SOLDIERS from Bulford-based 12 Mechanised Brigade have been recognised for their gallantry while serving in Afghanistan.

The brigade commander Brigadier Patrick Chalmers has been awarded the Distinguished Service Order for “a stand-out performance in command, delivered with indomitable determination that must demand formal and public recognition”.

And the deputy commander for Task Force Helmand in Afghanistan during 2012, Colonel John Bowron, has been awarded a Queen’s Commendation for Valuable Service.

Members of 1st Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment have also been honoured, with the commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Michael Aston, given the Distinguished Service Order and Lance Corporal Lawrence Kayser awarded the Military Cross.

Private Lewis Treloar, 23, had an instinct for where insurgents stored their deadly devices and found at least 40 major stores during his tour of Afghanistan.

He cracked an Afghan insurgent code to reveal the whereabouts of IED and weapons stashes, and has been made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).

He said: “I had a lot of experience from my previous tour and I would think about where I might hide something. Then, if we got a reading on the metal detector there, we would dig and we started finding weapons.”

Acting Sergeant Ross Silvey has been awarded a Mention in Despatches (MiD), while Major Adam Wolfe who designed a programme to speed up the safe handover of security in Afghanistan has been given an MBE.

And Lieutenant Berne Flower has been awarded a Queen’s Commendation for Valuable Service. Private Lewis Murphy, of 3 YORKS, was part of a team tasked with finding four insurgents who had abducted an Afghan Police Officer.

As they followed the insurgents they came under fire from machine guns and one of their group was wounded.

Removing his own protective equipment, including body armour and helmet, Lewis put the casualty on his back and began to wade and swim across the 20 metres of thick mud and water.

He was given the Queen's Commendation for Bravery.

Also from 3 YORKS, Warrant Officer Class 2 Eric Whitehouse has been awarded a Queen’s Commendation for Valuable Service (QCVS) for his actions after the devastating IED attack which killed six soldiers from his battalion.

Sent to the scene as the Quick Reaction Force, CSM Whitehouse worked tirelessly and refused to come off the ground until all six soldiers had been recovered, returning to base after nearly 24 hours.

His citation states: “The incident was exceptional but Whitehouse’s actions that night, and during the rest of the tour, inspired the company, whose men never faltered and went on to have a most successful operational tour.”

And Corporal Alex Guy, who was killed while attempting to rescue a wounded Afghan National Army comrade, has been posthumously awarded the Military Cross.

Other awards included an OBE for Lieutenant Colonel Neil Thorpe who commanded the Theatre Equipment Support Battalion And Lance Bombardier Thomas Smith, of 19 Regiment Royal Artillery, who received a Mention in Dispatches.

Queen’s Commendations for Valuable Service (QCVS) were awarded to : Major Andrew Cox MBE, of The Mercian Regiment, served as Chief of Staff at Headquarters Task Force Helmand (TFH), Acting Sergeant Paul Greenwood MC, of The Royal Regiment of Artillery, Captain George Harper, of the Corps of Royal Engineers, was working as the battlegroup engineer for the Police Mentoring and Advisory Group.

Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Potts, Commanding Officer of The King’s Royal Hussars (KRH), Lieutenant Colonel John Bridge of 26 Engineer Regiment was the Commanding Officer of the Engineer Group of Task Force Helmand and Warrant Officer Class 2 David Tidman, of the Royal Regiment of Artillery.