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Robert Neville Atkinson was born on 21st March 1947 at the Memorial Hospital in Adelaide.  He is the son of Neville Rupert Atkinson, a land valuer, and Nancy Mary, nee Hooper.  He had one sister who died at the age of 42 from breast cancer as did his mother aged 71. Both sides of his family were early settlers in South Australia, the Atkinsons from 1851 and the Hoopers from 1837. Atkinson’s father served in the 27th South Australian (Scottish) Regiment during WW2.  Family members have been dedicated to serving Australia in the military from his grandfather in WW1, his father in WW2 and Atkinson and his cousin in Vietnam. Atkinson was educated at Forbes Primary School and Marion High School. When he took his Leaving examination Atkinson won a Commonwealth Scholarship to attend University at the age of 15.  He started medicine at the University of Adelaide aged 16 years. He applied for the Army Undergraduate Scheme as a medical student but was called up in National Service Ballot system instead. After graduating MB BS he was appointed as an intern at the TQEH in 1970.

Atkinson started his Army career in January 1971 as a recruit with other health services recruits. His initial training was at Puckapunyal, followed by three months officer training at Healesville, Victoria. Under the National Service Act, as a 1st Lieutenant, he could not serve beyond the one year designated National Service period, so he was promoted to Temporary Captain in the Regular Army.  Atkinson volunteered to go to Vietnam. After going to Canungra for jungle warfare training, was posted to 8 FdAmb at NuiDat, South Vietnam. The FdAmb withdrew to Vung Tau. Prior to that time Atkinson was occasionally transferred to 1 Aust Fd Hosp to augment and manage a resuscitation bay along with other activities. Here, as a very junior doctor, he was mentored by Mr Gordon Ormandy, a senior Australian surgeon, who encouraged a surgical career. Atkinson mainly worked in the RAP with minor casualties in 8 FdAmb and more serious casualties in the Field Hospital at Vung Tau.  He recalls his last casualty at Nui Dat was a soldier who had picked up a grenade wrapped in tape which was the usual practice.  However the tape was old and the handle flew up, and the soldier shouted “grenade” threw it straight up in the air to explode at the top of the throw. One piece of shrapnel penetrated the soldier’s boot and injured his tendo-achilles.  All Atkinson heard from his RAP was “grenade”, an explosion and “Ow! Ow! Ow!”

When he was due to return to Australia Atkinson applied to return via the United Kingdom so that he could register for post graduate training in London. However Atkinson’s convoluted travel in his return home from Vietnam caused him to be AWOL for one day. He flew from Vung Tau to Baria, and then to Saigon, where he met up with David Rossi, a colleague from Adelaide. He then flew on a New Zealand Bristol freighter to Penang and then Singapore. He stayed at the exclusive Changi Officers Mess and was finally given a seat on an RAF T jet landing at Ghan and then onto Cyprus and finally landing at Brize Norton airfield in Oxfordshire, followed by train to London. He completed all his registration at London University, had a short stay with some friends, and repeated the same journey back to Singapore, where he caught a delayed RAAF C130 on the milk run back to Melbourne via Darwin and Canberra, then a train back to Adelaide arriving at 3RAR one day late and AWOL. Fortunately his CO thought his complex journey was very enterprising. Two months later he completed his National Service and transferred to the CMF.  Atkinson noted that more soldiers were being injured or killed on the road between Adelaide and Woodside, in the Adelaide hills, than were being lost in Vietnam, thus began his life long career in road safety advocacy.

After seven months in a very busy paediatric position at the Princess Margaret Hospital in Perth, Atkinson then travelled to the United Kingdom, in 1973, and gained a Diploma of Child Health and studied for the surgical primary in London. He took a position in Nottingham with the aim to do paediatric surgery. While undertaking another course at the Rowley Bristow Hospital in Surrey he met Graham Apley who introduced him to orthopaedics, and offered him a job and began his career in this speciality, in 1975.  It was while he was at Nottingham that he met his future wife Pauline, nee Kerr.  She was the principal pharmacist at the Children’s Hospital. The daughter of Andrew Wallace Kerr, a Bank of England clerk, and Pamela Hope, nee Partridge. Her father was a Dunkirk veteran.   They married on 25th September 1976 in West Wickham, Kent and had three daughters, Amy, Beth and Molly.  Prior to their marriage Atkinson had returned to Australia with Pauline and began the orthopaedic training programme in Adelaide.  After gaining FRACS (Orth) in 1980, he travelled on an Australian Orthopaedic Fellowship to Harlow Wood Orthopaedic Hospital, Nottinghamshire in Sherwood Forest, England. Whilst here he travelled widely in Europe and completed a Trauma Fellowship in Germany.

