A CAERPHILLY county borough war hero, who received a prestigious Arctic Star medal in 2013 for his services to the Armed Forces in the Arctic convoys to North Russia, has also been honoured by the Russian Embassy.

Jim Winfield, who is 93 and originally from Pontllanfraith, was presented with the Russian military Ushakov medal for Arctic convoy veterans earlier this month.

In October last year, Mr Winfield received a letter from the Russian Ambassador to the UK, Dr A Yakovenko, to notify him that he was to be awarded the Ushakov medal for his services during the Arctic convoys to North Russia during the Second World War.

In the letter, Mr Yakovenko said: “It is a huge privilege for me to thank you for the invaluable contribution you and your comrades-in-arms made… What you did 70 years ago, taking part in what Sir Winston Churchill rightly called the worst journey in the world, was extraordinary even among what is considered to be beyond the call of duty."

Mr Winfield’s daughter travelled to London to collect the medal from the Russian Embassy, and it was presented to him by Lord Don Touhig at the Castle View Residential Home in the presence of his family, friends and staff at Castle View.

He said he was very proud to accept the medal, and that "what they had accomplished had not been forgotten about all these years later”.

Mr Winfield, currently a resident at the Castle View Residential Home in Caerphilly, was also awarded the Arctic Star medal in November 2013, which is presented to former Armed Services personnel who served in the Arctic Circle during the Second World War.

He married his wife in 1948 and they lived in the same house in Pontllanfraith until she passed away, and he became a resident at Castle View Residential Home in 2013.

More than 3,000 sea men lost their lives on the Russian convoys in a 1,500 to 2,000-mile journey across the North and Barents Seas, one of the deadliest convoy routes during the war.