Britain
Harry Patch
1898–2009 Private in a Lewis gun team, 7th Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry, 1917
Born in Combe Down, near Bath, on 17 June 1898, Harry Patch left school at 15 and trained as a plumber. Conscripted in October 1916, he reached France in June 1917 as a private in the 7th Battalion, Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry, serving in a Lewis gun team. At Passchendaele on 22 September 1917 a shell burst overhead, wounding him and killing three of his friends; he later called that date his remembrance day. He never returned to the front. Patch kept silent about the war for 80 years and became known as the last fighting Tommy. In 2004 he met Charles Kuentz, a veteran of the German side, and spoke out against war. He died on 25 July 2009, aged 111, the last British veteran of the trenches.
In the chronicle
Sources
Sources
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Patch
- www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/25/harry-patch-obituary
- news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8168691.stm
- swheritage.org.uk/museum-of-somerset/explore/somerset-remembers/harry-patch-the-last-tommy
- www.bbc.co.uk/somerset/content/articles/2008/04/30/harry_patch_feature.shtml
- heritagecalling.com/2017/07/31/remembered-the-battle-of-passchendaele/harry_patch