20 Facts About William Wand

William Wand was the Archbishop of Brisbane in Australia before returning to England to become the Bishop of Bath and Wells before becoming the Bishop of London.

William Wand was born in Grantham, Lincolnshire, the son of Arthur James Henry Wand, a butcher, and his wife Elizabeth Ann Ovelin, nee Turner.

William Wand was ordained a deacon in 1908 and a priest in 1909.

William Wand was Anglo-Catholic in a chaplaincy in which 'low church' predominated.

William Wand was posted to Gallipoli, and would write vividly of his experience there.

William Wand's autobiography is an evocative but rarely used source of first-hand experience of Gallipoli, and William Wand wrote letters published in the Salisbury Diocesan Chronicle, including a reflection on how the reputation of padres depended on their willingness to display bravery.

William Wand was attached to Australian hospitals and hospital ships but caught paratyphoid and had to be evacuated to Malta and then to London.

William Wand had recovered by April, 1916, and was posted to Rouen and after the Armistice, to Cologne.

Demobilised in March 1919, William Wand was made perpetual curate of St Mark's, Salisbury, where St Clair Donaldson was bishop.

In 1925 William Wand became a fellow and the dean of Oriel College, Oxford and university lecturer in church history.

William Wand was consecrated in St Paul's Cathedral, London, on 1 May 1934, by archbishop Lang, together with the new bishop of Johannesburg and the suffragan bishop of Plymouth.

William Wand had a difficult reception: those who had wanted a local dignitary as their new bishop united to oppose Wand.

Sturdy in appearance, shy and gracious, William Wand was often seen as being aloof and something of an intellectual snob though this belied his natural humour and quick wit.

William Wand consecrated Ss Peter and Paul Cathedral, Dogura, Papua on 29 October 1939.

William Wand made a lecture tour of the United States of America in 1940.

William Wand argued in support of a new constitution for the Church, but thought that the proposed appellate tribunal should have a majority of bishops, rather than legal laymen, to determine points of doctrine.

Early in 1943, William Wand was offered the see of Bath and Wells, and the family left Brisbane in July the same year.

William Wand was surprisingly translated to London two years later, being interviewed personally by Winston Churchill at a lunch he described in his autobiography.

William Wand resigned his see as Bishop of London in 1956.

William Wand was the first Chairman of the Executive body of the British Council of Churches, attending the 1948 foundation of the World Council of Churches in Amsterdam.