A DEVOTED couple who found that absence makes the heart grow fonder in their early days together, have since stuck by each other's side for 60 years of marriage.

Rosemarie and Keith Holmes married on March 14, 1964, at St Blasius Church in Shanklin.

As a child, Rosemarie lived in Australia for five years, but when her family returned to the UK, they just happened to move into the flat above John Baileys, where Keith worked.

Rosemary subsequently got a job there too and the pair got to know each other.

After Keith returned from national service he got his old job back and he and Rosemarie became a couple. He said: "Absence truly does make the heart grow fonder. On our wedding day, as I turned to see Rosemarie being led down the aisle and to meet me at the altar, her radiant beauty just took my breath away."

A wedding reception was held at The Channel View Hotel in Shanklin and a honeymoon taken in Jersey.

The couple moved into a new bungalow and son Andrew was born that same year. They lived in their bungalow until 2019, but an operation on Keith's neck left him paralysed on his right side, and he was unable to return home.

The plan was to get him walking again, but unfortunately it wasn’t to be.

In May, 2019, he moved into Inglefield Nursing Home in Totland, and Rosemarie visited two to three times a week, until one morning in 2021, Andrew visited her at home and found that she had suffered a stroke.

Since then, the couple have lived together at Inglefield.

Keith told us the secret to a happy marriage.

He said: "If you have a disagreement between you, don’t stand and argue, take time away to calm down and think and then things will be easier to talk through.

"Oh and never, ever go to bed on an argument!"