Harrogate Herald - 2nd May 1917

W H Breare letter

My late lamented friend and colleague, Robert Robinson, had a brother, not so far from Cape Town, South Africa, who has been out there for many years - in fact, from quite a young man - about twenty years, I think, altogether. He was an apprentice of the late Mr Linskill, joiner, and left just before he finished his time. He has not been in this country for sixteen years. When the war broke out he served a year with the African troops in West Africa. He is the youngest brother, and his name is Herbert Robinson. He volunteered for service in France, and has just arrived in England with a South African contingent. Way back in the South African war he assisted in erecting blockhouses, often in dangerous positions. His friends in Harrogate are hoping he will get leave and be able to visit them. You will realise how the wheels of time and circumstance revolve when I tell you that at one time he was admitted into a German colony out there where seldom Englishmen were received, and he worked at his trade as joiner. On the land which the German colony occupied there were diamond mines. A German sent out from his homestead to look after things looked after them too well in his own interests. It was discovered that he was surreptitiously smuggling diamonds away, secreted in cement. The trick was discovered, but before they could arrest him he threw himself out of a window, and received such fatal injuries that he died. Herbert, I thought, must be over military age, but have ascertained he is 37. It shows his patriotism and pluck that he should be willing to embark in another military campaign at his age.

Harrogate Herald - 30th January 1918

Photo Page

In Hospital - Company Sergeant Major H Robinson, South Africans, brother of Mr Richard Robinson, of Starbeck, has been invalided to England with malaria and tonsillitis.