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Source: Reuters -
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More than a thousand people are expected to attend the funeral
of Harry Patch, who was Britain's last surviving veteran of the
World War One trenches until his death at the age of 111 last
month.
Patch, born in 1898 and described by his biographer as having a
good sense of humour and a twinkle in his eye, died in a
residential home in Somerset, western England.
Friends, family and senior representatives from the government
and military, including army chief General Richard Dannatt, are due
to attend the ceremony at Wells Cathedral which will have the theme
Peace and Reconciliation.
About 1,000 tickets have been allocated to the public and a large
screen will relay the service to others on the Cathedral
Green.
The Ministry of Defence said Patch's wish was that people should
remember with gratitude and respect all those who fought in the
war.
At the end of the service a bugler will sound the Last Post and the
cathedral bell will toll 111 times.
Patch, a former plumber, was conscripted as an 18-year-old, and
served in the trenches of Ypres on the Western Front, where he was
injured and saw three of his closest friends killed in the battle
of Passchendaele.
Patch, who served as a machine-gunner for four months in the summer
of 1917, did not speak about his war experiences until he turned
100, and in his later years he promoted peace.
"War isn't worth one life," he would say.
His biographer Richard van Emdem said Patch recognised he was a
symbol of his generation.
"He was very aware of the fact that he was the very last veteran to
have served in the trenches, and I think there was a certain pride
in that," he said.
"But he realised ... that after him it would be a gone history.
There would be nobody else to talk to and so he felt very strongly
that he should remember the dead, that he should remember those who
suffered on both sides of the line."
Patch passed away a week after the death of another of the few
remaining survivors of the conflict, and the world's oldest man,
Henry Allingham, who died aged 113.
The sole British-born survivor of the four year conflict is now
seaman Claude Choules, who lives in Australia.
