Young bride from West Wittering died from bowel cancer just weeks after her wedding day

Angus and Victoria Hall-Hulme first met after they recognised each other from a brief ‘swipe right’ moment on a dating site.

Until then, both had been unlucky in love and had almost given up on finding ‘the one’. Mr Hall-Hulme had even begun developing a new type of dating app.

NOW READ: Slimming World: Gosport mum loses three stone after beating breast cancer and is now a Consultant

But one day in late 2020, while walking through Hyde Park in London, their eyes met.

The couple did not speak to each other but, later, Mrs Hall-Hulme, of West Wittering, contacted Mr Hall-Hulme and they went on a date.

They fell in love and enjoyed a blissful wedding in Chelsea on August 4 this year.

Just four weeks later, Mrs Hall-Hulme died. She was 33. Mrs Hall-Hulme, who had a first class degree from Cambridge and a career in venture capital, had been diagnosed with bowel cancer just a year earlier.

She had had no inkling anything was wrong until she suffered two weeks of abdominal cramps, a little weight loss and fatigue.

In between the couple’s meeting in Hyde Park and their wedding were months of pain and heartbreak, but also the joy of falling in love.

Speaking to the PA news agency earlier this year, Mrs Hall-Hulme said the diagnosis ‘was so terrifying’ that her initial reaction was to push her new boyfriend away.

‘Why would anyone want to go out with someone with cancer?’ she said.

‘But Angus kept coming back, and every time I pushed him away, we would find ourselves being drawn back. He was my new best friend and so supportive.’

Surgeons removed Mrs Hall-Hulme’s tumour and she began six months of chemotherapy, but the news kept getting worse.

In March this year, scans revealed the cancer had spread to her peritoneum (tissue lining the abdominal wall).

‘It totally turned my life upside down,’ she said. ‘All my plans for having children, starting an awesome new job, all the things we strive for when we assume a long life, were scuppered, just like that.’

The couple’s love shone through despite the tumour. Knowing her time was limited, Mrs Hall-Hulme organised a wedding in six weeks from her hospital bed.

One friend made her dress while others helped arrange the service at St Thomas More’s Catholic Church. Mrs Hall-Hulme said the wedding was ‘magical and an absolute miracle it happened at all’.

The bride’s health continued to deteriorate. She was moved to the family home in West Wittering, then to St Wilfred’s Hospice, Chichester, where she died surrounded by her family on September 2.

SEE ALSO: Waterlooville paramedic recognised in the News Year Honours for his fundraising efforts after being diagnosed with a brain tumour

Her family are supporting the Stand Up To Cancer campaign from Cancer Research UK and Channel 4 – building on Mrs Hall-Hulme’s fundraising efforts before she passed away.

Mr Hall-Hulme, 49, said: ‘Victoria was a beautiful, fit young woman with a boundless enthusiasm for life.

‘Cancer can affect anyone’s life, at any time, so we really have no choice other than to unite against it and help support scientists to keep making new discoveries.’