Sir – On Saturday, January 30, I came to Oxford with my daughter to visit my granddaughter.

As I find it difficult to walk for long distances or stand for any length of time I was using a wheelchair.

We turned into a road with a very narrow pavement, and as my daughter was pushing me along the front wheel of the wheelchair became caught in a pothole and I was tipped out of the chair.

I hit my face very hard, broke my nose and bled profusely.

While my granddaughter was calling the ambulance, a group of people, mostly young people, gathered around us to help.

A gentleman on a bicycle stood guard against passing cars. Exeter College sent out a young man with blankets to keep me warm. Several young people ran to nearby shops to get tissues and bags to help us.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to all of these kind people. We would particularly like to thank a young man who attends a Sixth Form College in Oxford, who arrived on the scene very soon after the accident, offering the bandages he had just bought to help us stop the bleeding.

He stayed with us until the ambulance arrived to take me to the John Radcliffe Hospital, doing everything he could to help us, even offering me his coat to keep me warm. He then took my daughter back to the car park where she had parked her car and gave her excellent directions to the hospital.

The paramedics and the doctors and nurses at the hospital who treated me were kind, thorough and efficient and I would also like to thank them for the treatment they gave me. We often read or hear of the bad things that young people are said to do, but I witnessed some of the wonderful things that young people do and I would like to say a big thank you to them all.

Jose O’Leary (Mrs), Fetcham, Surrey