Golden years for couple who share their life

By Sarah Robinson

Last updated 11:49, Friday, 10 October 2008

WHAT started out as a childhood friendship is still going strong almost 60 years later as a Whitehaven couple celebrate their golden wedding.

Friends for 56 years: Jim and Hilda Allinson have celebrated their special day

Jim and Hilda Allinson met when they were at school. Jim vowed he would marry her – and eight years later he did.

Hilda (née Cartmell), aged 11 at the time, was friends with Jim’s sister, Catheline.

Jim, 70, said: “ I was about 13-years-old and I was in the garden with my mum. I saw Hilda running down the road and I said to my mum: ‘I’m going to marry that girl!’. My mum said: ‘well you’d better run fast to get her!’”

Jim left Whitehaven to join the army. He was stationed in Carlisle and then moved to Preston. When he returned, the pair were reunited.

The couple got engaged in 1956 and married on October 4, 1958 at Christ Church on Preston Street in Whitehaven.

“My dad said I could get married when I was 19. I had my 19th birthday on the Thursday and got married on the Saturday.” said Hilda.

When they first married, the couple moved into two rooms in a house on Queen Street, Hilda was working at Marchon at the time as a packer and box sealer.

“I was working at Marchon and a fortnight after we got married, I got paid off,” she added.

Jim worked for a short time as a butcher, he also worked as a bus conductor and then at Sellafield.

“My favourite job was working on the buses because I met a lot of people from all over the place,” he said.

The couple moved to Meadow Road on Mirehouse and then Rutland Avenue, where they have lived for the last 38 years. They have three children, seven grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren and have also fostered children for around 22 years.

They celebrated their anniversary at the Whitehaven Miners Welfare Club on Coach Road with friends and family.

And the secret to their success? Jim said: “we just share and share alike.”