How it came to be that my dad is a hero. A not funny story.
When I was doing my PhD I was plane old mister scum, and my mam and dad went camping at clumber park. Some months before, getting on a year or so i think, there had been the most appalling sexual assault on a young girl in the toilets at the camp site. The poor girl nearly bled to death I was told. Anyway, for months after that, all the women and kids in the neighbourhood were chaperoned by male relatives and work mates. (we'll come back to this bit). It was similar when i was a kid and the ripper was busy.
After some months the cops nicked some lorry driver for it who was remanded in custody and i understand he had a very nasty time of it in chokey. And you may think this is no bad thing eh?
About a yearish after the original attack, my mam and dad were on holiday. They went to take the dogs for a walk one evening and there were people running about on the campsite shouting a male name. It turned out a young boy of nineish had gone missing. My mum and dad joined in the search. They walked offdown a road in the park and found a car that had driven off the road and there was a young bloke in it revving it trying to make it go some. They stopped to see what was going on and the young bloke was clearly in shock. My dad looked under the car and saw that the car had gone over a substatial fence post that had ripped out the drive shaft (or something fatal for the car anyway). My old man told the bloke to come back to the campsite and get sorted out, and he agreed. He got out the car and my parents saw he was wearing dungarees, open to the waist and with blood on them. They assumed he was bleeding but they couldn't seewhere from.
As my mam and dad were talking to this chap, the dogs went off in the trees and started barking at something. Good dogs. My mum went to investigate and found a young boy hiding in the undergrowth. He was obviously terrified and not in a good way. She picked him up in her arms and carried him back to the road.
They set off back to the campsite and my dad made the bloke walk in front of them so he could keep an eye on him. Mam carried the distraught boy and talked to him, finding out that the guy had kidnapped him and while trying to get away the boy had caused the car to crash. Brave. My mam put it all together and was flaring up, but my dad kept everything calm enough till they got back to the camp and could get the police in.
When the got back it took four blokes to keep the father off the bastard who raped his son.
Eventually, the lorry driver was released.
The young bloke went away for ever.
Turns out he had been working at a hotel / restaurant nearby and was one of the designated chaperones during the months after the first attack.