Decades Of Agony

The widow of a war hero who had been wrongfully denied a pension by Whitehall bureaucrats for years was celebrating a victory after the Ministry of Defence admitted "maladministration".

Lt Norbury won an immediate Military Cross for an action in Burma in 1944 in which he received horrific injuries to his feet, legs and abdomen.

Fifty-four years later the decorated King's African Rifles officer died penniless in a public hospital in South Africa after decades of agony and operations.

After selling the family home and its contents and despite his wife Gillian working part-time while nursing her husband, the Norburys ran out of money to support the medical bills.

Compensation Doubled For Military Casualties A new deal was offered to the Armed Forces yesterday to make up for the upheaval caused by the Iraq and Afghanistan operations, including a doubling of the compensation awarded for the most seriously injured.