BComd Col Douglas Gunter sits with the Royal family during Queen Elizabeth II’s visit to CFB Shilo in July 1970. Photo courtesy Anne (nee Gunter) Brigham.
Jules Xavier
Shilo Stag
Imagine being posted to first Camp Shilo, and later CFB Shilo, on three occasions 11 years apart?
That’s exactly what happened to Col Douglas Gunter during a military career which started in Fredericton, New Brunswick in October 1939 and ended with his retirement in Ottawa in August 1974.
Born in 1959, daughter Anne Brigham shared her father’s military history from her home in Regina, Sask.
“Personally, I do not recall being there for that ceremony,” she offered regarding her dad’s Change of Command (CoC) ceremony held outdoors on June 14, 1969. He officially moved into the BComd’s HQ office July 4.
Then 48-year-old LCol Gunter was already on the Base for his third posting, serving as Chief Instructor in Gunnery (CIG) with the Royal Canadian School of Artillery (RCSA).
He replaced outgoing BComd Col David Francis, also 48, of Whitewood, Sask. — he left Manitoba for Quebec, where he was appointed chief of artillery at mobile command headquarters in St. Hubert.
Col Gunter’s first posting to Camp Shilo happened when he went from lieutenant to captain from October 1946 to November 1948. Posted to 1RCHA, he held positions as Gun Position Officer (GPO) with C Bty and then adjutant.
By the time he had reached major, and had six other postings to places like Kure, Japan and Korea, he returned to CFB Shilo and served from September 1957 to June 1959 at the RCSA as the arty staff CRS/IG.
Born in Saint John, New Brunswick on March 22, 1921, Brigham said her dad became involved in the military purely by circumstances.
“The Second World War broke out in September 1939, just as dad was to enter his second year at UNB,” she recalled. “Originally, he was a history major with his sights on becoming a lawyer. However, he went to Fredericton and joined the COTC [Canadian Officers Training Corps].
“It was the right thing to do. He applied for the artillery because his dad, who was a serious marksman having won the Governor General’s medal and is in the New Brunswick Sports Hall of Fame, was in the artillery. Clearly, if it was good enough for his dad, it was good enough for him.”
Col Gunter was accepted as an officer cadet effective on Oct 1, 1939. He graduated from UNB and joined the Active Army on June 18, 1942.
During the war, Col Gunter was a member of 12 Field Regiment, RCA, 3 Canadian Division and landed in Ghent on Nov. 8, 1944. Later, he was assigned to 11 Field Battery, where he was Gun Position Officer (GPO), CPO and other gun positions.
“Dad didn’t talk much about [the war],” she recalled. “He preferred to write it in his memoirs. We were greatful for those. I was also not clever enough to persist with questioning … shame.”
“Mom and dad moved 17 times — not always popular moves with my mother,” laughed Brigham.
“But the plum moves were to the UK [Larkhill and Wilts] and [Heidelberg] Germany. I participated in six of those moves.”
It was while posted to the UK, where Brigham was born in Salisbury in 1959. As a Canadian citizen born abroad, she said this has caused her no end of troubles when applying for visa status in other countries.
While soldiers might have seen Col Gunter in a different light when it came to the military work, his daughter had a different view of the man, who was BComd and RCSA Commandant for CFB Shilo from July 1969 to August 1970. From here he was posted to St. Hubert, Que. and served as DCOS (training) and A/COS (operations) from September 1970 to July 1972.
“Dad was a no-nonsense kind of person, who admired effort and dedication,” she said. “He had a great sense of fairness and fun. He was also very generous.”
Being a proud Army brat, Brigham had no qualms like her mother when it came to packing up another PMQ and going back on the road.
“Traveling was a way of life I enjoyed … learning new cultures etc. It was all I really knew, so I was surprised when we stopped moving every two or three years.
“I thought everyone did that. I recall being amazed in Grade 8, when the geography teacher asked where people had traveled to, and one person said she had never been outside of Ottawa city. That shocked me. I had been so fortunate going all over Europe, the Middle East and Canada.”
After his second stint at CFB Shilo and a UK posting, then Maj Gunter then spent from October 1962 to October 1964 in his home province at CFB Gagetown. First, he was A Bty BC and 2IC with 1RCHA, then slid over to 3 CIBG HQ as the brigade major.
This was followed by a deployment to Cyprus on peacekeeping duties where he was GSO 2 (plans) at the HQ in the Nicosia Zone. Afterwards, he returned to CFB Gagetown to continue his job at 3 CIBG HQ from May 1965 to September 1965.
Next, it was a flight to Germany in the fall of ’65, where the Gunter family resided in Heidelberg, and now LCol Gunter was the ACOS G1 in AMF(L) HQ. He returned to Canada three years later in August 1968 and his final CFB Shilo posting in August 1968.
After retiring in 1974 at NDHQ in Ottawa, where he was D Arty/DLR, Col Gunter spent the next decade as executive director of the Canadian Figure Skating Association.
“Given his lack of skating skills, this was always amusing,” she said, “but he knew how to put ice in drinks and he was very much organized!”
Brigham’s dad died on March 4, 2005 while living in Ottawa. He was buried in Beechwood Cemetery along with wife Josephine, but not in the actual military section. Brigham said her father was laid to rest just next to it.
For his daughter following all of the military moves along with her brother Richard, 10 years older and still living in Brandon, she chose a career as a teacher. Her forte in the classroom was science, math, French and outdoor education.
“Then my husband [Dr Mark Brigham] and I had children and he got a job as a university professor here in Regina,” she said. “We were fortunate to enjoy sabbatical years multiple times in Australia, and South Africa…so that helped my travel fix.”
A highlight from her time at CFB Shilo alongside her dad as BComd, Brigham said it has to be the Royal tour, where Queen Elizabeth visited the Base on July 13, 1970. She was accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince of Wales and Princess Anne.
“The Queen’s visit was hysterical post-fact,” she offers. “I even used it in dad’s eulogy … it lifted some spirits. I recall the sniffer dog coming to our house to make sure it was safe for the Queen.
“A big German Shepherd which set our little dachshund into apoplectic fits. Our dog didn’t see the humour in this majestic beast routing through our house, while our little protector turned himself inside out trying to defend. He had determination, if not sense.”
The Stag will share more of this royal moment from the Base’s history in future 75th anniversary editions thanks to Brigham sharing her dad’s military memoirs with the Stag.
Both aged 48, Col Douglas Gunter (right) replaced outgoing BComd Col David Francis (left) during their outdoor Change of Command parade on June 14, 1969. Photo Stag archives
