Princess Elizabeth (prospective Queen of England) was married to Prince Philip on November 20, 1947. This was the centennial of the death of Henry F. Lyte. The Princess, therefore, arranged for the rendering of his hymn:
“Praise, my soul, the King of heaven,
To His feet thy tribute bring,”
when the bridal party entered Westminster Abbey. “This same hymn,” said The Diapason, “was also sung at the wedding of King George and Queen Elizabeth.”
“Abide with Me” in a Submarine
Fiction has rarely given us anything more arrestingly strange than the following narration of a few minutes of life with their bewildering experience. The story was related in The Methodist Recorder, London, in its issue of December 19, 1946, and is here reproduced in the exact words of the writer, Campbell Marr of Kirkaldy:
“In the early days of the war (World War II) a British submarine was trapped at the bottom of the Heligoland Bight through an unlocated defect in the machinery. In frantic despair the engineers endeavored to find the fault, but without success.
“When the oxygen supply was almost exhausted the lieutenant in charge assembled the crew and told them that the situation was beyond all hope. He gave each man an opiate so that death might be made easier. Someone started to sing that very popular hymn:
“‘Abide with me,’
and they all joined in. Suddenly one man swooned, and fell into the machinery and immediately the lights went on and the engine commenced to buzz. The man in his fall had operated a lever which in the light of the hand torches had been overlooked.
“In a few minutes they had surfaced, and were thanking God for their miraculous deliverance. Many of these men are now back in civilian life, and not one of them is ever likely to forget that grand old hymn.”
Wheel Chair Singers
We looked long at the unusual picture which stood out prominently on the front page of our morning newspaper (an AP Wirephoto). The item carried the heading which we are using. A group of twenty-five singers was shown, and they all sat in wheel chairs. They were all polio patients, and among them were several naval officers. A special article in The New York Times supplied additional details.
The courageous singers were seated in the little white chapel in Warm Springs, Georgia, where President F. D. Roosevelt last attended a service of worship. Now, two years after his sudden passing, a memorial service was being conducted for him. This was on April 12, 1947, and three hundred polio victims and villagers were present—the patients also occupied wheel chairs. An overflow company of two hundred were outside on the greensward in front of the chapel, and listened to the service which was conveyed to them by loudspeakers.