By Donald Van Deusen

The death of Anglican Archbishop Trevor Huddleston at 84 just a few months ago, on April 22nd, appropriately resulted in multiple obits paying tribute to his work leading the British campaign to end apartheid (for which he was knighted) in South Africa where he served. He had helped found Britain’s Anti-Apartheid Movement in 1959 and led its campaigns for sanctions against the White-led government. Mr. Huddleston was educated at Oxford, became a monk in 1939 and two years later was working in the black slums near Johannesburg. From the start, he fought against the terrible poverty and laws that made blacks "non citizens" in their own land.

South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a friend for more than 50 years, was quoted in the Philadelpia Inquirer obit as saying, "If you could say that anybody single- handedly made apartheid a worldwide issue, then that person was Trevor Huddleston." He did this, noted, South African President Nelson Mandela, "at great risk to his own personal safety and well-being."

A touching, but largely untold story of the Archbishop Huddleston was relayed to me a few years ago by the Rev. Warren H. Davis, the retired, but still working rector of St. Christopher’s Church in Gladwyne, we wrote about recently as the "jazz priest." of Philadelphia. He heard it from Mr. Huddleston when he was visiting here some 20 years ago. It’s a simple story telling of the multiple and sometimes seemingly miraculous effects and of the little things we may do to help one another. In a sense, it is like John Guare’s play about the "Six Degrees of Separation" that connect each of us to everyone else in the world.

During Huddleston’s tenure as an Anglican priest in the black slums of Soweto, a boy child of one of his parishioners was gravely ill. Like many South African boys, he had fallen under the spell of American jazz and the one thing he wanted more than anything else in the world was a trumpet. Serving as a monk to a poverty-stricken people left Huddleston with few financial resources to simply just go out and buy the trumpet for the boy to ease a child’s illness and , just perhaps, give him something to live for. One long shot possibility occurred to him. Louis Armstrong—America’s "jazz ambassador" and arguably, the greatest jazz trumpet player of all time—was appearing in Johannesburg on one of his world tours.

Huddleston went to see Louis and told him the story, asking if Armstrong might be of help in possibly getting a trumpet for the boy. As soon as Louis heard the story, he held out his hand, holding the trumpet, he had just used in his performance. The boy would not only have his trumpet, but he would have one played the acknowledged finest trumpet player who ever lived, Louis Armstrong. Huddleston was overcome at Louis’ characteristic generosity. The boy to whom Huddleston gave his horn was, as you might imagine, nearly speechless with joy. He not only recovered from his illness, but went on to become a world-renowned jazz trumpeter himself. His name was Hugh Masekela, who has starred all over the world and appeared here just a few years ago in Philadelphia in the Forrest Theater production of "Sarafina."

From "The Weekly Press & University City Review" in Philadelphia, Pa.