Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Family Group:

A Second War ‘Internment Camp Commandant’s’ O.B.E. group of five awarded to Colonel E. D. B. Kippen, Veterans Guard of Canada
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, O.B.E. (Military) Officer’s 2nd type breast badge, silver-gilt; British War and Victory Medals (Lieut. E. D. B. Kippen.); Canadian Volunteer Service Medal; War Medal 1939-45, Canadian issue in silver, mounted as worn, together with mounted companion set of miniature dress medals, good very fine

1914-15 Star (55084 Pte. A. Kippen. 19/Can: Inf:) reverse scratched overall in attempt to obscure naming, otherwise good very fine (6) £280-£340

O.B.E. (Military) Canada Gazette 8 June 1944: ‘Colonel Eric Douglas Bruce Kippen, Veterans Guard of Canada.’
The recommendation states: ‘This officer has completed over five year’s service as Officer Commanding Internment Camps of Prisoners-of-War, having in that period an enviable record of success in several military districts. His last command has been Camp 133, Lethbridge, Alberta, with a prisoner of war strength of upwards of 13,000. He has at all times displayed tact and fairness in dealing with his charges, but has been instrumental in fostering among them the ideals and practical machinery of democratic methods, by both precept and practice. His work has been voluntarily enlarged by exhibiting the same qualities in his dealings with the civil population adjacent to camps so that the relationship between them and the guards and other army personnel has been maintained on a basis of good will and courtesy. His service embraces also the war of 1914-1919 in which he served.’

Eric Douglas Bruce Kippen served in France in World War I, having been commissioned in 1916, severely wounded and taken prisoner in the battle of Cambrai in December 1917. The first three months of his captivity were spent in German hospitals, and then for over a year he was detained at four different camps in Germany until he was liberated in December 1918.

Returning to Canada in May 1919, Kippen obtained his discharge and went into the investment business in Montreal and New York. In 1922 he launched his own investment firm, Kippen and Company, in Montreal. Anxious to serve his country again when the Second War started, the present commanding officer of Canada's largest Prisoner Of War camp volunteered his services, and in June 1940 became a major in the Veterans Guard of Canada. That same month he opened an internment camp at Lle-Aux-Noix, Quebec, for internees from England and received his first prisoners in July. He opened another camp at Farnham, Quebec, in October 1940. Early in 1942 he was posted to the P.O.W. camp at Espanola, Ontario, in command of a guard company, and after a short stay there was sent to the camp at Angler, Ontario. From Angler he went to the temporary camp at Ozada, near Banff, in the summer of 1942. Promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, Kippen was appointed commandant of the internment camp at Angler in September 1942, which was the camp detaining Japanese internees. The following February, Colonel Kippen organised and opened the Prisoner Of War camp at Grande Ligne, Quebec, for German officers, and received his first captives in June. He remained commandant of that camp until moving to Lethbridge Camp in October 1944, at the same time receiving his promotion to the rank of full Colonel. After the war he returned to his investment business, from which he retired as a Director in 1975. Colonel Kippen died at Toronto on 22 October 1988, aged 95.

Arnold Kippen ‘is reported wounded again. He went overseas in May 1915. He was then a lance-corporal, but received his commission on the field [as Lieutenant]. He is 23 years old, and was employed at the Merchants Bank. This is his third time wounded. Last March he was severely wounded, and might have had light duty in England, but volunteered to go back on the firing line.’ (Copied news cutting refers).

Sold with copied research and the book Prisoners of the Home Front, by Martin F. Auger, which contains numerous mentions of Colonel Kippen.