War hero too ill to work sells his medals for £156k

AN Iraq war hero given a top military award for exceptional bravery has sold it with his other medals for £156,000.

Colour Sergeant James Harkess won the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross – second only to the Victoria Cross – after putting himself in the line of fire to save his men three times in two months in 2006. But since leaving the Army last year after 22 years, he has depended on his military pension because ill-health prevents him from working.

The 46-year-old (pictured) put all his medals up f or auction and they sold in London for a t otal of £130,000.

Most of that was for the CGC, a record. With fees, the British buyer paid £156,000. Pierce Noonan, of auctioneers Dix Noonan Webb, said Sgt Harkess was ‘delighted’.

The platoon sergeant, from Nottinghamshire, served with the Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment. He and the four-man crew of the Warrior armoured vehicle he commanded fought off 200 enemy soldiers during a six-hour battle near Basra. Sgt Harkess spent much of it exposed from the turret and said later: ‘They were coming at us in waves.’

On another occasion he secured a route to safety for his platoon after they were cut off by 50 militiamen. He also led his men towards the enemy after an ambush, locating and killing two snipers pinning them down.

As well as the CGC, Sgt Harkess sold his General Service Medal for Northern Ireland, Nato Medals for service in former Yugoslavia and Kosovo, Iraq Medal, Operational Service Medal for Afghanistan, Elizabeth II Golden and Diamond Jubilee Medals and the Military Long Service and Good Conduct Medal.