Ewen Balfour

Peter Chapman, lay canon and vice- chairman, St Paul’s Cathedral Foundation, writes: Your obituary of Ewen Balfour (Dec 15) did not mention his work for St Paul’s Cathedral. In 2001 the chairman of the St Paul’s Cathedral Foundation, Sir Roger Gibbs, asked Brunswick to provide media and public relations support for the cathedral’s 300th anniversary restoration campaign. Ewen’s name was put forward to act and he served the cathedral for the subsequent eight years.

His wise counsel was sought on many occasions, he usually arriving flushed having cycled to an appointment. He grasped a proposition with speed and he never failed to raise our sights on what should be achieved. His final illness came when the cathedral was celebrating the reaching of its funding target of £40 million and the 300th anniversary of the placing of the last stone in the Lantern. He was giving advice from his hospital bed a week before he died which we at St Paul’s and his colleagues at Brunswick acted upon. It was typical of his commitment and dedication.

The Rev Canon John Fenton

Canon Michael Perry writes: One of the delights in inviting John Fenton (obituary, Jan 7) to speak or preach was in wondering in what novel way he would attack his subject. We were rarely disappointed. Asked to speak at a forum organised by the Movement for the Ordination of Women, he spoke not a word on his allotted theme, but regaled us by rehearsing all the reasons why Eskimos could never be admitted as members of St Chad’s College. Again, the year after a disastrous Founders and Benefactors at Durham Cathedral, at which the preacher had harangued the congregation for 43 minutes and antagonised the university representatives, John Fenton was asked to preach — and did so in six minutes flat, to the delight of all assembled.

The Rev Anne Kiggell writes: Your photograph of the trimly barbered and decorous young cleric did not really do justice to the magnificent prophetic figure that John Fenton cut in his maturer years, when the flowing white locks waved over the beaming smile and mischievous eyes, which gave warm humanity to one of such scholarly distinction and reflected his generously loving heart.

Stephen Caney writes: It was Canon John Fenton who, addressing the Headmasters’ Conference, suggested that their pupils should consider going into the Church. “We like what we do and, by and large, we do what we like.”

In our obituary we made an error in the spelling of the maiden name of Canon Fenton’s widow. It should have read Linda Brandham. We apologise for the mistake