MARRIAGE has truly been a lifelong commitment for one Rogiet couple who celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary recently.

Glyn Howells, 91, and Lillian Howells, 88, married in St Mary’s Church, Monmouth on 29th September 1947.

70 years later they celebrated their partnership with more than 50 friends and family including their daughter Carole, three grand children and six great grandchildren.

While they have lived in Rogiet for the past 25 years, they spent the first 45 years of their marriage living in Catbrook, where Glyn is from.

They met in 1946 in Monmouth where Lillian was living and working at the Savoy Theatre.

Lillian, formally Bodenham, said: “I was an usherette at the Monmouth cinema, I was born in Monmouth, and Glyn was on leave from the Royal Air Force.

He saw me and followed me and came to the cinema and started chatting me up and that was it.”

Making it to 70 years together is not something the couple ever thought about but it is their love for each other that has got them this far.

Lillian said: “Who does think about that? (reaching their 70th anniversary) It’s just been one of those things, we’ve been fortunate and God’s been good

to us.

“Just being together and just being happy together has got us this far. Companionship and, well, that we just both love each other and that’s it, for 70 years it’s never been any different.”

Glyn said: “I never could have wanted a better wife.”

One of the activities which has kept their bond strong is sequence dancing.

Lillian said: “When Carole went into teacher training we needed to do something, and we wanted to do it together so we took up sequence dancing, we were doing that for 30-odd years.

“We danced locally, we also went away on holidays with them to different places.”

One of the couple’s many congratulations came in a card from Her Majesty The Queen, it was a different card to what most receive with the message mentioning they share the same anniversary year as the Queen and Prince Phillip.