Resident of Eastcotts Nursing Home, near Haverhill, who shared many chats with Queen Elizabeth II celebrates her 100th birthday

A great-grandmother with royal connections who for decades ran a bed & breakfast in Clare has celebrated joining the 100 club.

On Thursday, March 21, staff at Eastcotts Nursing Home, in Calford Green near Haverhill, joined relatives of Jean Tuffill in celebrating her 100th birthday.

Mrs Tuffill has lived at Eastcotts since September 2015 and now has advanced dementia,
but her life has been one that has seen her live on three different continents, serve in the British Army during the Second World War and share many a friendly chat with Queen Elizabeth II.

She also ran the Cobbles Bed & Breakfast, in Nethergate Street, in Clare, near Sudbury and Haverhill, for many years, first with her late husband Mike – who died in 1993 – and then with help from her son Alastair and daughter-in-law Woolfy, who continue to run it today.

Mrs Tuffill was visited by her son and his wife on Thursday, the day on which she also received a birthday message from King Charles and Queen Camilla.

Woolfy and Alastair said Mrs Tuffill loved to paint and ‘was a talented artist but missed out on art college due to the war’ and that she also ‘loved to dance and listen to classical music’.

Mrs Tuffill was born in India, where her parents worked, but spent part of her childhood at a boarding school near Tewkesbury, in Gloucestershire, before, aged 16, returning to India, where she married Mike in 1946.

They had a son, Alastair and a daughter, Diney, as well as two grandchildren Marko and Clarey, and five great-grandchildren.

Mrs Tuffill served in the British Army during the Second World War, as did her husband, who rose to the rank of colonel.

Mike went on to serve as a Queen’s Messenger, whose duty it is to hand-carry secret and important documents to British embassies, high commissions, and consulates around the world.

It led to her spending time with The Queen on many occasions, as Alastair said: “Mum used to get on well with the Queen and used to sit and chat with her because of dad’s job as a Queen’s Messenger.”

Jean has also lived in Africa and Germany and after returning to England with Mike they lived in Belchamp Walter for 20 years before she then moved to nearby Clare, where she lived for 30 years.