Geoffrey Anketell Studdert Kennedy

Geoffrey Anketell Studdert Kennedy, MC (27 June 1883 - 8 March 1929), was an Anglican priest and poet. He was nicknamed 'Woodbine Willie' during World War I for giving Woodbine cigarettes along with spiritual aid to injured and dying soldiers.

Early Life

Born in Leeds in 1883, Kennedy was the seventh of nine children born to Jeanette Anketell and William Studdert Kennedy, a vicar in Leeds. He was educated at Leeds Grammar School and Trinity College, Dublin, where he gained a degree in classics and divinity in 1904. After a year's training, he became a curate in Rugby and then, in 1914, the vicar of St. Pauls, Worcester.

Military Career

On the outbreak of war, Kennedy volunteered as a chaplain to the army on the Western Front, where he gained the nickname 'Woodbine Willie'. In 1917, he won the Military Cross at Messines Ridge after running into no man's land to help the wounded during an attack on the German frontline. He wrote a number of poems about his experiences, and these appeared in the books Rough Rhymes of a Padre (1918), and More Rough Rhymes (1919).

During the war he supported the British military effort with enthusiasm. Attached to a bayonet-training service he toured with boxers and wrestlers to give morale-boosting speeches about the usefulness of the bayonet.

Later Life

After the war, Kennedy was given charge of St Edmund, King and Martyr in Lombard Street, London. Having been converted to Christian socialism and pacifism during the war, he wrote Lies (1919), Democracy and the Dog-Collar (1921) (featuring such chapters as "The Church Is Not a Movement but a Mob," "Capitalism is Nothing But Greed, Grab, and Profit-Mongering," and "So-Called Religious Education Worse than Useless"), Food for the Fed Up (1921), The Wicket Gate (1923), and The Word and the Work (1925). He moved to work for the Industrial Christian Fellowship, for whom he went on speaking tours of Britain. It was on one of these tours that he was taken ill, and died in Liverpool.

He is mentioned in the Divine Comedy song "Absent Friends": "Woodbine Willie couldn't rest until he'd/given every bloke a final smoke/before the killing," and in Finnegans Wake by Irish author James Joyce: "...tsingirillies' zyngarettes, while Woodbine Willie, so popiular with the poppyrossies..."

Kennedy is honoured with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on March 8. The Museum of Army Chaplaincy also honours Kennedy with a large display about his life.

Books in Print

• The Unutterable Beauty Diggory Press, ISBN 978-1-84685-110-0
• After War, Is Faith Possible? An Anthology by G.A. Studdert Kennedy, edited and introduced by Kerry Walters, Lutterworth Press, 2008.

External links

• "Kennedy, Geoffrey Anketell Studdert", on the website of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (subscription or UK public library membership required), http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/38028 

Works by Kennedy

• The Unutterable Beauty: The Collected Poetry of G. A. Studdert Kennedy, 1927.
• I Believe: Sermons on the Apostle's Creed by G. A. Studdert Kennedy, 1928. First published as Food for the Fed-up (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1921).

Works about Kennedy

• War! Lies! And a Packet of Fags!. A play by David Gooderson about the Great War and its aftermath—the story of “Woodbine Willie” (Studdert Kennedy). The play is based on extensive research into the life of Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy, including meetings with members of his family, and a detailed study of the background of the period.
• Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy: The Pastor and the Suffering God An OCMS lecture about Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy, given by Robert Ellis, 2005 February 15.