I recall as a young Cadet on a night navigation exercise in the Canberra area. After becoming geographically embarrassed, namely lost, a classmate and I decided that a few quiet beers in the private bar at the Ainslie Hotel would be far more to our liking than trying to find navigation markers on a very cold night in the hills of Canberra.
As the hours slipped by very pleasantly, we eventually adjudged it time to return to the College and so we commenced our long walk back. Around about the Russell Offices area we were getting quite weary and thought it best to further conserve our energy by flagging down the next passing car heading in the direction of Duntroon.
Soon the lights of an approaching vehicle loomed large and I stood in the middle of the road and flagged it down. It stopped, and it was not until my classmate and I had made ourselves comfortable in the back seat, that the unpleasant realisation hit us, that there in the driver’s seat was none other than the Director of Military Art, Colonel Hassett.
‘Good morning boys’ he said. ‘Good morning Sir’ we said. ‘What have you been doing?’ he asked. ‘Night navigation exercise’ we squeaked. ‘Umm’ said the DMA, totally unconvinced. He drove us to our company lines without further comment or conversation.
We thought we were gone; 21 days confinement to barracks and 84 days stoppage of leave at least; possible dismissal loomed large in our minds. But nothing happened, nothing at all.
We sweated for weeks on the consequences of that fateful evening, however it never came. Years later as a very junior General, when I asked why we were never reprimanded, Sir Francis replied with a smile ‘I knew that in waiting for the sword to fall, you were punishing yourselves far more than I ever could’. So true and so typical of his leadership style.
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