Sidney Cornell, who is credited with being the first black paratrooper to land in Normandy on D-Day, has been remembered at an exhibition in his hometown.

Born in Portsmouth, Sergeant Cornell served with the 7th Parachute Battalion, winning a Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) for bravery in 1944.

He is credited with inspiring the character Lt Arthur Kingsley in the Call of Duty video game series.

Chris Cornell, whose research helped raise the profile of his stranger, said: “He became almost famous, which I never would have believed. He was extremely brave and as a family we are very proud of what he did. .”

The Winchester researcher was encouraged to piece together the story of his mixed-heritage family by a chance meeting with Baroness Floella Benjamin.

The actress and TV presenter inspired him to spend 10 years researching military and civilian archives.

Sidney’s African-American father Charles, a Barnum and Bailey circus acrobat, arrived in Britain from the United States in 1889, he discovered.

Charles left the show and met his wife Florence, settling in Portsmouth, where Sidney was born in 1913.

As mixed-race immigrants to the North End, the family may have faced a sometimes rough welcome, the researcher said.

“Sidney and his brother were taught boxing by their father as a way of supporting themselves,” Mr Cornell added.

“There was a time when the Cornell family was well respected and practically as tough as nails and no one beat them or mocked them.”

Sidney worked as a truck driver for a building materials company before joining the Army and eventually the Parachute Regiment.

He was the first black paratrooper to land behind German lines in Normandy on the night of June 5/6, 1944, according to the Royal British Legion.

His DCM citation records: “For the next five weeks he was in almost continuous action of a most trying and difficult nature.

“Cornell was a company leader and repeatedly delivered messages through the heaviest and most accurate enemy mortar and MG (machine gun) fire.

“Wounded four times in action, this soldier has never been evacuated and continues his job with cheerfulness and efficiency.

“Many acts of gallantry were performed by the members of the battalion, but for sustained bravery nothing surpasses Cornell’s effort.”

Race appears to have played a small role in Sergeant Cornell’s military career, his great-grandson added.

Respected for his bravery, he was also much older than his battalion mates and was treated as a “grandfather figure,” Chris Cornell said.

On April 7, 1945, German soldiers detonated explosives on a bridge over the Rhine, killing Sergeant Cornell and about 20 members of his platoon.

Chris Cornell recalled: “The time the family found out about his death was exactly when my father joined the army, and I don’t think it was a coincidence.

“When the war came, he became this kind of hero – my father’s hero – and my father joined the army because of him.”

Although the paratrooper never received his DCM – who is still missing – the service medal was returned to the family in 2021 after it was reportedly found in the River Thames by a mudslide.

In the same year, Call of Duty: Vanguard was released. The creators credited Sgt Cornell as the inspiration for one of the game’s main characters.

Sidney Cornell’s role in D-Day and the battles that followed have been commemorated in a pop-up museum at the North End Library, near where he grew up.

Along with his grave in Germany, Sidney is also named on the war memorial in Portsmouth town centre.

His great-grandson said: “It’s sad that I never got to know him. My father was always talking about Sidney. He was amazed by him.”