Are you, perhaps, unaware that these are in different units? 38.7C is 102F. The UK switched in the 60s to centigrade[0]. I'd also be suspicious of the accuracy and method of temperature collection in 1911.. the Met Office didn't start collecting data until 1914, and of the source accuracy.. Wikipedia[1] seems to suggest 98F (36.7C) and in another town. It certainly was extremely hot that August in 1911... especially without modern conveniences.
What's your point? That this is unreliable reporting?
I'll take your word for it that the met office didn't start collecting temperature data until 1914. Countless other entities didn't either, and none of them were cited either. In what year did Wikipedia start collecting temperature data?
I imagine his point was that there is no reason to believe a disputed 100f peak temperature during the notorious 1911 heatwave makes today's 104.5f temperature advance on 2019's 101.6f peak in a country that does a lot of weather reporting unremarkable and unworthy of media coverage. Unless one was using the wrong Fahrenheit/Celsius conversion factor and somehow didn't realise the claimed 1911 temperature was smaller...
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication_in_the_United_King... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1911_in_the_United_Kingdom