WW11 Veteran Brant Robinson of Whangamata was a prisoner of war for four years. Photo / Alison Smith.
WW11 Veteran Brant Robinson of Whangamata was a prisoner of war for four years. Photo / Alison Smith.
Locked down for another Anzac Day as Covid-19 restrictions ease and cases peak outside his rest home, 104-year-old World War II veteran Brant Robinson is resigned.
"That's how it goes," he says.
Brant spent four years in a prisoner of war camp.
The ship that his army division was expectingto collect him from the Greek island of Crete never arrived, and German captors arrived instead.
He never knew how long he would be held a prisoner of war.
Brant was aged 22. He joined the war effort at age 21, in Wellington.
Brant Robinson was 21 when he went to war. Photo / Robinson family
"I went away with the advance party on 11 December, 1939, with 113 others. We went on the HMS Awatea because it could get to Sydney in two-and-a-half days. Then we took a train to Melbourne at night and went to the wharf."
The New Zealanders joined an Aussie advance party of 120. At ports along the way they dived into the Red Sea and stopped in Israel.
"I used to smoke then so we stopped and got some cheap tobacco. I knocked off it 55 years ago."
Brant was promoted to staff sergeant and was a quartermaster for the signals division.
"I had a motorbike to go and find the signals people to see if they required any equipment."
He says in Greece they didn't see a great deal of action.
"I was in Crete for a while before the Germans came and spoiled everything. Quite a lot of us were supposed to be picked up by the ship but the ships stopped coming. I think they'd lost a few and didn't want to risk losing any more ships because the Germans could bomb them from Crete."
Brant says being a prisoner of war "wasn't too bad".
"As a staff sergeant I didn't have to be put into work camps, staff sergeants could please ourselves and went to a sugarbeet factory to work. Most of the [German captors] were reasonable."
They slept in barracks three tiers high and could talk with other prisoners.
"They had a toilet inside you could go to. Every now and then they would take us and we could all have a warm shower which was quite good, every now and then, like weekly."
He didn't question how long he would be kept captive.
"We knew we were there until the war finished. In the end it was four years."
Four years, not knowing when the time as a prisoner of war would end, he has thought about whether he'd sign up again if he could turn back the clock.
"In the same circumstances, would I sign up again? The Post Office pay wasn't all that good, some of my mates were joining up so I'd join."
Brant has said before to family that he joined the war effort because it was the right thing to do.
With no Anzac parade last year or in 2020, Brant will again miss his traditional participation in the parade with his great-grandchildren by his side — and his visit to the Whangamata RSA.
Fellow WWII veteran Roy Brooks is also living at Moana House and will also miss the Anzac parades.
Management of his home, the 47-bed Moana House and Village, say 300 people in Whangamata have been recorded with Covid-19 and no residents are allowed out in the community right now.
John and Brant Robinson in Brant's room at Moana House and Village, Whangamata. Photo / Alison Smith
Already one resident has been ill with Covid - thankfully the man made a full recovery and no one else was infected.
General manager Vivian Blake said it was a credit to the staff who managed what could have been a very different situation.
Residents had to isolate in their rooms for 12 days and had meals delivered and laundry collected. They were not allowed to even walk the halls. There were no family visits.
Brant still makes his own breakfasts and believes it's important to keep active.
He is hard of hearing and his sight is failing, so television isn't a highlight in his day.
"There's not much you could do here. You just had to rest quietly," he says.
Vivian says there were few complaints.
"Ninety-five per cent of residents were overwhelmingly supportive, one or two wandered around but we made sure they didn't come in contact with other residents. We have such a vulnerable population ... it's so important our protocols are tight."
Health authorities and the Whangamata Medical Centre had been supportive and provided easy-to-follow protocols and advice, she said.
