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Thursday, July 10, 2008, 08:25
Lisa Hollingworth was on the back of fiance Barney Beddows' black Suzuki bike when they were involved in the fatal crash, near Cromford.
She escaped with minor injuries but Mr Beddows, 43, died minutes after they came off the A5012 Via Gellia Road and hurtled down an embankment on June 28.
He leaves a four-month-old daughter, Freya.
Ms Hollingworth does not know what caused the crash, which happened at about 2.40pm. The 37-year-old said: “I just had this feeling that we'd lost it. It was as if Barney had run out of road.
“We came off the road and I was rolling for ages. We landed in this patch of nettles and grass. I tried to move but I couldn't because I'd damaged my ribs.
“Barney just lay there. There were lots of people around us who had been driving by and stopped and I saw someone doing chest compressions on him.
“When the paramedics came they put a defibrillator machine on his heart and they were trying to block my view of him because they knew it would be upsetting.
“Then it all went quiet and I asked a paramedic if Barney was dead. He said 'yes' and lifted me into the ambulance.”
Miss Hollingworth managed to contact her family and, after a brief visit to Derbyshire Royal Infirmary, she returned to the home she shared with Mr Beddows in Nottingham Road, Giltbrook.
She said: “That was the worst, to go home to an empty house.
“The clothes he had taken off when he got dressed in his motorbike leathers were still lying in the bedroom.”
Mr Beddows was a keen motorcyclist and had ridden bikes since he was a teenager.
A telecommunications engineer, he served with the Second Royal Tank Regiment for 15 years until the mid-1990s.
Two years ago, he met Miss Hollingworth at a gym and they were engaged on her birthday, October 5, last year.
She said: “I don't understand why he died. It's awful, it's absolutely awful. I feel completely numb about it.
“I'd never met anybody like him, he was really gentle and kind and would put everybody before himself. So many people knew him.”
Police are keen to trace the rider of a red motorbike who may have witnessed the crash.
Anyone with information should call PC Pete Matthewman on 01773 572929 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.
NEW FATHER: Barney Beddows with his daughter, Freya. Left, fiancee Lisa Hollingworth. Above right and below, pictures of Mr Beddows and Ms Hollingworth, who became engaged last year.
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