Oldest Battle of Britain pilot dies at 99

LONDON -- William Walker, whose poem is part of a national monument to his comrades in the Battle of Britain, has died at age 99.

The Battle of Britain Trust said Walker died Sunday at home in London.

Walker, a Spitfire fighter pilot, was shot down and took a bullet in his right ankle on August 26, 1940, as British pilots engaged a German bomber force.

His poem "Our Wall" is inscribed on the memorial on the Dover cliffs to the nearly 3,000 men who flew in the battle from June to October 1940.

After retiring as chairman of the Ind Coope brewery, Walker wrote poetry including tributes to the fliers hailed by Winston Churchill: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

-- Associated Press