

© Ron
Shambrook AM
2IC B Coy & OC C Coy
1st Tour |
 |
When
I arrived from Admin Company and took over as
2IC B Company, 5 RAR from Bob O'Neill in 1966,
the Company was continuing to set up the Company
base. Here, below, is a true story of the
Queen's colour portrait at B Company in 1966.
Many years later I wrote to HM Queen Elizabeth
and this is an extract from that letter.
"As an officer in the 5th Battalion, The Royal
Australian Regiment, my unit was deployed from
Australia to Phuoc Tuy Province in South Vietnam
in May 1966. Our infantry unit establish, from
scratch, a battalion base in an area that had
been a rubber plantation. We commenced active
patrolling from this base, which was to be our
home for the next 12 months. Priority was
security of the base area, tactical domination
of the immediate area, defence works and the
erection of tented accommodation and living
facilities. We had in our Company crates;
brought with us from Australia, a framed colour
photograph of Your Majesty that we intended to
have pride of place in B Company 5 RAR combined
Officers/Sergeants Mess. After some months we
acquired a US Army marquee and were in a
position to establish our mess. We sand bagged
around the marquee and so we were ready to open
our company mess.
When your framed photograph was unpacked we
noticed the glass had broken in transit. I was
to journey about 25 kilometres south by road to
the logistic area and local township of Vung Tau
the next week, so I took the damaged framed
photograph with me. After asking around if there
was glazier in Vung Tau I found a small
Vietnamese shop, complete with dirt floor and
packing case counter. I spoke very little
Vietnamese and the owner spoke very little
English. In fact, it is likely that the owner
had little or no previous contact with
Australians. I left his shop more hoping than
believing that I had satisfactorily explain to
him what I required and that the reglazing be
completed by 4 p.m. that day. I needed to return
by road to my unit in daylight hours for
security reasons.
At about 4 p.m. I returned to the shop to find
the Vietnamese owner excited to see me walk in.
He then reached under the packing case counter
and produced the reglazed framed photograph. He
then looked at me then the Photograph and said
in broken and heavily accented English, which I
assume he has rehearsed "Very nice wife, very
nice house". I was so taken back I failed to
correct him but thanked him for his good work
and paid the account and left."
In
1982 I headed up about 1550 men and women from
the Navy, Army and Air force in support of the
XII Commonwealth Games in Brisbane. I was also a
member of the Royal Tour Directorate for that
Tour. On 9th October 1982 I was received into a
private audience with HM The Queen and HRH
Prince Philip aboard HMY Britannia. She
presented me with a signed portrait of herself
and HRH. I immediately thought of the B Company
5 RAR portrait of HM the Queen but did not
gather myself together well enough to tell her
the story. I regretted that I had not done so.
Many years later I wrote the above letter and
told the story.
The reply from Buckingham Palace;

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