1. John Randal Bradburne was born on 14 June 1921 in Skirwith, Cumberland, England.
19 Facts About John Bradburne
1. 2.
John Bradburne was educated at Gresham's, a private school in Norfolk, from 1934 to 1939, after his father had gained a new benefice in Norfolk.
3.
John Bradburne was a member of the school's Officers' Training Corps.
4.
John Bradburne was planning to continue his studies at a university, but at the outset of the Second World War he volunteered for the Indian Army, with which his mother's family was connected; she had been born in Lucknow.
5.
John Bradburne was sent for training at an Officer Cadet Training Unit at Bulford Camp.
6.
In December 1940 John Bradburne was commissioned in the Indian Army.
7.
John Bradburne was assigned to the 9th Gurkha Rifles of the Indian Army and soon posted with them to British Malaya to face the invasion of the Imperial Japanese Army.
8.
John Bradburne then saw active service with Orde Wingate's Chindits in Burma.
9.
John Bradburne relinquished his commission in March 1946, on account of ill health.
10.
John Bradburne had a religious experience in Malaya, and his faith became the dominant impulse in his life.
11.
John Bradburne wanted to be a Benedictine monk but the Order would not accept him because he had not been in the Church for two years.
12.
John Bradburne tried to live as a hermit on Dartmoor, then went to the Benedictine Prinknash Abbey, before joining the choir of Westminster Cathedral as a sacristan.
13.
On Good Friday 1956, John Bradburne joined the Secular Franciscan Order but remained a layman.
14.
John Bradburne cared for them as their warden but fell out with the Leprosy Association and was expelled from the colony.
15.
John Bradburne stayed in a tin hut, just outside the perimeter fence, for the last six years of his life but continued to minister to the lepers.
16.
John Bradburne's friends urged Bradburne to leave but he insisted that he should stay with the lepers.
17.
John Bradburne was buried in a Franciscan habit, according to his wishes, at the Chishawasha Mission Cemetery, about 18 kilometres northeast of Salisbury.
18.
The 40th Anniversary of John Bradburne's assassination was marked both at Mutemwa with the pilgrimage and then an exhibition and talks at Westminster Cathedral on 21 September 2019, where his relics were displayed for the first time.
19.
John Bradburne is in the Guinness World Records for being in terms of lines of poetry alone, the most prolific poet in English.