A 22-year-old Territorial Army soldier whose leg was broken in a fusillade of shots in Afghanistan refused to abandon a wounded colleague and gave him life-saving first aid for two hours while continuously firing at Taleban positions.

The remarkable courage of Private Luke Cole, of the Mercian Regiment, was recognised yesterday with a Military Cross. He was one of 184 members of the Armed Forces to receive honours in the latest operational awards.

Private Cole had been serving with his regiment last year alongside the Grenadier Guards and Royal Marines in Garmsir, southern Helmand province, one of the most dangerous areas in the south of Afghanistan because of a strong Taleban presence.

The incident took place overnight on September 7 and 8. Private Cole and the other soldiers had been given the task of driving the Taleban away from their heavily defended positions, and his own platoon was to secure the southern flank.

He described the moment a Taleban fighter’s 7.62mm Kalashnikov round had blown five inches of bone out of his left thigh. “I looked down and it was a mess, to be honest,” he said. “I knew it was serious but I thought ‘this can’t be the way I go out’ so I carried on.

“I could see muzzle flashes of the enemy in a ditch behind some trees and I kept shooting and gave my mate first aid when I could. I was a bit nervous trying to patch myself up but I was a lot calmer helping my mate so I stuck with that. Then I got shot again.”

The first bullet had hit his left femur and the second struck his right hip before ripping open his stomach. He said: “It felt like a stone had hit me and I put my hand down but there was a lot of blood.

“I looked at my stomach and it was cut open, so I tucked my shirt in to keep it together and kept on firing until more lads from the platoon arrived.

“I didn’t want the morphine but I guess I was in shock. I couldn’t feel the pain but I didn’t want the morphine to slow me down.”

Army medics dug out the bullet from his thigh later and he now keeps it in his bedroom at home.

His citation says: “Private Cole demonstrated remarkable gallantry and altruism in the face of a ferocious enemy.” Private Cole said of his award: “I’m shocked that I’ve got this. I was just doing my job.”

Captain David Hicks, of The Royal Anglian Regiment, whose courage under fire was publicised around the world when he died while leading his men against the Taleban, was posthumously awarded the Military Cross. Like Private Cole, the 26-year-old captain refused morphine after being severely wounded, and refused to leave his post until he could no longer take part in the battle against the Taleban. There had been some expectation that the Victoria Cross might be awarded.

Flight-Lieutenant Michelle Goodman, of the RAF, became the first woman to win the Distinguished Flying Cross, equivalent to the Military Cross, which is awarded for exemplary courage. Flight-Lieutenant Goodman, in her mid20s, was one of five women to be awarded medals yesterday.

She was part of an incident reaction team which was alerted to a serious casualty in central Basra, southern Iraq, on June 1. Rifleman Stephen Vause, 20, had been wounded in a mortar bomb attack, and would have died where he had fallen if he had not been rescued.

Brigadier James Bashall, who had taken over command of the British forces in Basra that day, decided it was a decision to be left to the helicopter pilot, Flight-Lieutenant Goodman.

Brigadier Bashall said recently: “It was dangerous. There was a risk the helicopter could be shot down.”

She chose to fly to the rescue of Rifleman Vause. Wearing night-vision goggles and under heavy fire, she landed the Merlin helicopter next to the casualty and extracted him, despite mortar rounds landing nearby.

The citation says that the wounded soldier would have died within 15 minutes if Flight-Lieutenant Goodman had not arrived to take him out of the danger area.

“It was an awesome bit of flying,” Brigadier Bashall said.

Nearly 7,500 homes rented by the Ministry of Defence for the Armed Forces have been left empty, 2,400 of them for at least a year, figures released under the Freedom of Information Act show. One hundred have been vacant for a decade. The total cost of having so many properties empty, including the lack of revenue from rent, council tax and maintenance bills, is estimated to be nearly £14 million. All the properties were included in a lease-back deal signed by the MoD in 1996 with Annington Homes, which bought most of the ministry’s married quarters and other accommodation.

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