A PAIR of wartime sweethearts celebrated their platinum wedding anniversary.

Albert and Brenda Matthews toasted 70 years of marriage after meeting at a friend’s party in Brighton in 1941.

Mr Matthews, a 93-year-old known to his friends as Joe, and Mrs Matthews, 96, marked the occasion with their triplet children Shirley, of Golden Cross, Sandra, of Woodingdean, and Trevor, who lives in Yorkshire, their four grandchildren, two great-grandchildren and other relatives on Saturday.

Shortly after meeting each other Mr Matthews joined the Royal Navy as a petty officer for radar and was posted to the Mediterranean. Mrs Matthews joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force and was stationed in Harrogate.

They did not see each other for three years but wrote to each other constantly. Once back in the city Mrs Matthews helped at the then Metropole Hotel – where several hundreds of soldiers were stationed during the war – and was in charge of the officers’ mess for repatriated prisoners of war.

The couple married in 1945 at St Martin’s Church, Lewes Road, Brighton before Mr Matthews took up work as a tailor and Mrs Matthews worked in a bakery.

They lived in Kemp Town and Moulsecoomb before settling in Westdene for 47 years. Mr Matthews still lives in their home but Mrs Matthews has moved to the Oaklands Nursing Home in Hove.

Mr Matthews said: “It was lovely to celebrate with all the family together and we were thrilled to get a card from the Queen. You don’t get anything in this world without working hard for it so we think the key to a long, happy marriage is give and take.”