Alfred Robinson

Medals awarded

  • Companion of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath (CB)
  • Distinguished Service Order
  • 1914-15 Star
  • British War Medal 1914-20
  • Victory Medal 1914-19
    MID oak leaf
  • 1939-45 Star
  • Defence Medal 1939-45
  • British War Medal 1939-45
    MID oak leaf
  • General Service Medal 1918-62
    Clasp: Palestine
    MID oak leaf
  • Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal 1953

Medals are shown left to right, as per the bullet point list above.

Alfred Eryk Robinson was born in 1894 into a service family and joined The Yorkshire Regiment on 12 August 1914 as a young officer. His career spanned both world wars.

Alfred Robinson in France, February 1915.

He was wounded at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle, 12 March 1915 and again at Ypres in December 1917.

Promoted to Major in 1932, he served in the Palestine operations of 1938-39 and was Mentioned In Despatches.

During the Second World War he commanding the 1st Battalion in Norway in 1940, earning the Distinguished Service Order.

He showed, “exceptional ability in occupying a defensive position at Otta on 27 April 1940, and holding it throughout the 28th. He extricated his battalion on the night of April 28/29 from very close combat, and succeeded in withdrawing it intact.”

Promoted to Brigadier Commander later in 1940, he commanded the 4th Infantry Division between 1942 and 1944 before becoming the first Commandant General in the RAF Regiment from 1945 to 1948.

Major-General Robinson died in 1978.

At his funeral Lieutenant-Colonel Morgan recollected that on one parade, “an officer looked at me and said, ‘Lay your kit out in front of the Battalion’. I laid out my kit about 20 paces in front of Captain Robinson, my Company Commander. Suddenly he hissed in a large stage whisper ‘What are you missing?’ I hissed back ‘My knife!’ About a quarter of a minute later a knife whizzed through the air and landed near enough for me to lay it out with my kit. What he deservedly said to me after the Parade I cannot remember!”

A comrade simply concluded “He was the Green Howard of all Green Howards”.