Much loved bonkers actor Brian Blessed, owner of the loudest voice in the world has just told the most incredible anecdote ever. One that's both horrifying and sort of worthy of applause.
Here it is, in his own incredible words, as told to Libby Purves on BBC Radio 4's Midweek programme:
It was years ago, around 1963. I was in Z Cars and I was running all over Richmond Park and a woman was having a baby under a tree and there was nobody around. I had been brought up with babies, kind of working class background and helping with babies. I rushed across to her, she'd got her legs open... she knew me in Z Cars, I said 'breathe deeply' and gradually I got the baby out, first the head . Then the afterbirth came out, and the clots, I pressed her belly and got rid of the clots, and the afterbirth came out. Then I bit it loose and tied it into a knot, et cetera and then I just called for help and eventually an ambulance came. I was covered in blood, my shirt was covered in blood - I was wrapping and wiping her saying 'it's all right darling,' and I was licking the baby's face. It's absolutely true. I've just never talked about it. But what I'm saying is it was natural. You would tell her to breathe deeply and push, push, push, because I'd seen my mother do all this. I was always kept in the background, because all the neighbours were kind of midwives.
If you can find a story more bizarre than that this week you can have a packet of Jaffa cakes on us.
Listen to the man explain it in full below:
