inzilbeth: (Default)
[personal profile] inzilbeth
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8157447.stm

Now only Harry patch, aged 111, remains of those UK servicemen who fought in WW1

I remember listening to Henry talk of his experiences in a documentary some years ago. As always, I was struck by how vividly all these veterans remember every detail and by how the things they saw and did in those few years of their youth have remained the most important experiences of their lives. I was only discussing this with a colleague at work a couple of days ago. He was going to meet a survivor of the very concentration camp that his late father had helped liberate at the end of WW2. His father apparently never spoke much about those times but apparently everything he experienced in his life after the war, including getting married and raising a family, was an anticlimax to him, such was the impact of  the things he had done and witnessed during the war.

I don't think we can ever really understand the debt that we owe such people. That fact that JRR Tolkien himself was one of them is something I never forget either.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-18 09:16 pm (UTC)
shirebound: (Four hobbits - Mucun/Rei)
From: [personal profile] shirebound
Thank you for sharing that.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-18 09:18 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
I was very sad when I saw the news of Henry's passing.
(deleted comment)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-18 09:25 pm (UTC)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-18 11:08 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] estelcontar1.livejournal.com
I'm sure he had a very fulfilling and happy life. If he had not he wouldn't have lived to this ripe old age. Farewell

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 08:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
It was an extraordinary age, wasn't it. There were three very old, old times who have been much in the news, but only the one is left now. I find myself very moved by the fact that soon WW1 will just be something to read about in the history books and no one will be able to add to our understanding of those terrible times.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 08:34 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] estelcontar1.livejournal.com
Indeed it was.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 08:43 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] curiouswombat.livejournal.com
I was sad to see his death on the news - a grand old man, I thought.

Although I have to admit the coverage gave me the giggles; I saw it when on the boat home, in the quiet lounge where Sky News is on a screen at the front, but with no sound, just subtitling. The subtitling was a bit odd - it included mention of where Henry Allingham was 'when the pharmacist was signed'!

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 08:47 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
Lol! Someone messed up there then!

I will be even more sad then the very last tommy has finally gone.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 02:10 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
That's very sad to hear. May he rest in peace. I couldn't agree more with everything you've said.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-19 03:16 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
Thank you, Almut. There were so many lives lost and ruined due to the stupidity of a few leaders in both wars yet, as I believe was common with many who were there at the time, my colleague said his father felt no bitterness at all towards the German people afterwards as he really liked the ordinary soldiers that he dealt with during the first weeks of the peace.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-20 09:57 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
my colleague said his father felt no bitterness at all towards the German people afterwards as he really liked the ordinary soldiers that he dealt with during the first weeks of the peace
I've heard people (of all nations involved) say things like that quite often, too. One of my grandpas was in Russia in WW2, and I know from letters he wrote to my grandma that he often had surprisingly peaceful and friendly encounters with the Russian civilian population. It was also clear that he was deeply ashamed and horrified by how parts of the German army behaved in that country - he was no Nazi (thank God there was not a single Nazi in both parts of my family) but a pastor who belonged to the same peaceful resistance movement Dietrich Bonhöffer was part of. He spent years in a Russian prisoner-of-war-camp after the war. He never spoke about that time. I think we really can't begin to understand what those soldiers have gone through in both World Wars.
Edited Date: 2009-07-20 09:58 am (UTC)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-20 01:06 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
Thank you for sharing that, Almut. Your grandpa must have lived through some awful times and been a brave man. In the days before counsellors and therapists, simply not speaking about what happened seems to have been a common reaction. My dad served 5 yrs in the British Army in WW2 but I have only the scantest details about that part of his life as he never told me a thing.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-21 11:12 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
My dad served 5 yrs in the British Army in WW2 but I have only the scantest details about that part of his life as he never told me a thing.

It was the same with my grandpa. If I hadn't been the one who typed the letters he wrote to my grandma into the computer, I had likely never learned anything about that part of his life.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-21 01:12 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
I'm glad you had that as these things should never be forgotten.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-21 08:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
Amen to that.

Oh, you have changed your journal - I like that theme! It's a variation of the one I'm using. I think you have the dawn and I have the night. ;-)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-21 09:20 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
Yes, as you have seen, a new account! I liked the night version of this too but as both you and Larner have that one, I thought I would be different. I love this one!

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-22 10:09 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
I really like the version you have of that theme, too - it fits in perfectly with your beautiful Rivendell-icon. :)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-22 11:28 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
Thank you. I think I just like natural shades the best.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-22 06:03 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] silivren-tinu.livejournal.com
I think I just like natural shades the best.

Me, too! :)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-20 12:54 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] cairistiona7.livejournal.com
I think we're in such danger of losing that knowledge of just how awful war is, and how incredibly brave soldiers are. It always makes me sad to hear of another of the dwindling remainder of WWI vets die.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-20 01:08 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com
As their numbers have declined, the last few have become very well known so each death is now big news. It will be very sad when they have all gone.

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