LADY Evelyn Hilary Deedes, wife of former Ashford MP and Fleet Street editor Bill Deedes, has died after a long battle with cancer. She was 88.

The couple were married for 61 years. Lady Deedes died in the Ashford Pilgrims Hospice.

The couple married in 1942 and just after the war bought New Hayters, a large Victorian farmhouse at Aldington overlooking Romney Marsh.

They had three daughters and two sons. The youngest son died while working as a Kent Messenger Group reporter.

After a private cremation, a service will be held at St Martin's Church, Aldington, near Ashford, on Thursday, May 13, at 2pm. The family has requested no flowers but donations, if desired, can be made to Ashford Pilgrims Hospice.

Bill Deedes, also a one-time Government Minister, is still at 91, a globe trotting reporter.

His wife made her own indelible mark through her passion for country pursuits. Horses were her first love but she was also a keen breeder of Jersey cattle, Jacob and other sheep, and poultry.

She was a familiar and formidable figure showing her prize stock at county shows across southern England. In her younger days she hunted enthusiastically both in the North and with the East Kent, and rode at point-to-point meetings.

As Hilary Branfoot she was the daughter of a Northumberland shipping family. Her parents both played tennis in the Scottish championships and her father competed at Wimbledon.