Pondering the Loss of Henry Allingham: World's Oldest Man at 113

"Henry Allingham was a reminder of why we fight and live and remember the sacrifice in order to continue building a world where men can live free to 113." - Peter Hankoff, award-winning documentary director/producer

(SALEM, Ore.) - It seems that it wasn't too long ago when you could still track down an occasional World War One veteran at a Veteran's Day or Memorial Day observation. I have had the pleasure more than once, and I am sorry to know that the last known man to fight in the Great War, Henry Allingham, has finally left this mortal world at the age of 113.

Peter Hankoff, who has spent years looking at the world through the eyes of a documentarian's dirty lens, has a few thoughts on this recent loss which will undoubtedly affect both historians and documentarians.

His National Geographic program Scrapbooks from Hell - The Auschwitz Albums sent him to history's most infamous concentration camp. Other documentaries have taken Peter to Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima, the site of the San Francisco earthquake and other infamous places throughout the world.

While en route to France to shoot on location for an upcoming TV program, Peter take a moment to write his thoughts about Henry Allingham, a WWI veteran and the world's oldest man, at 113.

"Henry Allingham, the world's oldest man, died today after 113 years on the planet. While that may not seem like a lot of time in a geological or historical sense, from a cultural perspective, it's an eternity. Most of what we take for granted was invented in his lifetime - automobiles, planes, rockets, computers, radio, television, modern medicine, digital anything. But what ties him even deeper to history is that he was also the world's oldest veteran."

"As a member of the Royal Air Force, he fought for Britain in World War One. Millions died in the war to end all wars and Henry Allingham was a reminder of why we fight and live and remember the sacrifice in order to continue building a world where men can live free to 113."

Peter Hankoff is an award-winning documentary director/producer/writer who lives in Los Angeles.

According to Wikipedia, Henry Allingham initially wanted to join the military and head for war as a dispatch rider, when it was very new, in August 1914.

His mother was critically ill and that ultimately delayed his entry. Her death soon relieved him of his duty at home and Harry Allingham enlisted with the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS).

Soon he was a formally rated Air Mechanic Second Class and on September 21st 1915, he was posted to Chingford before completing his training at Sheerness, Kent. After graduation, he went to the RNAS Air Station at Great Yarmouth to work in aircraft maintenance.

On April 13th 1916, King George V inspected the air station and its aircraft. henry later told people that he was disappointed when the king turned and left just before he would have had a chance to speak to him.

Henry Allingham was ordered to join the naval trawler HMT Kingfisher next. Onboard was a Sopwith Schneider seaplane that was used to look out for the German High Seas Fleet.

In September 1917, the newly promoted Air Mechanic First Class, was posted to the Western Front to join No. 12 Squadron RNAS. This unit acted as a training squadron for other RNAS squadrons based on the Western Front, Wikipedia states.

There are reports that the squadron was involved in combat operations. Henry Allingham was at Petite-Synthe, where the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the RNAS were involved in the Ypres offensive. He also instrumented the very first reconnaissance aircraft camera during World War I.

Then Henry was sent to the aircraft depot at Dunkirk, France where he would spend the rest of the war, recovering and repairing planes. He used to talk about being bombed from the air and shelled from both the land and the sea. He transferred to the Royal Air Force when the RNAS and the RFC were merged on 1 April, 1918.

Henry Allingham returned to the Home Establishment in February 1919 and was formally discharged to the RAF Reserve on April 16th 1919.

Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor.
Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines. Tim holds numerous awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), the first place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several other awards including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting. Serving the community in very real terms, Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website, affiliated with Google News and several other major search engines and news aggregators.
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