Lieutenant-Colonel Karl Mitchell
North Nova Scotia Highlanders

If I have to work on this side of the Atlantic, I don’t know of any place I’d rather be than here (Brockville). O.T.C.’s have the most important mission in the army in Canada–preparing future officers who are going to lead the Canadian Army into battle.

(Kingston Whig-Standard, 31 Jul 1943, 2)

Born on 9 March 1894 in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Karl Reginald Mitchell was a Truro pharmacist and First World War veteran. He had joined the Princess Louise Fusiliers in 1910 and went overseas on a reinforcement draft in 1916. He joined the 27th Battalion in France, where he was twice wounded. He ended the war as a corporal. By the Second World War, he served the North Nova Scotia Highlanders at the rank of major.

He succeeded Lieutenant-Colonel Horatio W. Murdock in May 1942 but would command for only a brief time before the over-age policy required his transfer to a reinforcement unit. Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Petch assumed command in September and Mitchell returned home soon thereafter.

In March 1943, he succeeded Colonel Milton Gregg as commandant of the Officer Training Centre at Brockville. One newspaper described the purpose of the OTC under Mitchell’s direction:

The commissioned officers, who graduate from Canada’s officers’ training centres, are among the toughest physical specimens in the Canadian Army at home. It is a hard grind, both mentally and physically, but those who complete the course successfully know they are quipped to lead and gain the respect of the men under their command. This is the reason of the tough training meted out during officers’ course. The commissioned officer has to be able to do the almost impossible.

Mitchell ended the war based at Camp Borden with an infantry training centre.

He died on 12 July 1958 in Toronto.