Posted on 12/10/2005 5:39:18 PM PST by REactor
A Polish army veteran - thought to have been Britain's oldest man - has died at a nursing home in Cumbria.
Jerzy Pajaczkowski-Dydynski - known as George - who was 111, lived in Sedbergh until ill-health forced a move to a nursing home in Grange over Sands.
The former colonel was born in what is now the Ukraine, but was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in 1894.
He escaped the German invasion of Poland in 1940 and worked as a gardener in Scotland before moving to Cumbria.
His son-in-law Richard Thomas from Birks Fold, said he and other members of the family had seen the highly decorated veteran at the Boarbank Hall nursing home before he died on 6 December.
Mr Thomas said: "We saw him on the day he died. He had a very colourful and eventful life."
Mr Dydynski studied law at the University of Vienna, but when World War I broke out joined the Polish Army and saw service in the war between Russia and Poland in the 1920's.
He was still with the army when Germany invaded Poland in 1939, but eventually managed to escape to Britain.
He spent months in hospital after falling ill on New Year's Eve 2003 and breaking his hip.
The colonel was born in Lwow on 19 July, 1894, and moved to Sedbergh from Edinburgh in 1993 with his now late second wife Dorothy.
The family said his long life was down to his positive outlook and, until recently, a daily half glass of Guinness.
He leaves 10 grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.
The colonel was called up to the Austrian Infantry in 1915 and became a sergeant before going to Montenegro and Albania where he fought against the Italians.
He married in 1924 but his first wife later died so he married again in 1946.
Family from Poland, Britain, the US, Australia and France are due to attend a funeral service at Sedbergh Parish Church on 12 December.
I know... My grandmother and grandaunts, they all left a permanent mark in time. Incredibly tough, and equally sweet hearted women.
Strange for me to be a young man in 2005, yet intimately related to a group of young farmgirls from the 1910s (all deceased but one!).
You are very lucky to be among these women...can you even imagine what it must have been like for these women, what the times were like for them?...they have a wealth of information, for those wise enough to learn...sounds like you are one of those wise enough to appreciate what you have, and how important it is for you...its always important, at least to me, to know who you came from, what they did, what they believed...its a continuance of your family, through time...
Indeed RIP. They say Guinness is good for you (it should be since it tastes like medicine,)but good genes also help.
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