Oldest newlyweds tie the knot on Valentine’s Day

HE’S 93 and she’s 84 but yesterday they proved nobody is too old for romance and getting married.

It was love at first sight for James Mason and Peggy Clarke when they first met in a daycare centre at Torbay, Devon, in south-west Britain last November.

Both widowed, the pair married in a register office three weeks later and, yesterday, their union was blessed in a 20-minute ceremony on a sunny St Valentine’s Day in Killarney.

Yesterday the blushing bride said: “It’s wonderful and at this time of life it’s a miracle really.”

Recalling how she first met her husband, she said: “I looked at James, at that smile and that twinkle in his lovely blue eyes.”

Groom James said: “If people look they can find a little happiness. That’s what it all amounts to: a little happiness in the twilight years of your life.”

Rev Susan Watterson, priest in charge at St Mary’s Church of Ireland, Killarney, welcomed the happy couple — believed to be the world’s oldest newlyweds — and described it as a special occasion.

“Just getting to Killarney for today’s blessing has been quite an adventure for Peggy and James. Their wedding is an adventure and a fairytale and we’re delighted to be able to share it with them,” she said.

Gregarious Peggy, who lived in Ballyhar, Killarney, for about three years in the 1980s, turned out in a long, ivory-coloured wedding dress, a fur, short-sleeved jacket and tiara. James was in top hat and tails.

Unfortunately for James, a father-of-two, he was in a wheelchair as he twisted his ankle while stepping out of their camper van a week ago.

He purchased the camper van after selling his house and the honeymoon is being spent travelling through Ireland, Britain, Scotland and Wales.

Best man yesterday was Killarney mayor Niall O’Callaghan, who first met the couple only two days before.

As James is a former mayor of Torbay, he felt there was no better man for the job than Killarney’s first citizen.

Maid of honour was Peggy’s best friend, Andrea Wallis, from Torbay. Niall and Andrea celebrated afterwards with the couple in Killarney’s Royal Hotel.

Peggy, who has no children, told reporters she had been very lonely for many years after her husband’s death, and she had also suffered the death of her pet dog Lady.