The founder of the World War One Veterans’ Association, Dennis Goodwin, has died at the age of 91 at his home in Sussex.
The association, set up in 1989, provided a forum where former soldiers could discuss their experiences and remember comrades who died during the war.
Goodwin, who died on Monday, was appointed MBE in 2008 for his services to veterans. With the help of his son Stephen, he brought together 400 survivors of the first world war, providing assistance in obtaining pensions and compensation for the long-term effects of the conflict.
He helped to arrange visits to former battlefields and memorial sites in Belgium and France, as well as to events at Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament and the Cenotaph.
“But for Dennis, many of [the veterans] would never have been acknowledged,” Goodwin’s family said in a statement.
“As the veterans diminished in numbers, the supercentenarians came into their own and Dennis … took Henry Allingham, Harry Patch and Bill Stone to all the remembrances and other functions until 2009, when the last one died.”
Allingham, Britain’s oldest man and the last RAF and British naval veteran of the first world war, died in 2009 at the age of 113. Goodwin co-wrote his autobiography, Kitchener’s Last Volunteer.
Goodwin is survived by his wife, Brenda, with whom he co-founded the association. She told the BBC in 2014 that the trips to former battlefields helped the men talk about their experiences. “There was no way their family or friends could understand what they’d been through,” she said.
Born in a fire station in Lancashire in 1926, Goodwin volunteered for the RAF in 1944 during the second world war. He served in Burma, working with the Air Sea Rescue, and then in Singapore and Malaysia until 1948.
After the war, he joined the Local Government Service in Preston and established a career in human resources. He became an executive director of HR for Bath city council, and then town clerk for Littlehampton after moving to West Sussex in 1982.
Goodwin went on to organise the twinning of Littlehampton with various towns in France and Germany. After retirement, he was welfare officer for the RAF Benevolent Fund for 15 years.
He was also a trustee for Age Concern and the Guild Care charity in Worthing until he reached the age of 90. He was honoured for his volunteer work.
Goodwin told the BBC the veterans of the first world war “got under his skin”, adding: “They were another breed.”