‘Vile’ trolling would have broken Capt Sir Tom Moore’s heart, daughter says

His daughter said: “I couldn’t tell him, because how do you rationalise to a 100-year-old man that something so incredibly good can attract such horror? “

Captain Sir Tom Moore’s daughter has revealed that she never told her hero father about “vile minority” who trolled the family in the weeks before his death, saying: “It would have broken his heart.”

Hannah Ingram-Moore also described how, even as he lay in a hospital bed suffering with Covid-19, the Second World War Veteran had pledged to continue walking laps of his garden after raising more than £32 million for the NHS last year.

During the first lockdown, Sir Tom’s fundraising effort to complete 100 laps of his Bedfordshire garden before his 100th birthday captured the nation’s heart. He died at Bedford Hospital on February 2 aged 100.

Ms Ingram-Moore has revealed that the family had been subject to “horrific” online abuse in the last weeks of his life. She told BBC Breakfast: “We really had to use our family resilience, our emotional resilience, and we never told him.

“Because I don’t think he could ever have understood it. I think it would have broken his heart, honestly, if we’d said to him people are hating us.

“I couldn’t tell him, because how do you rationalise to a 100-year-old man that something so incredibly good can attract such horror? So we contained it within the four of us and we said that we won’t play to them, we’re not talking to those vile minority, we’re not, because we are talking to the massive majority of people who we just connect with.”

She said the trolling had become “pretty horrific” and “really did hurt”.

She added: “It really is really hard to deal with but we have dealt with it and they will not win.

“They will never make this amazing thing negative, not ever. We won’t let them.”

Captain Tom Moore - In pictures

1/68

Ms Ingram-Moore also said her father had wanted to come home to steak and chips after he was admitted to hospital with coronavirus.

She said: “I said to him in the last few days: ‘So, what do you want to eat when you come home?’ And we decided it was steak and chips.

“He was really excited about coming out for steak and chips and getting his frame back outside and his walker.

“The last real conversation was positive and about carrying on, and that’s a lovely place to be.”

Ms Ingram-Moore said that when Sir Tom went into hospital, the family “really all believed he’d come back out”.

“We thought the oxygen would help, that he would be robust enough, (but) the truth is he just wasn’t. He was old and he just couldn’t fight it,” she added, describing how she was dressed in full PPE while sitting next to him.

She said the pride in his lasting legacy “oozed out of him” and said he told her: “I’m coming back out, there’s more fundraising in me yet, I’m coming back out to walk.”

Amid her family’s sadness and the “deafening silence” they have to live with, she said she understands that members of the public are also grieving the loss of Sir Tom.

“It’s really, really hard, but the legacy is hope and joy,” she said.

An NHS worker holds a Captain Tom message outside the Aintree University Hospital
REUTERS

Following his death, Buckingham Palace said the Queen would be sending a private message of condolence to Sir Tom’s family.

Ms Ingram-Moore said: “We had a lovely letter from her, and I think that she feels genuine loss. It’s another one of her generation.”

Additional reporting by PA

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in