Ethel Caterham, the world’s oldest living person, has celebrated her 117th birthday with family and friends at Hallmark Lakeview Care Home in Lightwater, Surrey.
Born in Hampshire in 1909, Ethel was three years old when the Titanic sank and was born eight years before the Russian Revolution. She has lived through two World Wars, the final years of the British Empire and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ethel became the world’s oldest living person in April 2025 following the death of Brazilian nun Sister Inah Canabarro Lucas at 116.
Remarkably, Ethel survived COVID-19 in 2020 at the age of 110, according to Guinness World Records.
The second youngest of eight children, Ethel grew up in Tidworth, Wiltshire. As a teenager, she travelled to India in 1927, where she worked as an au pair for a military family.
She later met Norman Caterham, a lieutenant colonel in the British Army, at a dinner party in Britain in 1931. The couple went on to live in Hong Kong, where Ethel established a nursery school.
They eventually raised two daughters, both of whom sadly died before their mother. Norman died in 1976.
Ethel is also believed to be the last surviving subject of King Edward VII. Her remarkable longevity runs in the family: her sister Gladys also became a centenarian, living to the age of 104.
At 117, Ethel's extraordinary life remains a living link to more than a century of history.
