Lieutenant-Colonel G.H. Rogers
Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa

We have had a couple of visits from Fritz planes and some of our boys got into action against him on one visit as he came down very low. They claim to have got the rear gunner as they put it out of action but we have no confirmation. It certainly broke the monotony for them and they are anxiously awaiting for a return visit.

(Ottawa Citizen, 8 Apr 1941, 19)

Born in Ottawa on 28 July 1895, George Harold Rogers was a funeral director, First World War veteran, and commanding officer the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa since 1936. He had enlisted in the 38th Battalion as a private in May 1915, served garrison duty in Bermuda and arrived in England with the unit in June 1916. Promoted to regimental company sergeant-major, he deployed to France two months later. A year later he was recommended for a commission and by 1918 was seconded to the Royal Air Force.

Rogers returned to Canada in 1919 and remained a militia officer in the Cameron Highlanders, which became a machine gun battalion in 1936. It mobilized for active service under Roger’s command and left for garrison duty in Iceland in summer 1940. He described the country as “barren of trees, just rocks, lava, dirt and mountains,” with little to do aside from the occasionally sighting of an Axis plane. After ten months in Iceland, the Camerons moved on to England in April 1941. Rogers remained in command for another year until his return to Canada in May 1942. Major G.F. Clingan took his place.

 As one newspaper noted, “Rogers was a member of the Royal Flying Corps in the last war, and might be expected to find things a little tame on the ground.” He transferred to the Royal Canadian Air Force for special duties. He retired from the military in early 1945 and returned to management of his funeral business, George H. Rogers, Ltd. In 1943, the business had the sad duty of holding the service for Roger’s sixteen-year-old-son, who had been killed in an accident at the family home in The Cedars.

Colonel Rogers died in Ottawa on 21 August 1986.