Harold Terens met Jeanne Swerlin in 2021
Caen, France:
Hundred-year-old World War II veteran Harold Terens will marry his 96-year-old bride on Saturday in the French city of Carentan-les-Marais, just days after being honored on the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. a few kilometers away.
Terens’ wedding to Jeanne Swerlin on Saturday will be followed by a celebration “with loved ones, in a small group,” said Sarah Pasquier, the city’s representative for D-Day celebrations.
“We are very honored that Mr. Terens chose to get married here, in Carentan, where in June 1944 the meeting of the Allied landing troops on Utah and Omaha beaches took place,” Mayor Jean-Pierre Lhonneur told AFP.
“We will offer you champagne, of course, but also a gift to thank you for taking part in the liberation of France.”
After the ceremony, “depending on possible fatigue,” Terens may participate in a veterans parade in the center of Carentan in the afternoon, according to Pasquier.
A liberation ball will also be held in the evening as part of the D-Day celebrations, she said, with attendees “invited to dress in a 1940s theme and soldiers from the nearby American base are welcome.”
“But Mr. Terens and his wife may be too tired to participate,” she added.
Terens, who lives with Swerlin in Boca Raton, Florida, was awarded the French Legion of Honor by President Emmanuel Macron in 2019.
After the war, Terens married his first wife, Thelma, with whom he spent 70 years and raised three children until her death in 2018.
In 2021, a friend introduced him to Swerlin, a charismatic woman who was also a widow, and the two have been inseparable practically ever since.
“She lights up my life, makes everything beautiful,” Terens told AFP in an interview last month in Florida. “She makes life worth living.”
In the same interview, Swerlin said her fiancé was “an unbelievable guy.” “He’s handsome – and a good kisser.”
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