LOVE, honour and obey are the key to a happy marriage according to one Winsford couple who celebrated their Diamond Wedding on Thursday.

Dennis and Audrey Whittaker, who live at Hazelmere Extra Care Village, first met when Audrey moved to Winsford from Manchester during the war to work as a shorthand typist for the then Winsford District Council.

But Dennis was posted to Burma with the Fleet Air Arms in 1943, meaning it would be another four years until he finally got his girl.

But when he fell ill and was taken to the serviceman’s hospital in Llandudno to recuperate, Audrey visited him and he wasted no time in popping the question.

Dennis, 85, said: “There must have been an attraction straight away because I got sent away for four years and we got together as soon as I got back.

Audrey joked: “I thought I had married a rich farmer but it didn’t turn out that way.”

They married at St Chad’s Church on March 18, 1950 and neither rations or the weather could do anything to dampen their day.

Audrey, 83, said: “We made do with what we could get. A lady used to come round and sell her clothes coupons to help her live with her family, I think she had a lot of children.

“You weren’t supposed to do it but everyone had to find a way to manage and that’s what we did.

“The day of out wedding was dull, cold and miserable. The photographer had to put his keys on the train to stop it from blowing away. It didn’t spoil it though.”

Audrey moved into Dennis’s family home at Dairy House Farm, next to Winsford Flashes, where their first son Paul was born, followed by David three years later.

Their boys married and gave them four grandchildren and two great-granddaughters and it is the future of their loved ones that worries them most.

Dennis said: “Our biggest worry is knowing what’s happened over the last 50 years, and what will happen over the next 50, what will happen to our grandchildren.

“A lot has happened and not all of it good.”

Asked what they thought the key to a lasting marriage is, Dennis said: “It’s about love, honour and obey. The first two are alright but it’s who does the obeying that’s the question.”

Audrey added: “We don’t have many differences of opinion now, we’ve mellowed a lot. We feel very fortunate that we have still got each other and we have had 60 years together. So many people are left on their own. We have had a good life together.

“And we couldn’t have managed without our family, they help us with everything.”