Arnold Ridley

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Arnold Ridley OBE (January 7, 1896 — March 12, 1984) was a British playwright and actor.

Ridley was born in Bath, England, and graduated from the University of Bristol. He saw active service in the First World War, sustaining several serious injuries: his left arm was left virtually useless by injuries sustained on the Somme, his legs were riddled with shrapnel and the legacy of a blow to the head by a German soldier's rifle butt left him prone to blackouts. After the war Ridley went into acting. He is best known as the author of the play, The Ghost Train (1923) (later a film with Arthur Askey), for portraying the elderly Private Charles Godfrey on the British sitcom Dad's Army, and Doughy Hood in the radio soap "The Archers".

Having unsuccessfully attempted to establish a film company between the wars, Ridley again saw active service during the Second World War, with the rank of major, but was discharged on health grounds. He worked regularly as an actor, but only became a household name during the 1970s when he was offered the role of Private Charles Godfrey in one of the UK's most successful sitcoms of all time: Dad's Army. He continued to appear into his eighties. He was awarded an OBE in the Queen's New Year's Honours List of 1982, for services to the theatre.