A former landlady has paid tribute to her ‘angel’ of a husband, former Rishton landlord Ian Walsh, who died last week after losing his fight with cancer.

Ian, 54, who used to run the Roebuck Inn on the High Street with his then partner, Glenda, 48, was diagnosed with an incurable brain tumour in January, and the couple married at the Royal Blackburn Hospital, where he was receiving treatment, on April 29 this year.

The former Liverpool firefighter of thirty years, who lived with Glenda and her daughter, Toni, in Commercial Street, Rishton, first met his sweetheart nine years ago singing karaoke at Rishton Legion Club.

Glenda said: “We knew each other for months and then the night I sang Gabrielle’s ‘When A Woman Wants Her Man’, we just got together.”

“He was a one-off, so popular with a great sense of humour, everyone was just drawn to him. He was so caring and had time for everyone, he was an angel.”

The lifelong Liverpool FC fan also loved cars.

Glenda said: “Before he died he asked me when my son Richie, 21, was coming home and the last thing he said to me was that he was going to take him for a drive, which of course he couldn’t have done. I went home from where we were staying at his sister’s house to get some clean clothes and he blew me two kisses before I left. Then when I got back he was gone.”

Describing their wedding day as ‘bittersweet’ she said: “When you marry someone you expect it to be for life but at least we finally did it after nine years together.”

The couple were joined at the wedding ceremony by family and friends, one of whom, Michelle Youds, prompted a laugh by fashioning wedding hats from bedpans and sick bowls.

The father-of-three leaves behind three children, Lee, 27, Scott, 23 and Katie, 20 and four step-children, Danielle, 31, Chauntelle, 25, Richie, 21 and Toni, 20.

The funeral will take place on Friday, September 4 with mourners asked to gather at the Roebuck, on the High Street, at 11.30am for a minute’s silence.

The funeral cortege will then proceed to Accrington Crematorium for a service at 12.20pm.

Family flowers only are requested, with others asked to make donations to East Lancashire Hospice. Ian’s family have also asked people not to wear funeral clothes but to dress ‘as if for a night out’ and to take red balloons.