Concurrently with his professional career Atkinson continued with his part time military career. His first posting with the Army Reserve was to 10 Field Ambulance, whilst at the Princess Margaret Hospital in Perth, in 1972. He was posted to a para field ambulance during his time in Nottingham undertaking courses in chemical, biological and nuclear warfare.  His one regret during this posting was not taking up an offer to do a parachute jump from a fully functioning aircraft.  Atkinson was posted to the Adelaide University Regiment (AUR), by Colonel Tom Beare the Director of Medical Services, on his return to Adelaide, in 1975.  He found his service with AUR enjoyable and completely different to his previous Regular Army service, noting he was serving with private soldiers who were studying for their PhDs. Once again back in England he was promoted to Major and seconded to 212 Fd Hosp in Sheffield.  Atkinson returned to Adelaide in September 1980 and was posted to 3rd General Hospital at Warradale Barracks, Adelaide.  Whilst on Exercise Kangaroo 81 in Shoal Water Bay, Queensland, he was withdrawn from the field to attend to casualties from a collision of two New Zealand helicopters.  Atkinson was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, in January 1985, and posted as CO of 3FdAmb. He recalls an amusing incident during a Freedom of the City of Marion parade. Whilst inspecting the troops with the Mayor of Marion, the handler of the mascot donkey gave a ‘brilliant’ salute and ‘belted’ the donkey on the nose.  The donkey took off and Atkinson had visions of the whole parade including the Army band being mowed down.  Fortunately the handler caught the donkey and saved the day.

December 1990, was the beginning of several peacekeeping and other medical support tours for Atkinson. He was promoted to Colonel and posted at CO of 3 Fwd Gen Hosp. Two days later on 1st January 1991 he was posted to the hospital ship USNS Comfort for active service for three months in the Persian Gulf War. This was followed by a posting in the 1st Forward Surgical Team in Rwanda in 1994. He represented the Defence Force in an Australian Defence Trade mission and visited Elizabeth the Queen Mother, the Colonel in Chief of the RAAMC, at Clarence House, London.  He had short service postings to New Guinea and East Timor and served with non-military medical teams in Banda Aceh and Samoa after tsunamis and earthquakes. Atkinson was promoted to Brigadier in 1998. He was appointed Colonel Commandant to the RAAMC, in South Australia, in 2013, and appointed Representative Colonel Commandant, to the RAAMC, in 2014. For his significant service to Australia, Atkinson was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2008. He has also received many other awards and commendations. He was award the Vietnam Medal 1972, Active Service (Vietnam) 1972, Active Service Medal (Kuwait) 1991,  Australian Service Medal (Kuwait - clasp) 1991,  Kuwait Medal (Foreign Decoration)  1991,  Saudi Arabian Medal (Foreign Decoration) 1991, Reserve Forces Decoration 1991, Australian Service Medal (Rwanda - clasp) 1994, Australian Active Service Medal 1945-1995 with  Vietnam clasp 1998, Australian Service Medal (East Timor clasp) 2000, INTERFET Medal 2000, National Service Medal 2003 and the Australian Defence Medal 2006. He has also received a personal citation for Active Service in the Persian Gulf War from the United States Navy 1991, US Navy Unit Commendation USNS Comfort during Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm 1991 and an ADF  Land Command Commendation  1994.

Atkinson takes an interest in all medical military matters and is President of the Naval, Military and Air Force Club of South Australia and a member of the Army Health Services Historical Research Group.  He retired from operative orthopaedic surgery in 2012, but continues to consult and give lectures. He is particularly involved with Veteran Affairs, Road Safety and the AMA, the College of Surgeons and Pedestrian Council of Australia and dreams of owning a bigger boat.

Blood, Sweat and Fears II: Medical Practitioners of South Australia on Active Service After World War 2 to Vietnam 1945-1975.

Summers, Swain, Jelly, Verco. Open Book Howden, Adelaide 2016

Uploaded by Annette Summers AO RFD