The face of our defiant Covid fight
Captain Sir Tom Moore NHS fundraiser and national hero
BORN APRIL 30, 1920 – DIED FEBRUARY 2, 2021, AGED 100
WITH his white handkerchief poking out from his blazer pocket, his war medals gleaming in the spring sunshine, Captain Tom Moore set out to raise £1,000 for NHS Charities Together last April when he was 99 years old.
By the time he had finished walking 100 laps of his garden over ten days, using his walking aid, he had been elevated to the rare status of national hero.
He had wanted to thank the NHS for a hip replacement, treatment for skin cancer, helping his late wife through dementia and because his great nephew worked as a doctor in children’s A&E.
But the country felt he was the symbol of something much bigger. He was standing up to Covid-19, showing leadership while all the time maintaining impeccable manners and charm.
However, his greatest skill was inspiring fundraising to the tune of almost £33million. At the home he shared with his daughter Hannah and her family in the village of Marston Moretaine in Bedfordshire, well-wishers sent him 170,000 cards and he took calls from England cricketer Ben Stokes and ex-racing driver Damon Hill. Singer Michael Ball made a single with him of You’ll Never Walk Alone, which reached No 1.
Born in Keighley in the West Riding area of Yorkshire, his mother Isabella was a headmistress and his fatherWilfred was a builder.
When war broke out he joined the 8th Battalion, Duke of Wellington’s Regiment and following officer training in 1941, was commissioned as a second lieutenant. In the jungles of Burma he used his motorcycling skills to find routes through the dense undergrowth and deliver messages.
After the Japanese surrender he went to Sumatra as a captain and after being demobbed he worked for his father’s building firm. Captain Sir Tom fell for the office manager of a building firm he worked for, Pamela Paull, who was 15 years his junior.
They had two daughters, Lucy and Hannah, who survive him. For 20 years he nursed Pamela through dementia until her death in 2006.
Being knighted by the Queen at Windsor Castle was an honour he treasured.
He contracted pneumonia last month and later tested positive for Covid-19. He summed up his philosophy as: “Tomorrow is going to be better than today, even if today was a good day.”