An American veteran, 97 years old, and French woman, 92, that fell in love during World War II, have been reunited after 75 years, and if this is not proof that true love never dies, then we don’t know what is.
During the war, an American soldier fell in love with a local 18-year-old French girl when he was stationed in her hometown.
Today, 75 years on, KT Robbins once again came face to face with the woman who has occupied his mind for over half a century.
Robbins was only a 24-year-old soldier in the American army when he first laid eyes on Jeannine Ganaye, in the northeast town of Briey in 1944.
Robbins had needed someone to wash his clothes when Jeannine’s mother stepped in to help. It was not long before the couple fell in love, but two months later Robbins was forced to leave the village and make his way to the Eastern Front to fight against the Axis Powers.
When the war came to an end in 1945, Jeanine even began learning English, in the hopes he'd one day come back for her.
But instead, Robbins, enlisted in the 26th Infantry, First Division in 1940 and then volunteered to serve in a bakery battalion, returned to his native United States.
He there met his wife of 70 years, Lillian. The couple worked side by side in a hardware store in Mississippi for fifty years before she died aged 92 in 2015.
Jeannine also loved once again, and married in 1949 and had five kids.
Nevertheless, Robbins never forgot about his romance in France, keeping a black and white photograph of Jeannine tucked away for over 70 years.
He showed the very same photograph to a group of French journalists who were reporting on WW2 veterans in the US, telling them he would like to return to her village to ‘find her family’ while he was in France for the 75th anniversary of D-Day.
He assumed that Pierson had died, saying: ‘For sure I won’t ever get to see her.’
Sure enough, though, the journalists tracked down Jeannine at a retirement home in Montigny-lès-Metz, Moselle, approximately 27 miles from where the pair first met.
The emotional reunion was captured on camera as they gazed into each other’s eyes for the first time in 75 years.
‘I always loved you. You never got out of my heart,’ Robbins told his long-lost love.
When asked why he never came back for her, Robbins said: ‘You know, when you get married, after that you can’t do it anymore.’
After several hours together, Robbins had to head off to the anniversary celebrations in Normandy, but the widowed couple promised to meet again, sharing a tender kiss for the first time in 75 years.
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