Britain's oldest person dies aged 112
Britain's oldest person - who was born in 1908 under the reign of Edward VII - has died aged 112.
Joan Hocquard passed away at her home in Poole, Dorset, according to her 74-year-old nephew Paul Reynolds.
An independent spirit, Ms Hocquard refused her 100th birthday card from the Queen back in 2008 as she didn't want people to know how old she was.
Coincidentally, she had shared her 29 March birthday with the world's previously oldest man, Bob Weighton, who died aged 112 in May.
Describing her as coming from "quite a well to do family", her nephew Mr Reynolds, said his aunt was born in a big house in Holland Park in Kensington, London.
Her father was a colonial officer who was in charge of shipping on the Great Lakes in East Africa so she spent her childhood between Kenya with her parents and her grandmother in Lymington, Hampshire.
As an adult, she spent nine years working as a cook in a French hotel near Geneva, where Mr Reynolds says she developed a love of rich food.
He said: "She loved eating butter and cream and didn't believe in dieting.
She also drove ambulances in London during World War Two, before marrying her husband Gilbert and moving to the South Coast.
The couple met through their shared love of sailing and travel, driving across the continent in a camper van and going on yachting holidays until Gilbert's death in 1981.
Later in the 1980s, Ms Hocquard met her second partner, widower Kenneth Bedford, who was 20 years her junior.
The couple got together at the Bournemouth Gramophone Society, and had lived together happily in Poole ever since.
Paying tribute to his aunt, Mr Reynolds said: "She had an extraordinary innings and died peacefully in her own home, which is all you could wish for.
"She was a strong-willed character and loved telling stories about how naughty she was as a schoolgirl.
"She was also a very hospitable and loyal person. She always sought to live life to the full.
"There is no secret to her long life. I suppose she just had good genes."
Lilian Priest, who is 111 years old and from Swanage in Dorset, now takes the crown as Britain's oldest living person.
The oldest-ever British person was Charlotte Hughes from Marske in Cleveland, who died in 1993 aged 115 years and 228 days.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the oldest woman of all time was French woman, Jeanne Calment, who died in 1997 aged 122 years and 164 days.
Watch: Coronavirus - Boots announces 12-minute COVID tests
