'Last living' WWI veteran turns 110
'Last living' WWI veteran turns 110
3 March, 2011 7:13AM AWST
The man believed to be the world's last living World War I veteran will celebrate his 110th birthday in Perth today.
British-born Claude "Chuckles" Choules was born in 1901 and signed up for the Great War at just 14 years of age, serving in the British Royal Navy.
He then moved to Australia, serving as an officer with the Australian Navy in World War II.
Mr Choules, who lives in a Perth nursing home, will mark his birthday just days after the death of American Frank Buckles made him the conflict's last surviving male veteran.
He lied about his age to join the Royal Navy - later witnessing the 1919 scuttling of the German fleet at Scapa Flow.
Mr Choules became the 1914-1918 war's last surviving combatant after Mr Buckles' death at 110 on Sunday. British veterans Henry Allingham and Harry Patch, aged 110 and 113 respectively, both died in 2009.
The only other surviving WWI veteran is believed to be Britain's Florence Green, who served with the Royal Air Force in a non-combat role and is now 110 years old.
Mr Choules moved to Australia in 1926 and served in the RAN, becoming chief demolition officer for Australia's vast western coastline, which was then considered vulnerable to attack from the Japanese.
Adrian Choules said his father, who was born in Wyre Piddle in the English Midlands on March 3, 1901, had been taught to think "that the Germans ... were monsters, terrible people" after joining the navy.
But he soon after realised "they were exactly the same as any young people".
"And he hated war. War for him was a way of making a living, that was his job," Adrian Choules said.
Adrian Choules says when his father talked about his life he rarely mentioned his war experiences, adding that the only military marches he participated in were when he was a serviceman.
"He wasn't interested in war, war to him was a terrible thing," he said.
Mr Choules's daughter, Anne Pow, says while her father is not too fussed about today's milestone, his family, friends and some representatives from the Navy will mark the occasion with a small birthday party.
"We're delighted for him. It's hard to be really excited when you're 110 and you're blind and deaf," she said.
Mr Choules published a book about his life, The Last of the Last, in 2009.
- ABC/AFP
