Lawrence Spiller, born at Staines in 1900, entered the College in 1911 and remained there during the war years, till 1919. His contemporaries were Douglas Rochford, Cyril Unsworth, Ian Forbes and Ludovic Bévénot, who were all destined to enter the big novitiate in 1919 when it returned after many years to the Abbey, from the Common Novitiate at Belmont Abbey.
As a boy he was a quiet character with special friends who in the VIth Form formed a group-'The Bohemians', to whom his mother Mrs. Spiller shewed much kindness over the years ahead. In 1918 Lawrence had a short spell of military training at Bushey then after the Armistice he returned to School. In 1919 the first Exhibition since 1914 gave him the chance to reveal what a fine actor he was, in the role of Shylock. At the final curtain call he disclosed to his mother that he had determined to try his vocation at Ampleforth, and so with his fellow Bohemians he entered the novitiate of twelve under Dom Bernard Hayes. The fusion in this unusual novitiate of six novices from the School, and six from the Forces who were felt to be rather 'tough' characters with a taste for levity, and practical jokes and colourful tales was no easy matter, and not least for Father Bernard. That the latter overcame the crises and was able to recommend seven was a sure testimony of his monastic wisdom and simplicity and trust in prayer, which cost him real anguish. The 'toughs' took long to discern that school and military disciplines were not the disciplina St Benedict required. But Father Bernard did train a durable breed to pioneer expanding novitiates and Professions and able to take up the burdens and fill many roles in the future.
In 1927 Father Antony, after three years study of French at Oxford, was ordained Priest and in 1927 he began a long and fruitful work in Gilling Castle Preparatory School. There his kindness, humour and unexpected firmness endeared him to all. His gifted teaching, his accomplished acting and powers of mimicry, were assets.
In 1941 that 'cocoon' opened and delivered him as curate at St Mary's Priory, Cardiff, to begin his pastoral life. In 1946 he went to St Mary's Brownedge. In 1950 Knaresborough received him as Parish Priest. Then in 1954 back to Wales as Parish Priest of the historic and lovely parish of Abergavenny where his pastoral gifts were fully deployed in a plurality of scattered hospitals. A Secular Priest recorded that he thought he had never met a priest so devoted and kind to the sick and troubled. In his garden, on the fabric and schools he toiled. Nor was he insensitive to the mystical aura and historic distinction which its great Recorder Dom Augustine Baker had shed upon it, as a great Welshman descended from Maelgwyn Gwynedd, Rhodri Mawr, Owain Glyndwr, and the Lord Rhys, hammer of the Normans. He did much to secure the removal from a small café of a fresco which had formed the secret altar piece of the martyr, Father Gunter, now installed in the Castle Museum. In 1962 he went to St Joseph's, Brindle to assist his fellow novice Father Joseph Smith in his failing years, whom he succeeded. In the old world peace and beauty there on March 5th, 1974, after a heart attack he gave back his soul and labours to God and was buried by a choir of his Abbot and brethren, one of whom uttered sadly an epitaph worthy of record 'We have lost one of God's comedians, may the angels rejoice'.
Father Antony's character and temperament somehow fused into a whole several apparent contradictions. His youthful exuberance and spirit endured into old age. His gay community life coexisted with the inner life of a solitary, a 'loner'. He would set off for his holiday not knowing whither, and explore a region, meet many types, in inns or on the road, perhaps calling at the home of some Old Boy, and returning with his knapsackful of 'experiences', slants on 'characters' or country lore, like an unhorsed Cobbett. One can see another paradox in the fruits of his pastoral responsibilities fused with the result of his glorious capacity for muddles, often the despair of superiors trying to unravel official 'returns' from a snowstorm of scribbled notes disgorged slowly, without ever achieving finality. Again few who knew his monastic hilaritas and loyal obediences guessed what his contemporaries knew, the volcanic rumblings and explosions of lava of loving rebelliousness.
He was an inspiration and a delight to his brethren, and now he has doubtless received the divine accolade from his Lord who knew whither all the fun, the 'dura et aspera' and the toil, and the inner glooms were safely leading. May he rest in peace.
LAWRENCE ANTONY SPILLER 5 March 1974
1900 2 Jan Born Staines
1911-18 Educ Ampleforth
1919 Postulant in the School
29 Sep Habit
1920 30 Sep Temporary Profession
1923 1 Oct Solemn Vows
1922-24 Studied at Oxford (certificate in French)
1924 2 Nov Tonsure & Minor Orders Bishop Shine
1925 4 Oct Subdeacon
1926 13 May Deacon
1927 10 Aug Priest
1929 Sep Ampleforth Preparatory School
1941 St Mary Cardiff
1946 Jan St Mary Brownedge
1950 Mar Parish Priest at Knaresborough
1954 Dec Parish Priest at Abergavenny
1962 Sep St Joseph's Brindle
1974 5 Mar Died at Brindle
8 Mar Buried at Brindle