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Im only 48. Your going to have to put up with me for another 60 years unless your lucky enough to die first. LOL
A Dwindling Band Of First World War Survivors
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London Times
November 15, 2004
A Dwindling Band Of First World War Survivors
By Alan Hamilton
Of the 9,000 men and women parading past the Cenotaph yesterday, Henry Allingham was, at 108, the oldest. He is one of an ever-shrinking band — the survivors of the First World War.
Eighty-six years after the end of a conflict that involved more than five million British and Commonwealth combatants, fewer than twenty are thought to be left alive in Britain, and the youngest is aged 104.
A handful of the survivors managed to parade before the Cenotaph on August 4 to mark the 90th anniversary of the outbreak of the war. It is unlikely, however, that they will parade again.
The known survivors are:
Henry Allingham, 108, from Eastbourne, an air mechanic aboard HMS Kingfisher at the Battle of Jutland, who was at the fighting at Ypres and the Somme.
Alfred Anderson, 108, from Alyth, Perthshire, a Black Watch sergeant at the Somme, who was batman to Captain Fergus Bowes-Lyon, brother of the late Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.
George Charles, 104, from Halesworth, Suffolk, a private in the Durham Light Infantry.
Bert Clark, 104, from Rushton, who was called up at the end of the war and served in Ireland and India.
Kenneth Cummins, 104, from Great Bedwyn, Wiltshire, a midshipman whose vessel was torpedoed.
William Elder, 107, from Kettering, a gunner in the Royal Garrison Artillery, who joined the Home Guard in the Second World War.
Alfred Finnigan, 108, from Whitland, Wales, a gunner in the Royal Field Artillery. His only wartime injury was a horse bite.
George Hardy, 104, from Porthcawl, a private in the 6th Enniskillen Dragoons.
Harold Lawton, 105, from Rutland, a corporal in the East Yorkshire Regiment.
Fred Lloyd, 106, from Uckfield, East Sussex, a private in the Royal Field Artillery.
Albert Marshall, 107, from Ashtead, Surrey. A private at Loos, Mons and Ypres, said to be the last man to draw a sword in a British cavalry charge.
Harry Newcombe, 104, from Worthing, a private in the Sussex Regiment.
Harry Patch, 106, from Wells, Somerset, a private in the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry.
Ted Rayns, 105, from Stafford, a dispatch rider on the western front. He saw all three battles of the Somme and was a firefighter in the Second World War.
George Rice, 107, from Birmingham, a private in the Durham Light Infantry who was recalled as a skilled tradesman to work in Midlands munitions factories.
William Roberts, 104, from Jacksdale, Nottinghamshire, a rigger and aircraft fitter with the Royal Flying Corps who signed up at 15 when his father was killed at the Somme.
William Stone, 104, from Oxford, a chief petty officer. He watched the German fleet scuttled in Scapa Flow and was torpedoed twice in the Second World War. Charles Watson, 104, from Bromham, Bedfordshire, an air navigator.
Cecil Withers, 106, from Bexley, a private in the Royal Fusiliers, who fought in the second battle of the Somme.
There is only one known German survivor of the First World War. He is Charles Kuentz, 107, who lives in Colmar, Alsace. He fought on the eastern and western fronts, seeing action at Ypres and the Somme. He survived the battlefield — but lost a son in the Second World War.
Appeasement cannot be bought from terrorists, it can only be rented
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