In 1901, Augustus Frank David, 33, and Angelique Avery, 32, were united in marriage. Their union would be eternal. Despite promising “to love and cherish until death do us part,” they would not be separated by death.

Both natives of Nova Scotia, Canada, they had arrived in America as young adults – Augustus having come into Gloucester, MA, aboard a fishing boat in the summer of 1889. After their marriage, the couple first settled in Providence and then in Warwick. They never had children, and both worked a variety of jobs to support their household. Augustus was employed as a molder for a silversmith while his wife – whom he called “Jennie” – toiled in a variety store and a jewelry story. He later worked in an optician’s office as a wire drawer, operating the machinery used to make, adjust and repair wire-framed eyeglasses. Jennie worked in a jewelry shop. After learning that the airport at Hillsgrove was to be extended onto the land where they resided, the couple relocated to another area of Warwick, moving into a home on Searle Street.

Early on the morning of May 31, 1951, 83-year-old Augustus fell gravely ill. Jennie called an ambulance. As per Roman Catholic tradition, she also called a clergyman. Reverend Francis Vincent Delellis, a graduate of Our Lady of Providence Seminary, he had been ordained into the priesthood only two years earlier. The 27-year-old, now acting as assistant pastor at St. Rita’s Church in Oakland Beach, answered Jennie’s call to Searle Street.

Reverend Delellis stood beside Augustus’s bed and opened a book of selected readings from Scripture. He began to give the elderly man his final prayers and ministrations – known as the last rites. In the Catholic religion, these sacraments are meant to spiritually prepare someone for death while offering them comfort and forgiveness of sins.

As Jennie stood nearby, the knowledge that her husband was about to leave her and the scene of that exit was too much to bear. She suddenly dropped to the floor. Jennie’s existence was over before the Bayside ambulance arrived to transport Augustus to Kent County Hospital. There, he was put into an oxygen tent to help extend his life. Later that morning, he died. A double funeral took place a few days later at Peter Barrett Funeral Home in Warwick. The two caskets were then carried to St. Rita’s Church so that family and friends might say their final goodbyes. The Davids left but a single relative here in America.

Although it’s rare, it is physically possible for an individual to die of a broken heart. The condition, known as Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, is a sudden weakening of the heart due to one’s response to a traumatic event or intense emotional stress. Without immediate medical attention, it can lead to fatal heart failure.

The marital bond of the Davids was not only a lifelong commitment, but a union which surpassed death. Their caskets were laid together in the hallowed ground of Saint Ann Cemetery in Cranston, a testament to eternal love.