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He was loved by millions as doddery Pte Godfrey in Dad’s Army but actor Arnold Ridley’s career was destroyed by the sacrifice he made in the First World War.

He was the only member of the original cast who had served against the Germans in both world wars – as well as signing up for the Home Guard.

As the new Dad’s Army film premieres in London tonight, Arnold’s son Nicolas tells how it was only the part in the BBC sitcom that saved a career wrecked by war.

He says: “Being in Dad’s Army gave him so much pleasure. It gave him his confidence back, and while it never gave him riches, it provided my parents with financial security during their later years.”

While conscientious objector Pte Godfrey could not hurt a fly, Arnold endured horrific hand to hand combat in the trenches at the Somme in 1916.

A bayonet through his left hand rendered him unable to use his fingers – and terrifying flashbacks of the war led him to once try to throttle young Nicolas.

Arnold also suffered blackouts after being hit on the back of the head with a German rifle butt. They cost him a career-defining role at the Old Vic theatre in London during the Second World War.

And he struggled to make ends meet until Dad’s Army creator David Croft saved him from the scrap heap in 1968 and made him a star.

Nicolas, 69, adds: “As a boy I saw my father constantly waiting for the phone to ring, desperately hoping he might get a little cough and spit in a soap sud commercial. He suffered a great deal of financial anxiety and lost his confidence.

“I’m immensely grateful to David Croft for taking the risk of casting a very frail, old man who everybody else thought would die by the end of the series.”

Arnold first volunteered for the Army in 1914. But the 18-year-old was rejected as he had broken a toe playing rugby. After reapplying a year later, he was accepted to the Somerset Light Infantry. William Arnold Ridley was posted to France and within days of arriving was hit by shrapnel and shot through the thigh.

He returned to the front from convalescence only to be sent over the top twice during the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The first time, was at Delville Wood, where many of his comrades fell.

He later said: “It wasn’t a question of if I get killed, it was merely a question of when I get killed.”

And during a second attack, at Gueudecourt, now as a Lance Corporal, Arnold’s battalion took even more devastating losses from machine gun fire.

When the survivors reached the German trenches they pushed back the enemy troops with bayonets and bombs, before Arnold was knocked to the ground by a rifle blow to the head.

(Image: Getty)

A German soldier lunged with a bayonet, but Arnold survived by deflecting the blade into his groin instead of his stomach. The next blow pierced his left hand and wrist.

Arnold came round in a field hospital. It took 15 ops to save his hand and he was invalided back home.

It was another two years before he found the rifle butt had cracked his skull. Nicolas says: “It is very strange to think of my dear, gentle father engaged in such brutal hand to hand combat. If the wound in my father’s groin had been any higher I wouldn’t be here now.

“When he woke up in hospital he was in tears because his arm had not been amputated. If it had, there was no chance of him being sent back to the front.

“For a man of his bravery to want to be disabled for life at just 20 years old, you can imagine his state of mind.

“I think today it would have been recognised as Post Traumatic Stress.

But Arnold still volunteered for the Intelligence Corps in the Second World War, making films in France.

After being discharged on medical grounds, he joined the Home Guard, before touring bases, entertaining the troops. While he described the First World War in detail in his unpublished autobiography, Arnold could not write about the Second World War. He said: “To recount events, I would have to relive them. I am too afraid.”

He suffered horrific nightmares and regularly woke drenched in sweat. If he was disturbed, his first instinct was to attack.

(Image: PA)

When Nicolas was six, he once tapped his dad’s shoulder to wake him and Arnold grabbed him round the throat to throttle him. Nicolas says: “It was a shock, but I think he was more appalled than I was. To find his hands around his son’s throat must have been awful.” After the Second World War Arnold eked out a living in minor TV roles.

Nicolas, a writer and teacher who lives in Bath, says: “He was terrified he would black out on stage but was such a brave man and kept acting when he could.”

In 1968, Arnold was offered the role of Pte Charles Godfrey, played by Harry Potter star Michael Gambon in the new film. He starred in 80 episodes of Dad’s Army until 1977. He died in 1984, aged 88. The show peaked at 18 million viewers and earned Arnold an OBE.

Now Arnold’s relative Daisy Ridley, a cousin once removed, has found fame at 23 as Rey in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Nicolas says: “If Daisy had asked my father about a career on the stage, I think he might have advised against it because he knew how tough it could be. But he would have been delighted to see her enjoying such richly deserved success.”

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Nicolas treasures an episode of Dad’s Army in which Godfrey’s comrades discover that he won the Military Medal for exceptional bravery as a stretcher-bearer at the Somme.

He says: “Unlike Godfrey, my father was never awarded the Military Medal. But he was awarded an OBE for playing a doddering old non-combatant.

“And he was put forward for the Distinguished Service Medal but never got it.

“But I’m glad I knew the real Arnold Ridley – a war hero, a great actor and playwright, and a good man.”