UK’s oldest lottery winner dies aged 92 just five years after huge £18m jackpot
Dennis Banfield became Britain's oldest lottery winner when he won a whopping £18,139,352 in 2018.
Britain's oldest lottery winner, Dennis Banfield, has died age 92, just five years after winning a huge jackpot of £18million.
The former RAF serviceman hit the jackpot with wife Shirley, 87, in 2018. Shirley was married to Dennis for over 60 years and said he felt he’d had a “good life.”
She said: "He was so well liked but he's gone now,” reports The Sun.
"He said when he was going, 'I've had a good life, I've done a lot and I've seen a lot and I'm ready to go now'.
"We had a lot of tributes when he died."
The pair shared their winnings with their two daughters - daughters Karen, 57, and Tina, 60.
They continued to live in their three-bedroom semi in Winterbourne, Bristol, after the win.
The couple were moved to tears at a press conference when they were presented with the cheque for £18,139,352.
But it was nothing fancy to celebrate their humongous win - as they went for a meal at a carvery.
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He was 87 when he won the life-changing amount and revealed at the time that his wife had urged him to stop buying tickets – because they never won anything.
But Dennis kept on having a go and joked that it was “only a matter of time” before he and Shirley, who was 83 at the time, won their fortune.
Their dream was to make their grown-up children “financially secure forever”. That wish finally came true with the single £2 Lucky Dip line.
Shirley, a former local government officer and shop assistant, said the jackpot had been a “complete and utter shock” but that she had always wanted to win for the children.
She added that she and Dennis might replace their three-door Nissan Micra with something a little roomier but “not a Ferrari or a Maserati”.
Dennis, who spent 40 years working for the South West Electricity Board, passed “peacefully” away in July last year.
His granddaughter Lucy Probert, 30, posted online: "Missing you more as everyday passes. We love you Grandad."