Portal:Somerset/Selected biography/1
Harry Patch
Henry John "Harry" Patch
B. June 17, 1898 – d. July 25, 2009 (aged 111)
Henry John "Harry" Patch was a British supercentenarian, briefly the oldest man in the United Kingdom and was the last surviving soldier to have fought in the trenches of the First World War. Patch was born in Combe Down. During the war, Patch was conscripted into the Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry, serving as an assistant gunner in a Lewis Gun section. He was a private at the Battle of Passchendaele (also known as the Third Battle of Ypres). After the war, Patch returned to work as a plumber, during which time he spent four years working on the Wills Memorial Building in Bristol and, during the Second World War, a fireman. (Full article...)