Charles and Ruby Wright from Ipswich mark their Platinum Wedding Anniversary

Charles and Ruby Wright on their wedding day 70 years ago.

Charles and Ruby Wright were married on June 8, 1946 when Britain and British allies took part in a parade to celebrate the defeat of Nazi Germany and Japan in the Second World War.

There were no lights in the town, no taxis available and no shops open, but the pair still managed to make their way to Saint Thomas the Apostle Church in Bramford Lane, Ipswich, to say their vows.

Charles, 95, served in the Second World War with the army and in 1943 he was captured as a prisoner of war on the Greek island of Leros for 18 months. When he was released he returned home to Ipswich to visit his uncle in Waveney Road where Ruby lived with her family.

“The war was just finishing so everything was rationed,” Charles said. “My uncle went down the garden to pick some radishes for tea and Ruby was in the garden picking strawberries next door. So my uncle Sam came in and said someone down the garden wants to speak to you.

“I had a cousin who was about four years old, and Ruby picked a hand full of strawberries as she thought there was a youngster going down to see her but it was me. Her mother was away because her father had died a month earlier, otherwise I would never have been able to speak to her. So that’s how we met.”

The couple have three children, John, Marion and Clive, 12 grandchildren and 22 great-grandchildren.

Ruby, 89, has dementia and has lived in Monmouth Court nursing home for 16 months. Charles lives in Playford Lane, Rushmere St Andrew, where he is still doing his own woodwork projects as well as gardening, housework and cooking.

Granddaughter Kelly Wright has arranged for her grandparents to receive a letter of congratulations from the Queen, and Ruby will also leave the care home today to join a celebration at the couple’s Playford Lane home.