‘I didn’t imagine him dying’ – mother mourns heroic son killed in Helmand

The family of an "inspirational" London soldier who died after being shot in Afghanistan paid tribute to him before his funeral today.

Lieutenant Mark Evison, 26, from Dulwich, was fatally wounded in Helmand province while leading his platoon under heavy fire. It was his first tour of duty.

Lt Evison, who served in the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards, was tipped for a successful military career. He was nicknamed "007" because of his charisma.

His mother, Margaret Evison, a consultant clinical psychologist at Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital, last spoke to her son two days before he was shot.

Mrs Evison said: "We've always been incredibly close.

"Being in the Army and going to Afghanistan was what he wanted to do, part of his job.

"When I said goodbye to him in April I just didn't imagine him dying because the number of soldiers killed compared with the numbers deployed was so small.

"Mark was an inspirational officer to his men and that's why he was so loved by them."

Lt Evison was flown back to Britain for treatment and died on 12 May with his family at his bedside in hospital in Birmingham, three days after being shot.

Full details of his death emerged in a handwritten letter to his mother from his commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe.

He wrote that Lt Evison was "under heavy weight of enemy fire" trying to extract half of his platoon from a building while on patrol at Checkpoint Haji Alem.

As he tried to bring them out of the line of fire, he stood up in a doorway and was hit by a single bullet in his right shoulder. Members of Number 7 platoon gave Lt Evison first aid as other returned fire, killing two insurgents.

Lt-Col Thorneloe continued: "Throughout this, Mark remained conscious and with great calmness and presence of mind continued to tell his platoon what to do.

"I have no doubt that his actions that day will have saved lives."

Lt Evison was taken back to Camp Bastion but bled so profusely he exhausted their blood bank as colleagues also gave blood to keep him alive.

His mother said: "He had been picked out as having very high ability so they put him in quite a tough part of the country for such a young officer, but he performed amazingly well."

He was a pupil at Dulwich College and won a music scholarship to Charterhouse in Surrey. He later read land economy at Oxford Brookes University before graduating from Sandhurst in 2007.