Brigadier “Shorty” Colquhoun
Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry

He was rather always upset about it, but he was the first Canadian taken prisoner in the First World War (laughs) … it was the first fighting patrol and Shorty was 6’7 and he was taken prisoner. That was the extent of Shorty’s first war … he was a regimental soldier, never went to staff college and when I joined … Shorty’s great pronouncement was that no Patricia will go to staff until he’s been shot at in anger. Well, that’s a pretty narrow philosophy, isn’t it?

(C.B. Ware, interview, 10 July 1979)

Born on 9 August 1888 in Hamilton, Ontario, William Gourlay Colquhoun was a First World War veteran and commanding officer of the PPCLI since February 1937. Although awarded a Military Cross for heroism at St. Eloi as a lieutenant with the PPCLI in February 1915, he spent almost the entire war as a prisoner in Germany. After repeated escape attempts, he was repatriated in October 1918. Nicknamed “Shorty,” Colquhoun in fact stood six-foot-seven.

Following mobilization in September 1939, Colquhoun led the PPCLI to England with the 1st Canadian Division in December. He declared to the press prior to departure:

My boys are going to be absolutely equal to the Princess Pats of the last war. They are young men, perhaps not as experienced as the boys who joined the regiment in 1914, but they are showing more stamina and enthusiasm.

(Ottawa Citizen, 1 Dec 1939, 15)

 Although there were rumors they were to participate in the Norway campaign, it remained stationed for training and defence at Aldershot. On 12 February 1940, the regiment paraded before their namesake, Lady Patricia Ramsay and the founder Colonel Hamilton Gault. “You are no longer a young regiment but one which possesses a great tradition,” she declared. “As I look around me today it is difficult to remember so many years have gone by. Time seems to have stood still and I feel as though I was speaking again the same men.” In Colquhoun’s case, she was.

He fell seriously ill in August 1940 and returned to Canada, where he was promoted and given command of the 7th Infantry Brigade. Overseas, command of the PPCLI passed to Lieutenant-Colonel J.N. Edgar, another original Princess Pat and a First World War Military Cross winner. Prior to the 7th Brigade embarking for the United Kingdom, in May 1941 Colquhoun relinquished his post to Brigadier Harry Salmon, who would go to lead the 1st Division until his tragic death in April 1943.

Colquhoun remained closely connected with his old regiment in retirement was present to see the Princess Pats off to Korea as part of the Special Force in 1951. A newspaper profile in 1958 described him as “a reticent man, anxious to speak about any topic apart from himself. He is still fighting. These days the struggle is to do the best he can for his old comrades in the PPCLI. Association.”

He died in Victoria, British Columbia on 18 November 1966.