大象传媒

This story is taken from an interview with Thomas Nutt at the 2nd Batt RIR event, Campbell College, and has been added to the site with their permission. The authors fully understand the site's terms and conditions. The interviewer was Bruce Logan.
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[High Road to China]
During our time in India the Dakotas had to fly over what was known as the Hump. I did that as - when we were flying I was not air-crew. But the ground-staff had to fly, especially the electrician and a fitter had to fly with all flights. So I volunteered as an electrician and I came too, and I did 1 trip over the Hump into China. On a C-47. There鈥檚 a story written by a famous author, and he talks about the DC-3s flying over the Hump in 1944, but there was no such thing as DC-3s in 1944. They were all C-47s. They were all called Dakotas, but it was 鈥� Higgins, Jack Higgins.

[鈥淭he last place god made鈥�?]
Something like that. And I remember reading that story, thinking 鈥渉e made a mistake in that story, he didn鈥檛 do his homework well鈥�. The difference is the engines, though they have the the manufacturer. The DC-3鈥檚 are much older. The C-47鈥檚 were made by Douglas Dakota also, but they was a later model. But actually, to see a photograph of them, you couldn鈥檛 tell the difference. They鈥檙e a very good aircraft, Dakotas. They still fly them in India. The maintenance is very simple, it doesn鈥檛 take an awful lot of people to work on it. And as they say, a good fitter could have flown one. I didn鈥檛 fly one, but I had to fly all the time because when there was an air test the equipment had to be tested onboard it, to test various other components. In the air, not on the ground.

The Japs eventually, at the Imphal and Kohima battles the Japs were beaten and they retreated. By that time we were dropping supplies continuously to the forward troops. That brought me right up to the beginning of 鈥�45. By that time it was decided to fit radar on the Dakotas. I was sent on a course right to Bangalore, which is on the southern India. Bangalore a couple of months, tired of flying much, but the war in Europe ended. They decided my course should end too, because 鈥� so they sent over a shortlist of radar people then in GB, so a number was sent out and I went back to my squadron, which I was quite happy to do. I spent the rest of my time there.

And then we had, one time we had after another test, we were stationed outside some miles from the town, a small place, I think it was Tidham. And we decided the Australian pilot wouldn鈥檛 mind if we took a run and had a look at Mount Everest, do an air test. That would be all right, it had to be air-tested anyhow. So we flew up, but we couldn鈥檛 fly right round Everest because one side was probably Chinese, or someone occupied at anyhow. They wouldn鈥檛 allow British aircraft to fly over their territory. So I saw Everest from about 20,000 feet.

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