LONDON — Michael Woods has been visiting his wife Mary every day since she moved into a nursing home two years ago.
But on Sunday, the 100-year-old Royal Air Force veteran will skip the daily meeting so he can fulfill another duty: honoring the men he served with during World War II.
Woods will compete for the first time since leaving the RAF in 1947 Great Britain national Remembrance Day service, with thousands of veterans joining in marching past the Cenotaph war memorial in central London to honor those who died during the world wars and all the conflicts that followed.
“It’s a great privilege for me to be able to do this,” said Woods, a mechanic who kept Lancaster bombers in the air during the war. “And I don’t think I’ll ever do it again.”
The annual ceremony is one solemn event celebrated every year when the king and envoys from the Commonwealth countries who fought alongside Britain in the two world wars laid wreaths at the Cenotaph. It culminates when approximately 10,000 veterans, many with shining medals on their chests and regimental berets on their heads, parade past the monument.
Until now, Woods watched on television from his home in Dunstable, 30 miles away. Maria always watched with him.
Woods previously had a lot on his mind. For years he was busy with his family: two daughters, a son, eight grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. And more recently, he cared for Mary, his wife of 68 years.
But there was something else holding him back. He did not feel he deserved this honor, as he was ‘just’ a mechanic working on the twelve-cylinder Rolls-Royce Merlin engines that powered the Lancaster bombers. He changed his mind after connecting with other ex-military personnel through Blind veterans Great Britainthe charity that helped him deal with macular degeneration and glaucoma.
He felt it was time to remember the men who didn’t make it home after taking to the skies aboard planes he declared airworthy. Each Lancaster had seven crew members on board, most in their early twenties, so the losses – so many at once – were difficult to bear.
“It’s very disturbing when a Lancaster takes off and doesn’t return,” Woods told The Associated Press.
“I couldn’t forget it if I wanted to,” he added. “It’s just etched in your memory, you know.”
According to the International Bomber Command Centre, the RAF’s Bomber Command had the highest attrition rate of any Allied unit during World War II, with 44% of aircrew killed. About 55,573 of the 125,000 who served in the aircrews died during the war.
Adrian Bell, CEO of Blind Veterans UK, said he has met many World War II veterans who describe themselves as just cogs in a huge machine. But that was necessary to defeat fascism. Everyone was needed.
So next Sunday, Woods will march.
With the stubbornness to maintain his independence that seems to have come from turning a centenarian, Woods insists he will not use a wheelchair because he has never used one before and isn’t going to start now. In addition, his son, Eddie, will act as a guide and his friends from the charity will be nearby to provide emotional support.
He will be an inspiration, Bell said.
“I think the most important thing is the fortitude of a man who is 100 years old, who fought in the Second World War and beyond, who will be there physically on Sunday and will march in tribute to those who lost their lives and as a kind of a sign of hope and a sign… that there is life after all these things,” Bell said. “That’s the embodiment of something that I think is very important.”
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