A Polish man who came to Essex after liberating his wife from a Nazi concentration camp died just four days after she did telling his family he could not live without her.

Adam Krzykowski, 88, saw his wife Jadweiga die from stomach cancer last Wednesday. She was 73.

He had spent years caring for her, along with other members of their large family.

Devoted - Adam and Jadweiga Krzykowski

However, Adam, who was disabled himself, could not bear to live without the love of his life. He died on Saturday evening.

On Friday he told his daughter Margaret, who was going to pay her respects to her mother: "Tell her to come and get me. I don't want to be here. I want to be with her."

Jadweiga had developed a severe fear of doctors after being held in a German prisoner of war camp during the Second World War, and did not know how serious her illness really was. It is thought the cancer had spread from her stomach to her lungs and liver.

Despite Adam's disabilities, his death came as a tragic shock.

He fought as a Polish soldier in the Second World War, freed thousands from the German concentration camps, and fell in love upon meeting Jadweiga.

The couple married in Italy, where Adam was stationed, before moving to England.

They worked in the Coggeshall and Kelvedon areas as refugees, before moving to Colchester and then Skitts Hill, Braintree.

They leave four children, Kazia, Ewa, Peter and Margare, as well as 13 grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.

One grandchild, Joanne Eves, 30, who lives in Boreham, said: "It has hit the whole family very hard. We knew that my nan was ill but then to lose my grandad as well was an awful blow."

"They were very close and completely devoted. My grandad could not live without my nan and he told my mum that.

"She went to pay her respects on Friday night and he told my mum to ask my nan to come and get him."

The couple were buried together, alongside their late granddaughter Samantha, at London Road Cemetery in Braintree.

Published Thursday, March 7, 2002