ONE of Gwent’s oldest residents has passed away, aged 106.
Great-great-grandmother Violet Lawrence was born in June 1908 and moved to Newport from Pontnewydd to live with her husband William on Chepstow Road. He was a police sergeant in the Newport borough police and died in the 1980s.
Mrs Lawrence was the oldest member of the Gwent Police Pensioners Association and a mother of three. She passed away at the Eleanor Hodson House nursing home in Caerleon on August 24.
She had remained a keen bingo player and knitter at the nursing home and was playing netball well into her second century.
Her grandson, Jason Way, said: “It is sad but at the end of the day we have got to remember she was a very happy person, had lots of heritage and lots of people who she knew over her life.
“She was quite a celebrity because she’d outlived all the people at the home. She had all her facilities and she was still as sharp as a button. She had special genes; she had the longevity gene.”
She had lived in the home since 1997 and her daughter Mary said: “She had a wonderful life. She enjoyed every moment.
“I did her hair and woe betide me if I was a day late. She always wore matching outfits, right up until the day before she died.”
Mrs Lawrence’s funeral will be held at Cwmbran Crematorium on Friday at 2.30pm.
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