Body of Shropshire soldier David Dalzell flown home

Hundreds of mourners lined the streets of Wootton Bassett as a Shropshire-based soldier who was accidentally killed in Afghanistan by a comrade made his final emotional journey.

People in the Wiltshire town paid their respects to Ranger David Dalzell, 20, of the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Regiment.

He had been based at Tern Hill barracks, near Market Drayton, before being posted to Afghanistan in the autumn.

Amid sombre scenes, Ranger Dalzell's coffin passed through the town draped in the Union Flag after his body was flown back to nearby RAF Lyneham yesterday afternoon.

Mourners clutched flags and roses as they braved heavy rain to pay their respects to Ranger Dalzell, whose coffin led the cortege.

The body of Warrant Officer Colin Beckett of 3rd Battalion The Parachute Regiment, who died when an improvised explosive device detonated as he was moving to cover his colleagues in the Nad-e Ali district of Afghanistan on Saturday, was repatriated together with that of the Shropshire-based soldier.

The town fell silent at 3.15pm as church bells tolled. The coffin of Ranger Dalzell stopped in front of his distressed friends and family, who placed a basket of white lilies on top of his hearse as his devastated mother Susan pressed her head to the glass of the funeral hearse and wept.

People from Market Drayton were among the crowds with members of the town's Royal British Legion attending alongside personnel from the battalion.

Ranger Dalzell's three brothers and three sisters hugged each other as the cortege went on its way to the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford.

In a statement Ranger Dalzell's parents said: "We are very proud of David as a son and he leaves behind a void that will never be filled."

Ranger Dalzell died last Friday in what military chiefs called an "operational accident". His family said he died after being accidentally shot by another soldier after returning to base from a patrol.

By Tom Johannsen