By David Bennallack - KFOX News Director

"We got turned around and then got lost and we rolled into Nasiriyah before it was secure and when we rolled in there was an ambush waiting for us," that's the beginning of a story of courage and survival for El Paso native Shoshana Johnson.

When part of the 507th Maintenance Company rolled into Nasiriyah, Iraq just before dawn on March 23rd, the unit was met with gunfire from every side. 19 507th soldiers were facing an all-out assault, and had little to fight back with. Some of the Ft. Bliss soldiers died where they fell. Shoshana Johnson dove under her truck and was shot - wounded in both ankles, perhaps by the same bullet. Near Johnson were Sgt. James Riley, Specialist Edgar Hernandez, and Specialist Joseph Hudson.

For 15 minutes the battle raged. Then "All our weapons jammed, failed, and people were coming out of the houses with weapons," said Johnson.

"And then we just got overwhelmed."

Sgt. James Riley ordered the surrender. The Ft. Bliss Five threw down the weapons and Iraqis pounded on them, kicking and hitting them with sticks.

Not Johnson. They opened her chemical weapons suit "and noticed I was a female," she said. Then they treated her "very well. I don't know why."

Next stop a Baghdad prison. Where the videotape we all saw on TV was apparently made. Johnson said her interrogators asked her about the locations of American divisions. "When they finally got that I was only a cook, they started asking me where the food came from, if it was coming from Kuwait," she said, smiling.

Iraqi Doctors performed surgery three times on her wounded ankles. "More than once, a doctor said that they wanted to take good care of me to show that the Iraqi people had humanity," Johnson said. Asked what she thought of that now, she says "I appreciate the care that I was given. But I also know that there was a reason behind it. They didn't give me care just for the humanity of it."

As the coalition forces moved closer to Baghdad, the prisoners were moved. A half dozen times in the last week. Each time there were new guards. "We were a hot potato," says Johnson "It was getting to the point where I believed they were going to kill us."

And when the U.S. Marines suddenly knocked down the door, there was another moment of concern. "At first they didn't realize I was an American," said Johnson. They quickly realized their mistake and gave her a jumpsuit from one of their light armored vehicles' crewmen, but she held on to her prison pajamas in a brown plastic bag.

"I broke down. I was like, Oh my God, I'm home," said Johnson.

And now Johnson says she has one goal, to be at her own home in El Paso by May 20th - her daughter Janelle's 3rd birthday.