Kenneth John Woollcombe (2 January 1924 – 3 March 2008)[1] was an Anglican academic[2] who was Bishop of Oxford[3] in the middle part of his career, from 1971 to 1978.
He was educated at Sandroyd School before heading to Haileybury, and served in the RNVR in the Second World War, being commissioned in the engineering branch in 1945 and confirmed in the rank of sub-lieutenant in 1946.
[5] He studied for ordination at Westcott House in Cambridge; was made a deacon on Trinity Sunday 1951 (20 May)[7] and priested the next Trinity Sunday (8 June 1952) — both times by Maurice Harland, Bishop of Lincoln, at Lincoln Cathedral;[8] and spent two years as a curate at St James, Grimsby,[9] before returning to St John's College in 1955, combining the roles of Fellow, Chaplain and Lecturer.
[10] He contributed to a book, The Historic Episcopate, in 1954 and published Essays on Typology with Geoffrey Lampe, his predecessor as chaplain, in 1957.
He was committed to ecumenism, serving as a member of the Churches Council for Covenanting for Unity, and as chairman of the English Anglican-Roman Catholic Conversations.