World’s oldest person celebrates turning 117 in Lightwater

ByNathan Bevan

South East

The world's oldest living person celebrates turning 117 years old in Surrey on Friday with her family and friends.

Ethel Caterham, who lives at Hallmark Lakeview Care Home in Lightwater, took on the mantle in April 2025 after the death of Brazilian nun Sister Inah Canabarro Lucas at the age of 116.

Born three years before the Titanic disaster and eight years before the Russian Revolution, Ethel has also lived through two world wars.

In addition, she is one of the oldest people to survive Covid-19, after contracting it in 2020 at the age of 110, according to Guinness World Records.

Originally from Shipton Bellinger in Hampshire, the second youngest of eight children, Ethel was raised in Tidworth, Wiltshire.

The last surviving subject of King Edward VII, as a teenager she travelled to India in 1927 and began working as an au pair to a military family there.

Ethel met her husband Norman, a lieutenant colonel in the British Army, at a dinner party in the UK in 1931 and the pair later lived in Hong Kong, where she set up a nursery school.

They then raised two daughters, both of whom died before her.

Norman also went on to die in 1976, while one of her sisters, Gladys, also became a centenarian, living until she was 104.

Ethel, who was still driving when she turned 97, was visited by King Charles last September, just after her 116th birthday.

During their meeting, she recalled his 1969 investiture as the Prince of Wales, when he was 21, telling him: "All the girls were in love with you and wanted to marry you."

However, the title of the oldest person ever is still held by French woman Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997 having lived to 122 years 164 days, says Guinness World Records.

Additional reporting by PA Media.

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