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:salutes:

mrreet2001 wrote:

macnuke wrote:

:salutes:

Bat wrote:

(CNN)...
His next task is to lay a wreath at Britain's war memorial, the Cenotaph, near the houses of Parliament in London, to mark the 90th anniversary of the war's end. Allingham, Britain's last flyer; Harry Patch, the last soldier, and Bill Stone, the last sailor, will lay wreaths on Tuesday.

Oldest WWI survivor remembers forgotten ones

The BBC just reported that Bill Stone has passed. He was 108.

:salutes:

A bit of a zombie, but from post 1...

Bat wrote:

LONDON - Henry Allingham is the oldest living link to the 9 million soldiers killed in World War I.

He is 112 now, nearly blind, mostly deaf and uses a wheelchair — none of which stops him from trying to remind everyone of those long gone.

"I don't want to see them forgotten," he says quietly, speaking after the opening of a Royal Air Force Museum exhibition on the conflict. "We were pals."
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His next task is to lay a wreath at Britain's war memorial, the Cenotaph, near the houses of Parliament in London, to mark the 90th anniversary of the war's end. Allingham, Britain's last flyer; Harry Patch, the last soldier, and Bill Stone, the last sailor, will lay wreaths on Tuesday.

Oldest WWI survivor remembers forgotten ones

A link no longer.

World's oldest man, WWI veteran dies

LONDON (AP) – Only death could silence Henry Allingham.

He went to war as a teenager, helped keep flimsy aircraft flying, survived his wounds and came home from World War I to a long — very long — and fruitful life.

But only in his last years did he discover his true mission: to remind new generations of the sacrifices of the millions slaughtered in the trenches, killed in the air, or lost at sea in what Britons call the Great War.

Allingham, who was the world's oldest man when he died Saturday at 113, attributed his remarkable longevity to "cigarettes, whisky and wild, wild women."

Jokes aside, he was a modest man who served as Britain's conscience, reminding young people time and time again about the true cost of war.

"I want everyone to know," he told The Associated Press during an interview in November. "They died for us."

He was the last surviving original member of the Royal Air Force, which was formed in 1918. He made it a personal crusade to talk about a conflict that wiped out much of a generation. Though nearly blind, he would take the outstretched hands of visitors in both of his, gaze into the eyes of children, veterans and journalists and deliver a message he wanted them all to remember about those left on the battlefield.

"I don't want to see them forgotten," he would say quietly. "We were pals."

Only a handful of World War I veterans remain of the estimated 68 million mobilized. There are no French veterans left alive; just one left now in Britain; and the last living American-born veteran is Frank Woodruff Buckles of Charles Town, West Virginia. The man believed to have been Germany's last surviving soldier has also died.

"It's the end of a era- a very special and unique generation," said Allingham's friend, Dennis Goodwin. "The British people owe them a great deal of gratitude."

Born June 6, 1896, during the reign of Queen Victoria, Allingham would later recall sitting on his grandfather's shoulders waving a flag for King Edward VII's coronation in 1902. [..]

RIP, Henry.