Husband, wife die hours apart after 71 years of marriage

Herbert and Marilyn Frances DeLaigle were inseparable through 71 years of marriage, and the only thing that separated them in death was a mere 12 hours.

Herbert died at 2:20 a.m. last Friday in Waynesboro, Ga., followed later by Frances, who passed away at 2:20 p.m.

Herbert was 94 and Frances was 88, according to their obituaries.

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Their love story began at a little a cafe in Waynesboro, according to local TV station WRDW. Frances was a 16-year-old working at the cafe and Herbert was a lovestruck 22-year-old who couldn’t take his eyes off of her.

“I kept seeing her going in and out, in and out and I had my eyes set on her,” Herbert told the station last year for a profile story on their 70th anniversary. “I finally got up the nerve to ask her if she would go out with me sometime.”

They caught a movie together and fell in love. Herbert asked her to marry him a year.

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Herbert was a veteran of the Second World War, and he later fought in Korea and Vietnam over 22 years in the U.S. Army. Frances joined him for a six-year tour of duty in Germany after their wedding, and they moved around the U.S. a lot to follow his work.

Herbert eventually retired as a master sergeant and became a security guard in his later years.

“He worked alongside his wife at Marilyn’s Nursery,” Herbert’s obituary says. “He enjoyed fishing, carpentry and raising a variety of farm animals.”

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The couple had six children together, according to their obituaries. They later had sixteen grandchildren, 25 great-grandchildren and three great-great grandchildren.

They were buried together at a funeral on Monday.

“He was always loving and patient and good-hearted,” Frances said last year.

“I never would have dreamed that we would’ve got this far, and I hope we got a few more years on that,” Herbert added at the time.

The couple ultimately got one more year before passing away on Friday.

“It’s amazing how they were together for 71 years and now they are together in heaven,” the Delaigle family told WRDW in a statement. “What an amazing love story that is.”