From the Summer/Fall 2008 Issue of the Powder Horn

By Colonel Neville (Robbie) Robinson CD

Having spent three years at the Royal Canadian School of Infantry in Camp Borden wearing RCIC badges, I was glad to be interviewed by Col. Peter Bingham as to my choice of “rebadging” among the Canadian Guards, the Black Watch (RHR) and The Queen’s Own Rifles of Canada. Having started my military career in 1941 in the King’s Royal Rifle Corps (60th Rifles), I naturally opted for The Queen’s Own, which turned out to be the best choice.

Soon after getting myself back into “Green and Black” I was posted to Korea as a replacement for Maurice Whiting, in 1954. The posting was for three months as 2QOR of C was rotating home in the spring. On arrival at the battalion, I was posted as 2 I/C D Coy. which was a large (170) company containing all the troops taking their release on return to Canada. For some reason, it was known as the “Jaggy Company’” by the other rifle and support companies. It was commanded by Maj. Larry Harrington who used hearing aids for which he had trouble obtaining batteries and was constrained to save them by switching them off whenever possible! Every morning was OC’s Orders where justice was dispensed.

As the battalion reserve, we manned the defensive positions in the Kansas Line during the numerous “Scram” Exercises, and did a large amount of repair work to the bunkers and slit trenches. Just as the Battalion was getting prepared to leave for Canada I was posted into the HQ 1 COMWEL Division to replace Capt. Erwin Fleury as Staff Captain (Canadian) and OC to KATCOM (Korean Army Attached to Commonwealth Division) Defence Coy, a standard three-platoon rifle company.

The staff work was the standard stuff and I spent a lot of time with piles of paper, one of which was 125 copies of the nominal roll of 2QOR to get the battalion aboard the troopship at Inchon. I went down to see them off and say goodbye to friends like Ron “Awful” Werry, Charlie Belzile and Peter Nixon. The tragic death of Lt. Bill Vipond was on my desk and that Board of Inquiry took a while to get to Ottawa, going back and forth. Years later, in the 90s, my wife Brenda and I visited Pusan and laid poppies on the graves of the three 2QOR casualties in the impressive UN cemetery on the hillside overlooking Pusan harbour.

The three months in Korea was extended twice to 13 months as the powers that be vacillated about who was leaving and who was staying. Before I left I was awarded a Korean medal by the Korean Army Chief of Staff and it now hangs in the QOR museum at Casa Loma as, in those days, we were not authorized to wear foreign decorations for peacekeeping duties.
_______________________________________________________

If you’d like to support the Regimental Museum and Archive with our goal of “Telling Their Stories,” you can find more information on how you can make a sustaining or one-time financial donation on our Donation page.