Last American WWI veteran dies
Source: Agencies |
March 1, 2011, Tuesday
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FRANK Buckles, who lied about his age to get into uniform during World War I and lived to be the last surviving US veteran of that war, has died. He was 110.
Buckles, who also survived being a civilian prisoner of war in the Philippines in World War II, died peacefully of natural causes early on Sunday at his home in Charles Town, West Virginia, biographer and family spokesman David DeJonge said in a statement. Buckles turned 110 on February 1 and had been advocating for a national memorial honoring veterans of World War I in Washington DC.
When asked in February 2008 how it felt to be the last of his kind, he said simply, "I realized that somebody had to be, and it was me." And he said he would have done it all over again, "without a doubt."
On November 11, 2008, the 90th anniversary of the end of the war, Buckles attended a ceremony at the grave of World War I General John Pershing in Arlington -National Cemetery.
He was back in Washington a year later to endorse a proposal to rededicate the existing World War I memorial on the National Mall as the official National World War I Memorial. He told a Senate panel it was "an excellent idea." The memorial was originally built to honor District of Columbia's war dead.
Born in Missouri in 1901 and raised in Oklahoma, Buckles visited a string of military recruiters after the United States entered the "war to end all wars" in April 1917. He was repeatedly rejected before convincing an Army captain he was 18. He was actually 16.
"A boy of (that age), he's not afraid of anything. He wants to get in there," Buckles said.
After Armistice Day, Buckles helped return prisoners of war to Germany. He returned to the US in January 1920.
Buckles returned to Oklahoma for a while, then moved to Canada, where he worked a series of jobs before heading for New York City.
It was the shipping industry that suited him best, and he worked around the world for the White Star Line Steamship Co and WR Grace & Co.
In 1941, while on business in the Philippines, Buckles was captured by the Japanese and spent three years in prison camps.
He married in 1946 and moved to his farm in West Virginia in 1954, where he and wife Audrey raised their daughter, Susannah Flanagan. Audrey Buckles died in 1999.
Buckles, who also survived being a civilian prisoner of war in the Philippines in World War II, died peacefully of natural causes early on Sunday at his home in Charles Town, West Virginia, biographer and family spokesman David DeJonge said in a statement. Buckles turned 110 on February 1 and had been advocating for a national memorial honoring veterans of World War I in Washington DC.
When asked in February 2008 how it felt to be the last of his kind, he said simply, "I realized that somebody had to be, and it was me." And he said he would have done it all over again, "without a doubt."
On November 11, 2008, the 90th anniversary of the end of the war, Buckles attended a ceremony at the grave of World War I General John Pershing in Arlington -National Cemetery.
He was back in Washington a year later to endorse a proposal to rededicate the existing World War I memorial on the National Mall as the official National World War I Memorial. He told a Senate panel it was "an excellent idea." The memorial was originally built to honor District of Columbia's war dead.
Born in Missouri in 1901 and raised in Oklahoma, Buckles visited a string of military recruiters after the United States entered the "war to end all wars" in April 1917. He was repeatedly rejected before convincing an Army captain he was 18. He was actually 16.
"A boy of (that age), he's not afraid of anything. He wants to get in there," Buckles said.
After Armistice Day, Buckles helped return prisoners of war to Germany. He returned to the US in January 1920.
Buckles returned to Oklahoma for a while, then moved to Canada, where he worked a series of jobs before heading for New York City.
It was the shipping industry that suited him best, and he worked around the world for the White Star Line Steamship Co and WR Grace & Co.
In 1941, while on business in the Philippines, Buckles was captured by the Japanese and spent three years in prison camps.
He married in 1946 and moved to his farm in West Virginia in 1954, where he and wife Audrey raised their daughter, Susannah Flanagan. Audrey Buckles died in 1999.
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