Robertson never forgot that he was a husband, a father and an
American soldier who was born in Alabama. However, he did forget
English and learned to speak only Vietnamese.
Robertson was captured by the Vietnamese and was accused of being a
CIA spy. As a result, he was tortured for a year. He was badly injured
and confused, but finally released and ended up marrying a Vietnamese
nurse that had taken care of him during his captivity. The two had
children and he assumed the name of her dead husband.
Jorgensen says that audiences will “lose their minds” and “come
unglued” when they see Unclaimed. “They don’t hold anything higher than
service to the country,” he said.
Ironically, Jorgensen said that there were roadblocks from the
military in making the film, especially in contacting Mr. Robertson’s
family. One high-0placed government source told him, “It’s not that the
Vietnamese won’t let him (Robertson) go; it’s that our government
doesn’t want him.”
Linda Barnard
writes:
Unclaimed follows the dramatic quest of Vietnam vet Tom
Faunce to prove that the man he was told about while on a 2008
humanitarian mission in Southeast Asia was indeed an Army “brother” who
had been listed as killed in action and subsequently forgotten.
Faunce, a soft-spoken man who has suffered crushing loss and turmoil
throughout his life, has devoted himself to helping the world’s most
desperate people. He was determined to make good on his vow to leave no
man behind after serving two years in a war that divided America and
made him feel like a pariah when he finally came home.
“Tom went to meet him (Robertson) and was very skeptical, grilled
this guy up and down trying to get him to break, to say, ‘Oh, no, I’m
just making it up.’ And he was adamant he was that guy,” said Jorgensen,
who was in Toronto to help host an invitation-only patrons’ screening
of
Unclaimed at the
Hot Docs Bloor Cinema two weeks ago and sat down for an exclusive interview with the Star.
Robertson’s story seems unbelievable. And Jorgensen was equally
skeptical when Faunce contacted him in 2012 about making a doc in the
hope it would add muscle to his quest to reunite Robertson with his
American family.
The film is complete with a touching meeting of Robertson and a
soldier he had trained in 1960 and also a very moving scene when he is
reunited with his only surviving sibling, 80 year old Jean
Robertson-Holly, who had no idea that her brother could even be alive.
According to Jorgensen, “Jean says … ‘There’s no question. I was
certain it was him in the video, but when I held his head in my hands
and looked in his eyes, there was no question that was my brother.”
Both the soldier and the sister claimed there was no need of
verifying fingerprints and DNA because they knew him at first sight.
However, attempts were made to have DNA testing with his American wife
and two children, but though they had previously agreed, they abruptly
declined.
“Somebody suggested to me maybe that’s (because) the daughters don’t
want to know if it’s him. It’s kind of like, that was an ugly war. It
was a long time ago. We just want it to go away,” says Jorgensen. “I
don’t know. What would compel you not to want to know if this person is
your biological father?”
Hugh Tran, a Vietnam-born Edmonton senior police constable, was with
Jorgensen to act as a translator between him and Robertson. He could
find no evidence of an American accent at all. “To tell you the truth,
after I interviewed him the first time, I was 90 percent sure he is
MIA,” said Trans. “I still didn’t believe . . . until I saw the family
reunion.”
Though Robertson appears to forget his birthday and even the names of
his American children, Jorgensen says that there are moments that were
not in the film where his memory is quite sharp.
“These memories pop
out,” says Jorgensen. “I’ll give you an example that’s not in the movie.
The minute he (Robertson) walks in that room in Edmonton, he knows it’s
Jean. He says to Henry, her husband, ‘Oh, I remember, you worked in the
drugstore.’” Jean’s husband had been a pharmacist for 50 years.
Both Jean and her husband want answers as to why he was left in
Vietnam. They were both involved in a car crash within days of their
reunion with Robertson.
Mr. Robertson is back in Vietnam now, having fulfilled a long awaited
wish to see his American family one more time before he dies.
When I think of men like John Kerry being promoted to Secretary of
State after the treasonous actions that he engaged in and the
politicizing of his “service” in Vietnam in his presidential bid and I
compare him to someone like Mr. Robertson, I genuinely am disgusted with
how such a man could ever be seen as anything but a coward. Perhaps if
enough people were to flood the U.S. State Department on behalf of
Robertson’s sister and brother-in-law, the pressure might be enough to
get some answers for this family that were separated by nearly a half a
century.
Unclaimed is
scheduled to be screened at the G.I. Film Festival in Washington, D.C. in May. Please visit the
Unclaimed website
or take the time to introduce this generation to what men like Mr.
Robertson and many in this audience have endured in the service of their
country.
