Description
Mr. Kelly shares his experiences and pride in being a part of this regiment.
Michael Kelly
Mr. Michael Kelly was born January 1940 in Sudbury, Ontario. Being active in the Cadet Program as a youngster, Mr. Kelly always held the idea that he would pursue a career in the military. Once of age, Mr. Kelly joined the Officer Candidate Plan School of Infantry at Camp Borden. Graduating as an officer, he accepted deployments overseas including Germany and Cyprus. Upon retirement from the army, Mr. Kelly held rank of major. After military service, he became quite involved in many organizations and worked with UNICEF and World Food Program in East Timor. Mr. Kelly has great pride in his membership with The Black Watch Regiment and is presently the president of the Upper Canada Branch of the Black Watch Association in Ottawa. He now resides in Ottawa with his wife Erica.
Transcript
The Black Watch were the only Highland Regiment in the regular force at the time and they are a very old and famous regiment in Canada. Their history is quite amazing. They have battle honours that range throughout the history of the Canadian Forces really, the Canadian military so they were a very highly regarded regiment in the Canadian Forces and I was very proud to be accepted to serve with them. Well, it helps to have a tough hide. The training is designed to place you under stress, to tire you and then present you with situations that you have to solve or deal with. And, of course, the instructors have to be quite ruthless when they are doing this. They were always outstanding in a way they did this, the way they approached it and some quite extraordinary officers and senior non-commissioned officers who were doing that. Most people who don’t graduate it’s because they can’t take this stress but for a farm boy from Sudbury it wasn’t too far off normal.