SIXTY years after his death, the grave of a Merchant Navy seaman has been tracked down and a Commonwealth War Graves Commission headstone erected.

Nineteen-year-old Havelock George Hipwell, the brother of retired nurse, Patricia Fenton from Newland, near Malvern, and uncle of Julie Allsopp, landlady of Link Top's Vaults, was killed after his ship was torpedoed near Newfoundland, Canada, during the Second World War.

His family were not given details of the whereabouts of his burial.

Earlier in 1942, Havelock's father Frederick, aged 42, had also been killed while on a flying mission over Germany.

Although his family believed he was ground-based, in May, 1942, he was the flight engineer aboard a 78 Squadron Halifax bomber which was lost while bombing Hamburg.

Enlisting the help of Dickie Valentine, the Worcester-based vice-chairman of the Merchant Navy Association, Mrs Allsopp began the search, two years ago, for more details about the deaths.

Initial enquiries by historian Peter Sharpe found that because Merchant Navy deaths were not classified as being "due to war causes", enquiries to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission proved fruitless.

The eldest child of five, Havelock signed up with the Merchant Navy in 1939.

After his first ship, the SS Beatus, was torpedoed, Havelock joined the SS Campus on November 11, 1940 and his 1942 diary charts the ship's journey from London to Newcastle and then across the North Atlantic.

The ship was attacked leaving Newfoundlandand and the critically burned apprentice died the following morning.

Mrs Fenton remembers Havelock as being a popular, handsome fair-haired man who would return for visits with gifts of perfume and trinkets.

"He was very much loved," she said.

Mrs Fenton was asked to write an epitaph for Havelock's new headstone.

"I composed something for my mother. She wore his Merchant Navy badge until her death. This means a lot."

She also said she hoped soon to make the pilgrimage to Havelock's grave in Newfoundland.

On Sunday, she will wear his medals to lay a wreath during a remembrance service at Tewkesbury Abbey.