Fifty years ago, Lydia and Bernard Richards were considered a fairly radical couple.

They were disowned by some of their family who disapproved of their mixed race relationship and say they had people shouting at them on the street.

But the West Bromwich pair are now celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary and are thrilled to prove people wrong. “We’ve always been very close, I think part of that is because we had such a hard time at the beginning,” said Lydia, a former cleaner at Sandwell Hospital.

“We were together for a year before I told my mum and when I did she went mad, it just wasn’t done back then.

“Then Bernard came round for tea and she fell in love with him, she saw him for the person he was instead of his colour. We lived with her for a year after we got married because we couldn’t afford a house.”

She added: “People in the street would call me a prostitute or an old bag, I was spat at, all of my mum’s side of the family wouldn’t speak to me and the neighbours turned away when they saw us. I just thought they were ignorant.”

Bernard made his way to England from Jamaica in 1956 when he was just 19. He made the journey with his brother Carlton and sister Bella to find a better life.

They had all worked on their father’s sugar beet farm and found factory life in England a shock to the system.

Lydia said: “When he got off the ship he saw all the houses with chimneys and he had never seen that before, he thought a fire inside a house was really strange and he just assumed they were all factories.”

Bernard lived in Handsworth and Leeds before settling in Tipton and finding work at the Vinspar factory in Spon Lane.

“At first it was very rough, people shouted all kinds of things,” he said.

“When I got with Lydia we were given a lot of grief but after a few years I started to get some respect.”

He added: “I tell my children about it sometimes, so they understand what we went through. Thankfully things have moved on.”

Retired welder Bernard, aged 72, met Lydia, now 69, at the Zako Chico Cafe in St Michael Street, where they say “all the youngsters used to hang out”.

They got married at the old West Bromwich register office, which is now home to the town’s Citizens Advice Bureau, and then went straight home because they could not afford a reception. Their whole wedding cost just £9. They have three children, Tracey Piper, 45, who now lives in Florida, Anthony Richards, 43, and Paul Richards, 41, who both live in West Bromwich. Paul has three children, Luke, aged 20, Ryan, 18, and Simone, 13.

Their golden wedding anniversary took place on August 2 and the couple, from Essex Avenue, Hateley Heath, have spent the last few weeks since holidaying in Canada, where Bernard’s brother Carlton lives. “They hadn’t seen each other for 30 years so it was a really special way to celebrate,” said Lydia.