Kurt Wahle

Major-General Kurt Wahle was a retired German army officer who travelled to German East Africa in 1914 to visit his son. At the outbreak of World War I, he re-enlisted in the German Army, becoming one of Colonel von Lettow-Vorbeck's field commanders, and then fighting in the East African Campaign until October 1918. During the Campaign, he was awarded the Iron Cross, First Class, and the "Pour le Mérite".

General Wahle, who had first joined the army in 1867, was the oldest combatant of any nation in World War I.

References

* Paice, Edward "Tip and Run: The Untold Tragedy of the Great War in Africa" Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2007, ISBN 0-297-84709-0. (see page 384)