Widow’s memorial to late husband

A Fife widow has spoken of her heartache after losing her husband to cancer just hours after the couple married.

Colin Wallace passed away after being married to Elaine by the chaplain at Edinburgh’s St Columba’s Hospice last Easter.

The 61-year-old had wanted to fulfil his engagement to the teacher from Dalgety Bay after the pair met at rehearsals for Edinburgh’s Easter Passion Play.

The couple were engaged on Valentine’s Day 2016. However Colin, an English teacher from Edinburgh, was told just a month later that he had only weeks to live.

Having complained of a bad back, doctors said that cancerous shadows on his lungs had spread, putting the couple’s wedding plans on hold.

“He was admitted to the Western for four weeks and his cancer had already been diagnosed,” says Elaine, 47.

“It spread quickly and he deteriorated a lot over the Easter weekend.

After being transferred to St Columba’s, Colin told Elaine that he wanted to marry her before he died. On April 27 last year, despite his ailing health, the couple were wed just hours before Colin passed away.

Almost a year on, the mother-of-three will take part in this year’s Passion Play in Princes Street gardens tomorrow.

She said: “I feel so proud to have his name and to carry on.”