The story of the Aberdeen major whose Pacific War heroics featured in Medal of Honor video game

To a certain generation of people, Martin Clemens will be a character in a video game who helped rescue American prisoners of war.

However, he was very much a real life figure and was born in Aberdeen before going on to lead an extraordinary life where he would be honoured for his incredible service.

Clemens was a district officer in the Solomon Islands and during his time in the Second World War, he helped the allied forces prepare for the resistance to the occupation of the Japanese.

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He served as a coastwatcher and was responsible for around 15,000 people. It was thanks to Clemens that the allies became aware of the Japanese's plans to build an airstrip on Guadalcanal.

He was born Warren Frederick Martin Clemens in April 1915 in the Granite City and excelled academically, receiving scholarships to Bedford School and Christ's College, Cambridge, where he studied agriculture and natural sciences from 1933 to 1937.

Clemens was dispatched to the British Solomon Islands Protectorate (BSIP) in 1938 after joining the Colonial Service one year prior to the outbreak of the war.

As the Pacific War emerged in 1941, Clemens volunteered for military service in the BSIP defence force where he was comissioned as a captain.

It was during this time that the Japanese had planned to cut off New Zealand and Australia's communications with the United States by building an airstrip on Guadalcanal.

The story is recalled on WikiTree: "When they began landing infantry, support troops and engineers to begin the airstrip, Martin reported such to the Allies by radio.

"He then established his radio station and coastwatching activities. After the Japanese occupied the island of Tulagi in early May 1942, they initiated searches for Martin and other known colonial officers.

"In June, the Japanese commenced the construction of an airfield on Guadalcanal, further isolating Martin and forcing him to conduct his activities from enclaves in the mountains.

"On his jungle-shielded mountain, Martin played a dangerous game of hide and seek with the Japanese. He and his tiny coastwatcher contingent were running low on everything they needed: food, supplies, and most critically, radio batteries."

Guadalcanal would become the site of the first major land offensive against the Japanese in the South Pacific. Upon the American landing on Guadalcanal, Clemens and his BSIP police made contact with the surprised marines when they marched to the American positions carrying the union flag.

The marines were provided with assistance in continuous raids on Japanese supplies and radio reports of the enemy position. For his service, Clemens was awarded the Military Cross in December 1942 and the US Legion of Merit two years later.

Clemens later served in Palestine and Cyprus and was Cypriot Defence Secretary between 1959 and 1960. He was made a CBE and later OBE before settling in Australia. He maintained a strong interest in the Solomon Islands and wrote to islanders in 2006 amid political unrest.

Clemens died in 2009 in Melbourne aged 94, four months after the death of his wife Anne. His memoirs, Alone on Guadalcanal, were published in 1998.

However, his legacy remains in the 2003 video game Medal of Honor: Rising Sun. During the game, he helps the main character locate and rescue American prisoners of war.