Sir Tom Jones has extended a heartfelt thanks to his fans following the death of his wife of 59 years. The Welsh singer has been in mourning ever since Lady Melinda Rose Woodward passed away after a short but fierce battle with cancer, but this week a message was posted on Sir Tom's Twitter account on his behalf. "A heartfelt Thank You to all who sent notes of their sympathy and support to me and my family over the last couple of weeks," it read. "So many beautiful and meaningful things were said and reading these genuine and lovely messages has lifted us all. See you soon."
Sir Tom has thanked fans for their support following his wife's death
Sir Tom and Linda, both from Pontypridd, fell in love and married at the age of 16, and had one son together, Mark, who is also the singer's manager.The couple had a complex marriage, with Sir Tom admitting he had been unfaithful on a number of occasions. Furthermore, in recent years, Linda had suffered a number of health setbacks, including cancer and depression, and became increasingly reclusive to the point she was housebound in their LA home. But she remained the love of his life.
A personal message from the star was shared on Twitter
In October last year, the 75-year-old singer opened up about his marriage during an interview with Jonathan Ross."[The affairs were] never discussed, I was never put on the spot," Sir Tom said. "Linda is a wonderful person and she would never put me on the spot. She loves being married to me and I love being married to her. "The star also spoke about how his wife inspires him. Discussing his single Take My Love, he sweetly said: "It reminds me of the time when my wife and myself when we were teenagers, we used to go dancing a lit in the dance halls in South Wales so that's the sort of stuff we would jive to and we still have a jive now.
Sir Tom and Linda were married for 59 years
"A lot of the songs that I do, the love songs that I do, of course it's Linda there and yes, she is the one," he added.
Sir Tom became emotional as he revealed that his wife has recently been quite ill. "I don't want to go on about it but she wasn't well a while ago and she got close to... we didn’t know whether she was going to make it or not and I said to Mark [my son] I said, 'If your mother doesn't make it, I don't know whether I can sing' because a lot of the songs that I do, I think of her when I do it so it would be hard if she wasn't there to be able to sing."