A FORMER Royal Navy coastal forces coxswain, and D-Day veteran, John 'Jack' Sowerby, has died aged 97.

Mr Sowerby died at Byrnhill Grove Residential Care Home in Ventnor, on June 5, while listening to the Queen's 75th anniversary D-Day speech.

He was a bricklayer by trade, with examples of his work found across the Island.

His decorations for military service during the Second World War included a Burma Star and the French Legion of Honour — awarded for taking part in the D-Day landings as coxswain of a gunboat.

Mr Sowerby met and married his wife, Freda, in September 1944, when the gunboat was based at Cowes.

They were married for 69 years and enjoyed ballroom and sequence dancing, before Freda died in 2013.