Last living US WWI vet dies in W. Va. at age 110

By Guest Column —— Bio and Archives February 28, 2011

Comments | Print This | Subscribe | Email Us

AP, Fox News MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Frank Buckles was repeatedly rejected by military recruiters and got into uniform at 16 after lying about his age. He would later become the last surviving U.S. veteran of World War I. Buckles, who also survived being a civilian POW in the Philippines in World War II, died of natural causes Sunday at his home in Charles Town, biographer and family spokesman David DeJonge said. He was 110.

Buckles would have want people to remember him as "the last torchbearer" for World War I, DeJonge said Monday. Buckles had been advocating for a national memorial honoring veterans of the Great War in the nation's capital and asked about its progress weekly, sometimes daily.