War veteran Captain Tom Moore, 99, hits £14 million for NHS as Matt Hancock calls him an ‘inspiration’

Follow our live Covid-19 updates HERE Coronavirus: The symptoms

A 99-year-old army veteran who set out to raise £1,000 for the NHS has now received more than £14 million in donations.

Captain Tom Moore was described as “an inspiration to us all” by Matt Hancock, hours before his fundraising campaign hit a £10m landmark.

The donations have continued to pour in and hit £14 million on Thursday afternoon.

Mr Moore, who lives with his family in Bedfordshire, decided to fundraise for the NHS by walking the 25-metre loop of his garden 100 times ahead of his 100th birthday.

His achievements were singled out by the Health Secretary as he opened Wednesday’s Downing Street press conference.

Captain Tom Moore - In pictures

1/68

Mr Hancock said: “I want to pay a special tribute today to Captain Tom Moore. Captain Tom, you’re an inspiration to us all, and we thank you."

The war hero reached £8 million at 5.30pm on Wednesday, reaching the next seven-figure milestone of £9 million less than three hours later.

Mr Moore then reached £10 million at around 11pm. By the early hours of Thursday, the figure had hit £12 million.

He completed his 100th lap on Thursday morning, and donations continued to pour in until the fund hit £13 million around midday.

By 3pm, he had reached the £14 million milestone.

He wrote on Twitter: “I’m speechless… This amount of money will help the #NHS beyond what we ever thought was imaginable.

Matt Hancock addresses the Downing Street press briefing
PA

“Thank you to everyone that’s helped me get there.”

Earlier, he told BBC One: “I think that’s absolutely enormous.

“At no time when we started off with this exercise did we anticipate we’d get anything near that sort of money.

Captain Tom will turn 100 on April 30 (REUTERS)
Reuters

“It just shows that people have such high regard for matters of our National Health Service and it’s really amazing that people have paid so much money.”

Mr Moore began raising funds to thank NHS staff who treated him for a broken hip.

His daughter, Hannah Ingram-Moore, said the amount raised was “beyond our wildest expectations”.

When the JustGiving page went live last week, they thought their £1,000 target was a “real stretch”, she told the BBC.

“No words can express our gratitude to the British public for getting behind Tom, for making this into a heartfelt story,” she added.

“He’s a stoic Yorkshireman, he’s an unruffled straight-down-the-line kind of person and has embraced this adventure as the next stage of his life.

“I believe that life is all about purpose, we all need purpose, and, whilst he’s had a life full of purpose, he did fall and break his hip and became much less independent than he had been for the preceding 98 years, and what you have done, the British public, and everyone who’s supported him, is giving him his next purpose.

“He is articulate, he’s alive, he’s doing this and I think he’ll do this until everyone says, ‘Stop, don’t do it any more’.”

Mr Moore is ahead of schedule with his walking and is hoping to finish the challenge by Thursday.

Meanwhile, an eight-year-old girl has started an online campaign for children to make birthday cards for Mr Moore’s 100th birthday.

Reegan Davies, from Port Talbot, South Wales, set a target of 1,500 virtual cards after posting a video online to thank him for his fundraising efforts.

She says in the video posted on Twitter: “You’ve got to make a birthday card for Tom, any social media you post it, and tag #makeacardfortom”.

To donate to Mr Moore's fundraising page, click here.

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