A PASTOR, peace campaigner and interfaith bridge-builder has died aged 81.

The Rev Canon David Partridge, was born and schooled in Bristol.

He completed his National Service in the Royal Marines and read history at Balliol College, Oxford, in the late 1950s.

Rev Partridge then did his theological training at Westcott House in Cambridge.

He married Susan Cooper in 1961 and, one year later, entered the ministry as a curate in Bolton.

In 1965, he moved to St Martin in the Fields, an Anglican church in Trafalgar Square, London, to serve under his mentor, Austen Williams.

He moved to the parish of Warblington with Emsworth in Hampshire in 1969 and was respected for his 32 years of pastoral work in the parish and in Portsmouth, where he served as a canon of the cathedral and was a pillar of the Portsmouth Housing Association.

Although nicknamed the ‘Whirlwind Vicar’ after his habit of arriving ‘just in time’, his pastoring was known for being fundamentally ecumenical and inclusive.

Following his retirement, in 2001, he moved to Oxford and became a very active member of the inter-faith community.

He was part of a group which set up the Oxford Council of Faiths in 2004, to value and celebrate diversity and understanding among different faith groups.

Rev Partridge was most drawn to explore the Muslim faith, and spent many Fridays at prayers in the various mosques in East Oxford.

He helped launch the annual Interfaith Walk which began in 2008, and continues to go from strength to strength

Rev Partridge was also involved in the installation of the Peace Plaque in Bonn Square, which was unveiled on UN Peace Day in 2010.

A regular letter writer to The Guardian, the Oxford Times and a BBC religious broadcaster, Rev Partridge gained a national profile by his decision, after the sinking of the Belgrano in 1982, to pray for the families on both sides and to resign from his position as chaplain to the Royal Naval College in Portsmouth.

From then on he committed himself to peace campaigns and especially to Clergy Against Nuclear Arms. He supported the Vietnamese refugees in Thorney Island, the Corrymeela project in Northern Ireland and was involved in the ‘Call to Prayer’ bells controversy in Oxford.

Rev Partridge, who was known for his sense of humour, was devoted to his family and loved spending time with his grandchildren.

He died on January 23 and is survived by Sue, his three sons, Andrew, Jeremy and Edward, and six grandchildren.