It was with sadness that I learned of the demise of Harry Patch this summer. I had just finished reading his autobiography so his passing away was particularly poignant. What struck me most, when I read his book, was that he was profoundly marked by the disappearance of the D-Day allied troups and dwelled upon their loss very deeply, perhaps moreso - at least in the book- than on the tragedies he witnessed in Flanders. His anti-war stance and his symbolic funeral make his existence count for a great deal. Harry felt that death was not the end; his experiences in the First World War convinced him of the possibility of a passage to another world. Let us therefore say Good bye and not Farewell to Harry Patch.
