Holme sweet Holme... couple mark 70th wedding anniversary

THEIR first meeting was like a scene from a movie – and John and Muriel Holme are now celebrating their 70th wedding anniversary.

The Sherwood couple met after bumping into each other in a corridor at John Player and Sons, in Radford, where they worked.

They celebrated their wedding anniversary with a meal at Hart's Restaurant with their family – but Mrs Holme was quick to point out that it had not been love at first sight.

The 91-year-old said: "I was walking back from the restaurant at Player's and dropped a book, and as I bent down to pick it up he bumped into the back of me.

"It wasn't really love at first sight but I noticed him."

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Mr Holme, 92, said: "We started talking and we had got very similar personalities.

"It was wartime so there wasn't much petrol but we went driving in my car on our first date. After that, much of our courting was spent cycling, which a lot of people used to do then."

The pair, of Retford Road, wed five years later, on September 30, 1944, at Holy Trinity Church in Lenton.

But before their wedding Mr Holme joined the RAF in 1941, and in 1942 joined Fighter Command, where he flew Spitfires and Hurricanes as he trained pilots.

He served in India and Burma with Bomber Command, for which he was awarded the Burma Star.

Mrs Holme added: "It wasn't a very nice time. Everyone was worrying about the men but that's just how it was."

After the war, Mr Holme returned to work at Player's, where he served for 40 years before retiring aged 56, while Mrs Holme stayed at home to look after their three children, Michael, now 69, Stephen, 63 and Melanie, 49.

They also have five grandchildren, Joanne, Sally, Charlotte, Jonathan and Lizzie, and four great-grandchildren, Jack, Katie, Holly and Eleanor-Mai.

Mr Holme said: "You have to remember your wedding vows and stick to them.

"Our life is like a jigsaw, it has been shattered a number of times, through deaths in the family and things like that, but we have always put them back together and that's why we've been married for so long."

Their daughter, Melanie, said: "I think they have stayed together because they care for each other and have similar hobbies, and have just stuck together through thick and thin.

"They are totally and utterly devoted to each other. They are quite young at heart and are inseparable. Both of them have a great sense of humour.

"They go for lunch with each other quite regularly and used to enjoy going on holiday together until the last couple of years, because mum's health isn't as good as it was so they haven't been able to get out.

"I think they have been unbelievable parents, grandparents and great-grandparents to us all. They have tried to instil family values in all of us.

"They still enjoy spending time with the family. Last year, we all went to Center Parcs for my mum's 90th, and that was dad's idea."

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