I flew to the isolated outpost of Xuyen Moc. Colonel Warr said it was important to find out if they were friendly people and needed support. The place was immaculate; the leader of the town was clearly a person of some capacity. He was Captain Duc – he had been isolated out there for a couple of years. We made our visits more frequent, supplied them, and pretty soon we were able to open up this road and make it a free passage for the local people to get to market. The standard of living at Xuyen Moc went up, and that produced a kind of rallying effect for us and the district chief. He gave me this lovely baton, hand-carved out of black ebony, with a tiger’s head on top. The 5th Battalion, RAR, has been known since its infancy as the Tiger Battalion. This has been on my bookshelf as a cherished souvenir ever since.