A PENSIONER couple living in Keighley have renewed their wedding vows after 72 years of marriage.

Fred and John Williams, who are both in their 90s, received a church minister’s blessing in their home.

The couple have lived most of her life in the south of England but six months ago moved to Keighley to live with their son Roy Williams.

Joan, 97, and Fred, 93, still like to get out and about, and enjoy regular visits from their many grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Roy Williams, a leading light of the Lund Park Community Group, described his parents as an amazing couple who had been married longer than some people were alive.

He said: “Not only have they survived but prospered, sharing 72 years of life together as man and wife.

“Having left home at 17 years I never believed that over 40 years later my parents would be moving back in with us.

“Their health and mobility was starting to deteriorate and we felt they would be much safer with us.

“They left a climate in Dorset which was a few degrees warmer, and a bungalow which they lived in from over 40 years, to be faced with the frozen north and a house with lots of stairs to climb.

“However thanks to a stairlift, a new central heating system and lots of TLC they have survived the northern climate and are still smiling.”

After Fred and Joan decided to renew their marriage vows recently, Bryony Partridge, the minister at Christ Church, Oakworth, agreed to visit their new home overlooking Lund Park to conduct a blessing.

Roy added: “They also received a lovely card from HRH Queen wishing them well.”

Roy said his father, a keen musician all his life, hoped to take up the violin again if a forthcoming cataract operation was successful.

Fred and Joan met at a dance during the Second Would War, when Fred was with the King’s Own Light Infantry and Joan worked in a munitions factory.

Fred went on to spend his working life at ICI’s Dulux paint factory in Slough, while his wife worked for Glaxo laboratories in Stoke Poges.

Throughout their life the couple have lived in Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and for the past four decades Poole, Dorset. They had two daughters and a son, and most of their family now live in West Yorkshire.

Roy Williams worked as a postman initially in Chepstow, transferring to Keighley sorting office several decades ago because houses were cheaper in the north.