New Year’s Day has been a momentous occasion for one Ilford resident as it marked her 100th birthday.

Ilford Recorder: Rose Lowe with Margaret McInerney, left, Sukhvir Hundal, right, and Sharan Kaur, of Eastwood Lodge care home, Goodmayes, celebrates her 100th birthday on New Years Day.Rose Lowe with Margaret McInerney, left, Sukhvir Hundal, right, and Sharan Kaur, of Eastwood Lodge care home, Goodmayes, celebrates her 100th birthday on New Years Day. (Image: Archant)

Rose Lowe celebrated her landmark telegram from The Queen at Eastwood Lodge care home where they threw a party attended by her four grandchildren as well as staff and residents.

Her four great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild also celebrated from afar.

The centenarian was born on January 1, 1914, growing up in Islington and surviving two world wars.

In World War Two she saved her older sister Esther’s life by convincing emergency teams that she was still buried alive after a German bomb landed on their house.

Her great-granddaughter, Leeann Cox, 39, of Harold Hill, said: “Esther was buried under the rubble but no-one would believe her.

“She kept on saying: ‘My sister’s under there!’ Then everyone started uncovering the rubble and they pulled her out alive.”

Mrs Lowe sadly surpasses her two daughters, Maureen and Anne, as well as her husband Leonard who died forty years ago.

“Her and her sisters all lost their husbands quite young,” said Miss Cox. “So they were all off gallivanting around, gambling on the horses, bingo and going on coastal holidays.

“She had a fantastic life.

“A sherry a day keeps the doctor away is her secret to life.

“It’s unbelievable what she’s been through. She’s still with it. I can’t believe she’s 100.”

Mrs Lowe worked most of her life as a civil servant for Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise and was one of the first residents in the Peabody estate by the Barbican.

A photo of her on her balcony reveals the Barbican’s towers being built.

At the birthday celebrations the Newbury Variety Group entertained the care home with songs and dances.