A Bermudian son of Portuguese immigrants who joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in the Second World War has died.

Ernest Abel Benevides, who lived in Canada, was 96.

Mr Benevides, whose grandfather, Manuel, brought the family to the island in 1905 and was recruited as the founding pastor of the Portuguese Evangelical Church in Bermuda, died on Monday.

Mr Benevides, who was born in the family home on Valley Road, Paget, worked in a nearby grocery store as well as at a livery stable before he became one of the first three Portuguese pupils to attend Saltus Grammar School.

Mr Benevides’s family in Canada said he was sent to Saltus after encouragement from Minnie Hewitt, a teacher from Nova Scotia, who worked at Gilbert Institute in Paget. He became a top student at Saltus and later wrote about some of his wartime experiences for the school magazine.

Mr Benevides excelled as a swimmer and became a show diver at island hotels.

He trained with W.F. “Chummy” Hayward, the founder of the Bermuda Olympic Association, and hoped to represent Bermuda at the Olympic Games.

The start of the war meant the 1940 Games, originally scheduled for Tokyo, Japan, but moved to Helsinki, Finland, were cancelled after hostilities began.

Mr Benevides went to Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, in November 1940 and his ship had to dodge German U-boats. He wrote later: “My father, mother and sisters all came aboard to say goodbye, no doubt wondering if they would ever see me again.”

Mr Benevides earned a bachelor’s degree in English, maths and French, and joined the Royal Canadian Air Force after graduation in 1943.

He had risen to the rank of Pilot Officer by the time the war ended and went on to study law at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto.

Sally Benevides Hopkins, his daughter, said: “As such, he was the first Portuguese-Bermudian to graduate from university and join a profession.

“He was a lawyer in the firm of Deacon, Benevides and Thomson for 50 years, and was a notary public and a Queen’s Counsel.”

She added: “As a lawyer, he represented many Bermudians in Canada.”

He married Isobel Wishart in 1959 and the couple had three children, Sally, Grant and Hugh.

Mr Benevides was a member of the East York Danforth Lions Club for more than 50 years, which included a time as president.

He was a keen hunter, fisherman and camper, as well as a skier and tackled the daunting ski jump at Mont Tremblant in Quebec.

Mr Benevides’s family said he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2003 and had lived at the Sunnybrook Veterans’ Residence in Toronto since 2007.