Jake and Mary Jacobs celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary last year, marking a beautiful journey filled with both love and hardship.
“When I told my father I was marrying Jake, he warned me, ‘If you marry that man, you’ll never set foot in this house again.’”
Jake and Mary met during the war when Jake returned from Vietnam. They both attended the same technical college—Mary was taking typing and shorthand classes while Jake trained with the Air Force.
Mary, living in Lancashire at the time, started a conversation with Jake, who won her over with his impressive knowledge of Shakespeare.
Invited to a picnic by Jake and his friend, Mary and her friend encountered trouble. A lady saw them conversing with black men and reported it to Mary’s father, who was furious and forbade her from seeing Jake again.
Despite this, Jake and Mary kept in touch while Jake was back in Trinidad. He returned to the UK a few years later to find better job opportunities.
When Jake proposed, Mary was 19 years old and agreed. However, her family did not support the union and kicked her out of the house.
“I left with just a small suitcase. In 1948, no family came to witness our marriage at the registry office.”
Mary’s father was horrified by her choice, and she soon discovered that society shared his prejudice.
“Living in Birmingham in our early years was horrendous—I was terrified and hardly ate. We couldn’t find a place to live because no one would rent to a black man, and we had no money.”
Everyday life was a challenge, even a walk down the street together drew stares and contempt from strangers.
Mary became pregnant, bringing hope and joy, but tragically gave birth to a stillborn child at eight months. “Though the stress wasn’t the cause, it broke my heart, and we never had more children,” she shared.
Life gradually improved as Mary worked her way up to an assistant principal at a British school, and Jake found stable employment with the Post Office. They made new friends, but Mary still felt the need to mention Jake’s race before introducing him.
“When my father passed away when I was 30, although we had reconnected, he never accepted Jake,” Mary reflected sadly.
Today, Mary, 84, and Jake, 89, live in Solihull, just south of Birmingham, and have recently celebrated their milestone 70th wedding anniversary.
Jake has no regrets but notes that many young black people today don’t understand the difficulties he faced in the 1940s.
“I dealt with daily abuse when I first arrived in the UK. A man once rubbed my neck on a bus saying he wanted to see if the dirt would come off,” Jake recalled.
