By Jeremy Sollars
A Clifton Vietnam veteran has joined calls from veterans in Warwick for a former Rose City boy killed in action in Vietnam to be officially recognised in his home town for his sacrifice.
As reported in the Free Times last week, veterans have suggested that a statue of Warwick-born Ronald Swanton be included in plans for a new memorial wall for Leslie Park, which will display plaques commemorating every military campaign in which Australia has been involved since the Boer War to the present.
Warrant Officer Swanton was killed under Viet Cong fire in Vietnam’s Tra Bong Valley in November 1965.
He was born in Warwick on 18 June, 1936, and in the Vietnam War served with the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV), who were initially sent as advisory trainers to South Vietnamese army units.
The trainers then typically became platoon and company commanders, usually working as a two-man team.
Swanton and fellow Warrant Officer Kevin ‘Dasher’ Wheatley died after their platoon came under heavy fire from the Viet Cong on 13 November 1965 in the Tra Bong Valley.
Wheatley – who refused to leave Swanton’s side after Swanton was shot in the abdomen by enemy snipers – was later awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross for his gallantry.
But Swanton himself died after trying to carry a wounded South Vietnamese army comrade to safety during the firefight, and local veterans believe his own bravery should also be formally recognised.
After last week’s story Clifton veteran Charles Emery – who worked alongside Swanton in the AATTV on active service in Vietnam – contacted the Free Times to tell us a bit about the man known to his comrades as ‘Butch’.
Charles and ‘Butch’ trained together in the AATTV on exercises in Queensland and New South Wales before deploying to Vietnam, with Charles describing his mate simply as “a good man”.
“We were both in the same battalion as Wheatley – we all worked together,” Charles, who also fought in Korea, recalled.
“We were part of a group of 30 Warrant Officers who were sent as trainers to the South Vietnamese army.
“Before we came along the South Vietnamese had been trained by the French and the Americans.
“Their systems were very different to ours – we trained the man, whereas they trained whole battalions at a time.
“Initially we weren’t allowed to carry arms, we couldn’t shoot back, it was a ridiculous situation.
“But that changed later on.
“On one occasion when he was working with a regiment of guns at Quang Tri they came under heavy attack and Butch practically drove them off single-handedly.
“He had a sense of humour, I think he’d be embarrassed at the idea of a statue but I think he deserves to be recognised in some way.
“The last time I can recall seeing Butch alive was in Hue while we were on leave – we were drinking booze in the gutter!”
Charles said Swanton and Wheatley were sent into the Tra Bong Valley following a US directive to man South Vietnamese army outposts which covered “vast areas of land”.
“It was like putting a rock in a creek and the fish all swim around it,” he said.
“They were just sent down to open areas with rice paddies – you’d sink down to your knees in them.
“They were working with soldiers who were largely of Chinese extraction from the border areas of Vietnam.
“They had very little experience of soldiering on the job and generally were pretty unreliable.
“When Butch and Wheatley were hit by an ambush the others dispersed but Butch picked up one who had been wounded and tried to carry him to supposed safety.
“But there was no safe place.”
The night after the two Australians were killed Charles and other AATTV members were flown up to the Tra Bong Valey in a Caribou “in the pitch bloody dark, flying between mountains”, to help strengthen defences against the Viet Cong.
They found Swanton’s and Wheatley’s bodies had been brought into a compound, and Charles possesses a weathered photo of Swanton’s coffin flanked by a guard of honour before ‘Butch’ was flown home to Australia.
“He was just a good man – he was happy-go-lucky, a good man to drink and play football with.”
In another postscript to last week’s story, Warwick’s Gordon McKeen contacted the Free Times to let us know he and Swanton served in 2 Battalion in the Malayan Emergency in the 1950’s.
Gordon was in the transport corps and Swanton, then a private was in the infantry, with Gordon describing Swanton as “a good soldier who did his job well“. Gordon said he’d known Swanton had a Warwick connection but didn’t realise he was born in Warwick until he read last week’s story.
Our thanks to both Charles and Gordon for getting in touch with us.
Memorial Wall donation call
Anzac Memorial Committee chairman Johnno Felton is asking the community to donate to the cause to bring the Leslie Park Memorial Wall project to life.
The committee needs around $80,000 for the project which would see a dais and memorial wall erected behind the flagpole and near the hedge adjacent to the existing cenotaph – the area in which a portable dais is currently erected for Anzac Day and Remembrance Day.
Donations can be made through the Warwick Credit Union:
Account Number: 100004705
BSB: 817 001
Account Name: Warwick Community Development ANZAC Memorial Committee
