Dr Jenny Taylor writes:
The Revd John Pretyman Waller, Vicar of Newbourn, Hemley and
Waldringfield, Suffolk, in St Edmundsbury & Ipswich diocese,
died on 21 December, aged 72, still in post. He was the last to
hold the family benefice in a line unbroken since 1857 - a fact
recognised in a congratulatory letter from the then Archbishop of
Canterbury in 1997 - and one of the last incumbents to escape the
1975 legislation obliging them to retire at 70.
The family owned, with the Pretymans, much of the land both
sides of the river around Waldringfield and Ramsholt, and shaped a
way of life. Waller's great-grandfather built the parishes' dame
school and first primary school, in 1874, and developed the land
for farming, building many of the farm houses such as Rivers' Hall
and White Hall. Squire parsons - squarsons - are very rare today,
and John may have been the last. A "sporting parson", he owned two
old fishing boats, one he named Jesus, on which his body
will be conveyed to the funeral by the Master Mariners of
Felixstowe,to whom he was chaplain for 40 years.
Waller had been a reluctant candidate for the ministry, setting
off, at his parents' behest, to read theology at Durham University,
but dropping out after only eight months, and running away to sea.
It was at Durham that he met his first wife, Hazel, though the
marriage was later dissolved.
He spent time in Australia with the Missions to Seamen, becoming
renowned for patrolling the docks with a packet of cigarettes for
the sailors, and a Bible.
A true vocation emerged later. He attended Salisbury Theological
College from 1968, was made deacon in 1971, and ordained priest in
1972, serving his title at St John the Baptist, Ipswich, before
returning to Waldringfield in 1974.
His subsequent ministry proved Christlike. He had a deep empathy
for working men, and a pastoral concern that stretched well beyond
the parish. An early bout of cancer in 1970 re-emerged with
aggressive secondaries of the bone, which bent him double for the
past three years. Yet he maintained his duties in the three
parishes until the day before he died, organising the carol service
for the following day.
He is survived by his second wife, Dorne, and children Arthur,
Agnes, and George.
