An Almondbank mum who was rescued from a ravine by her son has seen her young hero presented with a Pride of Britain Child of Courage Award.
Schoolboy Sebastian Williams has won the top ITV award on Sunday night for bravely saving his mother after she fell 100 feet down a ravine, and received the trophy from football icon David Beckham.
The 11-year-old, whose family now stay in London, climbed down the gorge at Ben Cruachan near Oban to comfort his seriously injured mother Suzanne and raised the alarm using her mobile phone.
He helped guide in a Coastguard helicopter and Mountain Rescue team in and she was airlifted to hospital.
Mrs Williams, 43, said she is lucky to be alive after losing her footing during a family holiday last October.
She managed to stop her descent to the ground 200 feet further below by jamming the sole of her foot into a gap in the rocks.
Husband Derek tried to call for help, but his phone battery was dead, so Seb climbed down and held her hand and talked to her for around 30 minutes to keep her conscious while they waited for the mountain rescue team to arrive.
He said: “I just reacted when I saw mum fall – I was not scared at the time.
“I was telling her about the amazing holiday we were going to have in Namibia, how we were going to go horse riding the next day and how everything was fine and they (mountain rescue) were coming.
“David was really kind and said that family was the most important thing to him, and that he admired what I had done. We chatted about many things including who my favourite players were, and I had to say Thierry Henry and Dennis Bergkamp.
Suzanne, whose family still stay in Perthshire, was left with a gash on her head, suffered two broken bones in her neck, a broken jaw and smashed her right kneecap.
She spent three weeks in Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth and Royal Infirmary hospitals and a week in St Mary’s Hospital in London.
She said: “I am incredibly proud and very touched by it and continue to be amazed by what he did, and the support he and all my family have given me ever since.
“He is excited and very happy to have won the award and is touched that Oban MRT and Coastguards nominated him.
“He enjoys having it but he has not been changed by it and is being very pragmatic.”
Mrs Williams’s husband Derek and daughters Francesca, 10, and six-year-old Natasha, were on the walking trip when the accident happened.
Last month the family returned to the west coast and climbed Ben Nevis to raise money for rescuers and a children’s charity, raising more than £12,000 so far.
Amongst those heaping praise onto Seb is the family’s minister, Rev Angus MacLeod, who said: “This is wonderful news and the award is much deserved.”
