The following is taken from an article in The Citizen dated 1st Feb 1939
The Oldest Old Boy
In his 101st year, still going strong
Whoever may be the oldest old Etonian or old Harrovian, Westminster School has no doubt of the identity of the oldest old Westminster boy.
He is the Rev. Frederick Willett, who, in his 101st year, is still going strong – though he has found this past January very trying.
Mr Willett has good claims, as a note in the current “Westminster Abbey Quarterly” puts it, to be the oldest public schoolboy alive. He entered Westminster in 1852, which was pre-Crimean war. Big Ben had not then been built, Dean Buckland presided over the Abbey and Dr. Liddell, still grappling with his famous lexicon, over the school.
Mr. Willett likes to recall that he link himself with the aid of only two men to the days of Charles II. “When I was 19,” he said recently, “I saw a very old man in bed. That man remembered a relative who saw Charles II. I remember, too, shaking hands with Madame Bonaparte, the sister-in-law of Napoleon. That was in America.”
Saw "Iron Duke's" Funeral
As a boy Mr. Willett was brought to London by his father to see the funeral of the Duke of Wellington, and he once saw King Edward VII, as a child in a short frock at Brighton.
Mr. Willett took his B.A. at Cambridge, his first curacy at St. Peter’s, Wolverhampton in 1861, and his M.A. two years later. For 25 years he was Vicar of West Bromwich. He resigned there in 1881 because of failing health, and went into retirement. Soon afterwards he inherited property in Sussex, and he took charge of Scaynes Hill Mission Church for 25 years without receiving a stipend. Because there was an inn on his estate, in which he placed a manager to run the business on reformed lines, Mr. Willett gained the nickname of the “Publican Parson.”
His last sermon was delivered at Lindfield when he was 95. It was at an Armistice service attended by members of the British Legion. He then spoke without notes for a quarter of an hour.