Wounded British Sergeant wins the cross of courage fighting off 100 Iraqi attackers

 

A HERO soldier, shot in an Iraqi hijack, has told for the first time how he took on 100 rebels with his one good hand.

And Sergeant Paul Kelly— who has been awarded the Military Cross—revealed how when his ammo ran out he turned snatched Iraqi guns on their owners.

He said: "I had been shot in the left hand. The bullet went through the length of it.

"I had to get one of the lads to reload my rifle for me while I fired it from the hip."

Speaking exclusively to the News of the World after being awarded one of the Army's highest bravery awards, the modest soldier insisted: "I was only one man in a team of heroes."

His patrol was called in when a huge weapons cache was discovered in a remote Iraqi house. But Kelly's heroes—five men from the Princess of Wales Royal Regiment and five from the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders— were ambushed by tribesmen.

Sgt Kelly, from Herne Hill, south London, said: "A man in black launched a rocket-propelled grenade and blew one of our lads out of the Land Rover.

"This same bloke fired on me, but missed. I aimed and hit him a couple of times."

The Brits retreated under a hail of fire, eventually holing up in the arms cache house.

Sgt Kelly said: "The house was being hit by bullets and grenades every second and we were firing back."

After two hours of battle, and on the brink of defeat, Sgt Kelly issued the order which saved his outnumbered men.

He said: "I was down to my last couple of bullets when I told the lads to start using the guns from the cache.

"The AK-47 is one of the most difficult weapons to fire accurately but I managed to take down a couple of Iraqis."

Sgt Kelly was also honoured for leading a charge on an Iraqi bandits' position just a month earlier and capturing two gunmen.