One of two Solomon Islanders who saved the life of John F Kennedy during the war in the Pacific died on Saturday at the age of 93. Eroni Kumana never forgot the man who would become US president and regarded him as his "honorary chief".
"Words can't really describe what a remarkable man he was," says local historian and dive school owner Danny Kennedy, an American now living in the Solomon Islands - and no relation to JFK.
"Every time we saw him, he was just the most animated, energetic little guy - bouncing around with all this energy, even at 93 years old. But I still don't think he ever realised what a brave guy he was."
Kumana's grandson, Rellysdom Malakana, says: "He did not feel like he was someone special. But people from overseas, people from America, they are the ones who told my grandfather that he was a special man - that he was the hero who rescued John F Kennedy."
In the early hours of 2 August 1943 several US Navy "patrol torpedo" boats were positioned off the coast of the Solomon Islands - then known as the British Solomon Islands Protectorate - not far from Papua New Guinea. Their mission was to intercept a convoy of Japanese ships that were regularly transporting soldiers further south to join the fight against US forces in the Pacific.
In command of one of them, PT-109, was Lt John F Kennedy - a 26-year-old from Massachusetts who had joined the navy two years earlier.
Kennedy aboard the PT-109 in the South Pacific, 1943
Kennedy's United 
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