One of the pleasures of writing these columns is that readers call to make corrections or to add information to the stories. In future, I intend to publish some of your remarks, if passing my censorship, as a postscript called "Heritage Recollections".

This week, Ann Frith Cartwright DeCouto rang to tell me of Joseph J. Ray, RNVR, who also made the horrendous Murmansk Run to north Russia in the Second World War, the subject of my article published on August 29.

Described as "Bermuda's prettiest boxer", that is, for pugilist style, not necessarily looks, Joe Ray was a member of the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps and a considerable Bermudian character.

He was in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve as an Ordinary Seaman and in that capacity served on a warship protecting the convoys around the North Cape to Murmansk, apparently making a number of such voyages in circumstances of considerable danger from the weather and German U-boats and planes.

A second call came from Cyril Dowling, the grandson of Joseph (Cuba Kid) Stovell, who was born about 1900. In order to serve in World War One, Stovell lied about his age, as many young men did. He became a fireman, that is a stoker of the engine boilers, and remained in the merchant navy until after the Second World War.

He made a number of runs to Murmansk and was twice torpedoed but rescued and transferred to another Liberty or cargo vessel of the convoys to north Russia. Joseph related stories to Cyril of the iced-up vessels, some in danger of capsizing due to weight of ice, and that the crew had a mug of rum each day to help with the cold.

He also said that the engine room where he worked was the most dangerous area, as it was generally the target for German U-boat torpedoes. Bermudians of the First Caribbean Regiment related to his family last seeing Joseph Stovell in a bar in Malta in 1945, when the Regiment was en route to Egypt.

Coming into the bar, "Porky" Ming heard a Bermudian voice say: "Set them up", and it proved to be Stovell. "Cuba Kid" looked at Ming and said: "What took you so long? I've been here (in the war) since 1939."

In 1947, at the AME church in St. George's, a memorial service was held for Stovell, presumed missing in the war, and Howard Sinclair Burgess, another Bermudian merchant seaman, who was lost to a torpedo of the U-110.

A couple of weeks later, Joseph Stovell walked into his home, having taken more than two years to get home after the war by working and hopping ships from the Mediterranean westward.

If anyone has any further information on Joe Ray or "Cuba Kid" Stovell, we would be pleased to add it to the database on Bermuda's military personnel at the Maritime Museum: give me a call or write a note.