A Didcot nurse has died at the age of 96 following a short illness.

Bridget Minihan was in charge of the medical centre at the town's former fruit and vegetable canning factory Samor Pure Foods.

Born in the Rhondda Valley, South Wales, she went to London when she was 18 to train as a nurse at the Park Fever Hospital, Lewisham.

After two-and-a-half years, she returned to Wales where she met Jim, a coal miner who was to become her husband. They were married in 1935 and lived at Drayton when Mr Minihan was working at the MG car factory, Abingdon.

Mrs Minihan was employed in what was then the isolation hospital at Abingdon before moving to the Churchill Hospital, Oxford, as a sister nursing injured troops.

In 1954 the couple moved to Garth Road, Didcot, and Mrs Miniham took over the medical centre at the canning factory in Park Road until she retired in 1971.

Because the factory was involved with food processing, Mrs Minihan was required to undertake regular health checks on staff and during her 16 years at the plant she became well known to many hundreds of employees.

Mr Minihan died from cancer in 1963.

Mrs Minihan was a characteristically independent person who latterly lived alone and enjoyed travelling, particularly to Italy and Greece.

The funeral of Mrs Minihan, who died of pneumonia, took place at Oxford Crematorium on Thursday, March 21.