Geoff Smith, who served in the Royal Navy and survived the sinking of a warship, HMS Spartan during the January 1944 Anzio Landings, has died just days before he was due to travel to Italy.
Tens of thousands of Allied troops poured onto the beaches at Anzio, south of Rome, to challenge entrenched German forces. The five months of fighting that followed was described by some German soldiers as being as bad as the Eastern Front, with one of the coldest winters on record making conditions almost unbearable for both sides.
Due to travel to Italy tomorrow to commemorate the landings with other British veterans, Smith died last week just short of his 89th birthday.