoyed, and he spoke of the characters as if they were friends we had in common.

Given his relish of a good story, his theatrical experience both in schools and Am Dram, and his friendship with Christopher, Peter was naturally a key cast member of the bi-annual Warnham Pantomimes. Giving his all to whatever part he was allocated, Peter would be at every rehearsal, his enthusiasm and enjoyment never dimmed, and even when after 2013 he found it physically too tiring to be on stage, he would attend more than one performance and still seemed to be part of the cast, even if it was only because he let us run across to his house from the Village Hall to use the loo in the interval.

Peter became firm friends with my mum, Jean, after she moved to the village in 2004. By the time she got too frail to go out much they had known each other for 6 or 7 years, and Peter would come to her house every day at 4 pm for an hour or so, and they would chat and pray together, and then he’d read to her – each day a new chapter of a book they’d selected. I and my family moved in to live with mum in 2012 in order to look after her, and Peter’s ‘yoo-hoo’ as he came in the back door at 4 was a highlight of our day – a change of scene for Mum and a welcome hour off for me. On Thursdays, his visit was extended to include Fish and Chips from the van that comes every week to the Village, and it was a joy to eavesdrop at a distance, hearing them chat away amicably or munching in companionable silence as they ate.

By about this time we had established a pattern of monthly Sunday lunches with Peter, when the 5 of us – me, Mark, my husband, Adam, our son, mum and Peter – would tuck into one of Mark’s delicious roast dinners after singing in church together in the morning. Discussion around the table would range from Maths to music, crosswords, quizzes, and etymology, and usually included Peter’s memories of his travels (either alone or with his brothers) and anecdotes from his long career as a teacher. When preparing this Eulogy I asked Mark and Adam to think of a classic one and they came up with the Cuban Cigar Story. Peter had flown to the US, taking with him the board game he invented, ‘Greyhound Race’ or ‘Ludham Dogs’ (which, incidentally, has been played regularly, at least twice a year I think, since 1963, in various parts of the globe, from Australia to Sweden.) The ‘dogs’ which in the game get moved around a racetrack were stored in a Cuban cigar box, and at the time relations between the US and Cuba were strained. Peter was called out randomly by the US customs officer who searched his bag. Finding the Cuban cigar box, he enquired of Peter “and what would I find if I opened this?” to which he replied, “well, you’re not going to believe this, but…..six small wooden dogs.”

With Adam, he relished exchanging fascinating maths facts (totally over my head), and with Mark,  musings on language – they both being modern language graduates from Oxford. With me though it was often conversation around faith, liturgy and so on, usually after Morning Prayer which we both attended every weekday. One or other of us might have an observation about the day’s reading or we would share a favourite part of one of the prayers. On one of these occasions we had both noticed the sheer perfection of one of the collects (which are short prayers set for particular weeks or days of the church year). (Peter had a fondness for Collects and wrote a sermon about them, which I heard twice, and, for his 90th birthday I bought him a book about their history). Anyway one morning there was a Collect that, we agreed, seemed to encapsulate all that you need to know about the life of faith, in just a few lines, written simply but elegantly.

Eternal God and Father,
you create and redeem us by the power of your love;
guide and strengthen us by your spirit,
that we may give ourselves in love and service
to one another and to you;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The thing about Peter is he had such a full and varied life, and had so many enthusiasms and loves, exploits and adventures, no-one could have known everything there is to know about him – except of course his beloved Lord and Saviour. We will all have our particular memory of his kindness and generosity, his love of theatre, scripture, children, fun, music, travel, God. I am thankful that I have known a wise and trusted friend, whose kindness and patience seemed limitless, and whose good humour never waned, even when life became quite tiring and tiresome towards the end. So many in the village who might even not have known his name, but would recognise ‘the lovely old guy who walks down to the shop every day’ have spoken fondly of him as someone who always gave a cheery hello (especially to dogs).

His faith shone out of him, he always believed the best of people, and when life dealt a blow either to him or to another, he would sigh ‘oh dear’ and give a bemused shake of the head, and even then a smile was never far from his lips. He had an enviable quality of putting his all into things he really cared about, whilst somehow simultaneously not taking anything too seriously.
The day after he died, I read this phrase at Morning Prayer, very appropriate in memory of a dear friend:
Those who are wise will shine brightly as the heavens,and those who have instructed many in virtue will shine like stars for all eternity. Alleluia.

Back to Kay to the end
‘St Peter’ written by Peter Wright

‘’One Christmas, under the tree, there were 3 identical parcels about 5 inches long labelled Michael, David and Peter. Michael opened his first and inside was a little wooden statuette of St Michael resplendent in shining armour, with the largest wings wielding a large sword, slaying a dragon.
David opened his next and his St David was also impressive in glorious bishops’ cope and mitre of gold and silver holding his cathedral
I was eager to open mine to see what St Peter was like
But what a disappointment. He was a very ordinary looking man wearing what appeared to be a black and white striped dressing gown with sandals and carrying 2 keys He had a kind face but that was about all you could say. This is him. I fervently wished I’d been called Michael or David, but over the years I learnt that Jesus’s special gift to St Peter had been the keys to the kingdom of heaven. I look forward to meeting him there…he may even be the first person I meet, and I shall enjoy telling him ‘‘Do you know I’ve had a picture of you since I was 5 and I’ve still got it, I said I would keep it til I die’ and he did.’’
Peter passed away suddenly outside the Church surrounded by his friends…

Now sleep tight Peter, Uncle Peter, Grandpa, there are not enough adjectives to describe you fully, but you were the most marvellous man, we were all blessed to know you.
We all love you and will continue to miss you….
until we meet again