Harry Patch, the oldest British WWI vet died in his sleep in a nursing home in Wells, England on Saturday, July 25, 2009. Read about him below and see a photo and video.
Harry Patch
The oldest veteran of World War I died just a few days ago. He was U.S. Navy veteran Henry Allingham who died at 113-years-old. Now the oldest surviving British WWI vet has died. Harry Patch died on Saturday at the age of 111.
Patch was drafted into the Army when he was 18-years-old. Her served as an Army gunner. He was wounded at Passchendaele in Belgium in 1917, where more than 70,000 British soldiers died. He served in the Auxiliary Fire Service in World War II.
Mr. Patch was interviewed for television several times over the past ten years. It is during these interviews that he first started talking about the war. In one interview he described the horrors of a young soldier dying, begging his comrades to kill him and crying out for his mother. He described the young man’s final cry for his mother as ‘a cry of surprise and joy’. He said that he always remembered that death is not the end. His message was almost inevitably that the war was a terrible waste of lives for all sides.
He received an honorary degree from Bristol University. Patch’s Pride, a cider, is named for him. Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Charles and Prime Minister Gordon Brown paid tribute to Patch as a representative of a generation and the last survivor of the Tommies who fought in the trenches for England. The Queen and Brown will attend his funeral.
Patch was born in 1898 in Somerset. He had two older brothers. was a plumber by trade. He survived two wives and his two children. He was married to Ada Billington for 58 years, until her death in 1976. He then married Jean, who died in 1984. His two sons, from his first marriage, were Dennis Patch and Roy Patch.
Now that Allingham and Patch have died, there is only one surviving British veteran of World War I. He is Claude Choules, 108-years-old, who now lives in Perth, Australia.
Harry Patch - Video