Diamond wedding: Colin and Maureen Jacobs

The Gosport couple married in 1956 and after making many happy memories together and with their family, they now celebrate 60 years of marriage.

Eighty-year-old Maureen says: ‘We always knew of each other before we met because we didn’t live far from each other as children.

‘We saw each other at a beetle drive and said hello. We’d both been dragged there by our mothers.

‘Then one Saturday I was on a bus and I saw Colin walking downtown – I smiled at him.

‘He mouthed at me to get off so I did, and that’s where it all began.’

The couple started courting and kept in contact while 81-year-old Colin, a former Gosport councillor and school governor, went off to do his national service for two years.

‘I hadn’t had a lot of girlfriends because I seemed to repel them,’ Colin laughs.

‘But I was instantly attracted to Maureen. There was something special about her and I thought, “ah, this is the one for me”.’

The pair married at St Mary’s Catholic Church two years after they got engaged and went on to have two children, Philip, 53, and Graham, 48. They also have four grandchildren.

After the wedding Colin became a civil servant and Maureen went back to work as a shorthand typer’s secretary.

Maureen adds: ‘We had a good, active social life because when we lived at Elson there were lots of families the same age as us.

‘The kids were always out playing and we had a gang of friends that we’ve still got now.’

As well as socialising the couple have done their fair share of travelling. They’ve taken trips to lots of different places, including family favourite Jersey, and have been on many cruises.

‘For our ruby wedding Colin took me to Singapore and that was lovely,’ says Maureen.

‘So were our trips to Venice and Dubai. We’ve been very lucky.’

Colin and Maureen celebrated their anniversary at the Court Barn Conservative Club with 40 of their friends and family members.

Maureen adds: ‘We had a lovely time, our loved ones did the whole thing for us.

‘We feel very lucky to be reaching 60 years together.

‘What made me want to marry Colin? He had a good sense of humour, he was very generous and very loving, and he still is.’

But Colin says he can’t put his finger on why it was he wanted to marry Maureen.

‘You don’t go looking for a partner aged 16 or 17, it just happens – and when it does something clicks and you just know. I had to hang on to Maureen or else someone else would have grabbed her.’