First VC Since Falklands Granted

[RACooper]

Iraq war hero presented with Victoria Cross

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...itaryiraqaward

LONDON (AFP) - An army private who saved the lives of dozens of comrades in Iraq was awarded the Victoria Cross, the first soldier to get the country's highest medal for bravery in 23 years.



"You're very special," Queen Elizabeth told the Johnson Beharry during a ceremony at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday.

"She said that she doesn't get to present the VC very often," the 25-year-old Grenada-born serviceman said after the medal was pinned to his khaki tunic.

Beharry's Victoria Cross is the first awarded since two were given posthumously during the 1982 Falklands War with Argentina.

He is the first living soldier since 1965 to receive the distinction, created in 1856 to honour soldiers of the British Empire during the Crimean War who showed particular gallantry in the face of enemy attack.

Beharry, who only arrived in Britain in 1999, earned the Victoria Cross for two separate acts of valour under fire in the town of Amara, near the southern Iraqi city of Basra, last year.

In the first, he was struck by bullet fire while guiding an armoured convoy through a major ambush in May. A month later, he rescued further soldiers but suffered serious head wounds in an assault by a rocket propelled grenade that left him in a coma.

"When I hear what I did, I can't really believe it was me," the former house painter said Wednesday. "But what I did was my choice -- I knew I had to get everyone out because I wouldn't have been able to live with myself otherwise.

"I think it's the training that just kicks in."

Only 1,355 Victoria Crosses, all made from the bronze of Russian cannons captured in the Crimea, have ever been awarded, most of them posthumously.

For the purposes of the ceremony, Beharry outranked Britain's most senior soldier, General Sir Michael Jackson, his award taking precedence to the general's being knighted.

And from the BBC:

Sir Mike Jackson said he had been "overshadowed" at the investiture by Pte Beharry. "And quite rightly so - it was an honour to stand alongside him," Sir Mike Jackson said.