Appeal pioneer soldiers on

The mind is still willing but the body isn’t so sure anymore. If the two can agree on the day, then one of the pioneers of the Red Shield Appeal in Australia will be knocking on doors again during this month’s 50th anniversary collection.

It’s not as easy now for Donald Campbell as it was when the first appeal was conducted in the mid-1960s. He was a 40-year-old major in Melbourne then. Now, he’s a 91-year-old retired commissioner living in an aged-care facility in Sydney, close to his daughter.

“I will know on the day whether I’m good enough to go out collecting,” Commissioner Campbell said.

“My mind and body aren’t as good as they used to be, you know,” he continued. “Oh, mentally I think I’m still up to it, but physically, well, that’s another story, I suppose.”

The Commissioner last year missed his first collection in 49 years. “My support staff let me down,” he said. “But I am keen to get out for the 50th.”

The then-Major Campbell was Divisional Youth Secretary based at Ballarat when he received a call to Southern Territory headquarters (in Melbourne) in late 1962. His appointment was a special mission with the then Major Charles Cross (later Brigadier) of the Eastern Territory. Brigadier Cross was promoted to glory in 2004.

They were to travel to Canada to investigate that country’s Red Shield Appeal, which had been operating since 1942, as well as other Canadian fundraising initiatives. Although his mind today may not be as sharp as it was 50 years ago, Commissioner Campbell kept a diary for every day of his officership. He was highly organised.

His 1963 diary records him travelling by the Spirit of Progress overnight train from Melbourne to Sydney on 8 January. He had afternoon tea with Eastern Territory leaders in Sydney on 10 January and, with Major Charles Cross, flew from Sydney on 12 January, via Suva and Seattle, arriving in Vancouver two days later. They met Canadian leaders on 17 January, arriving back in Australia six months later to report to their own territorial leaders.

Concept adopted

A former Salvation Army officer, John Smith, has intimate knowledge of the starting of the Red Shield Appeal in Australia. He was Southern Territory Information Officer from 1965-75, serving in the early years with then-Major Campbell.

An article that he wrote records that Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Lucas (Eastern Territory Public Relations Secretary at the time), commented: “Like Caleb and Joshua, they Majors Campbell and Cross) returned with favourable reports”.

“While the two territories may mark 1965 as the official start of the Red Shield Appeal in Australia, it was not until 1968 that it was truly national,” he stated.

“In the Southern Territory, it was still called the Self Denial Appeal in 1965 and then became the Annual Appeal and then the Red Shield Appeal, with the slogan Thank God for the Salvos coined in 1969 and adopted nationally after that.”

Pilot appeals were tried in several corps in 1964 in both territories. The Eastern Territory launched the appeal officially in 1965, while the Southern Territory continued with trials for a few more years.

The recommendations of Majors Campbell and Cross from the visit to Canada were adopted “pretty much”, according to Commissioner Campbell. The Canadians had a sound concept.

“There were just a few minor modifications,” Commissioner Campbell said.

John Smith remembers the then-Major Campbell for steely determination and organisation.

“He was an alert, energetic and achieving character. Because he saw himself and the process as change and himself as an agent of change, and with his driving personality and accent on getting things done, he did encounter considerable resistance from all levels of Army administration.

“I believe that without the knowledge, zest, vision, energy and entrepreneurship of Don Campbell, the process of the establishment of the Red Shield Appeal in the Australian Southern Territory would have taken so much longer.”

By Bill Simpson

Caption: Retired Commissioner Donald Campbell, one of the pioneers of the Red Shield Appeal. Photo creditL Shairon Paterson