大象传媒

Part 3 of 3 parts

Continued from A8119064

Further north there was another main American base called Chungking and he was sent there with an American Lieutenant called Lucia. He was the communications officer. They had to drive themselves from Kunming to Chungking.

That was a long journey through remote China, on their own this time, no convoy. There were lots of Chinese rebels around Chinese deserters who were basically just bandits, and on the way they had to cross from one Chinese Province into another but the border guards were very reluctant to let them through. They had a row there and Lieutenant Lucia just lost his rag, yelled 鈥淚鈥檒l go talk to Chiang Kai-shek about it鈥�, threw up the barrier, and drove through. He just trust to luck they didn鈥檛 open fire.

Then they had to cross the Yangtse on a raft, with coolies with poles. Anyway, they ended up in Chungking and were posted to Peishiyi airfield. They had a problem there with low cloud in the mountains that surround it. (It鈥檚 like a horseshoe surrounded by mountains, but there鈥檚 an entrance from the South that you can go through and land into that airfield. I got an old two-hundred-watt transmitter and put it right due south, and then they had to fly over it at a certain height and the operator would say 鈥淵ou are passing overhead now鈥�, and then he鈥檇 have to do a 180-degree turn and come in on a certain compass and that would come in the hoop of the horseshoe and land. Otherwise they鈥檇 have come down and hit the mountains. I put an old two-hundred-watt transmitter up in a Chinese temple. I don鈥檛 know what religion it was. It was put behind the altar place where there was a big statue. But mind you, in this the Chinese cooperated a hundred per cent. If I wanted something, I鈥檇 say it. There鈥檇 be a hundred coolies there if I wanted an aerial put up. There鈥檇 be a hundred coolies up there with poles all ready to put it up in next to no time).

There were lots of other incidents. One of their transport planes crashed and dad went out looking for it. When they got there of course it was being swarmed by Chinese coolies looting it, so it was a case of going there, fire your revolvers in the air, chase them all off and wait till somebody came.

Another, actually quite famous incident if you follow the history of the AVG. One of dad鈥檚 jobs, being teetotal, was to go in late at night with a station wagon and collect the American pilots who were visiting various bars and brothels in the town, and their girl friends. He鈥檇 go out, blow the horn, and they鈥檇 all come out. The Captain Paul Frillmann that dad knew said that he鈥檇 given up on saving their souls, it鈥檚 their bodies I鈥檓 looking after. But one evening he collected the pilots and brought them back to the airfield or to one of the hostels, and they didn鈥檛 go in. They went to the airfield, they got an old transport plane, a Dakota DC2, and they were mad these blokes. They loaded the fifty-pound bombs into the cargo bay, took off, and flew to Hanoi, and they unloaded these bombs on the Japs in Hanoi. And dad and Baughman had to spend the whole night in the radio shack listening for them to come back. It was totally unofficial. They were jolly good pilots but they were mad.

Anyway, towards July 1942, and this is where the politics cuts in again, General Chennault several times offered dad a chance to transfer him to the AVG. (He asked me if I wanted to change, I said 鈥淚 can鈥檛 do that. I鈥檓 a member of the Royal Air Force, you see鈥�. Anyhow, nothing happened, but what eventually happened, he called me in one day. He said, 鈥淲ell, they made General Bissel a four-star General a day before General Chennault鈥�, so he was his superior, and he said 鈥淚鈥檝e had a message now from General Bissel that I鈥檓 to return you to the RAF鈥�. He said 鈥淚鈥檝e had several requests, but I鈥檝e been able to ignore them鈥�. I didn鈥檛 know anything about 鈥榯hey鈥檇 had requests鈥�. The RAF were hundreds of miles away from where I was, and so I had no contact at all. But apparently they鈥檇 been requesting that I should be returned to the RAF a number of times but he鈥檇 just ignored them. He said 鈥淚鈥檝e been in charge and been able to ignore them鈥� and that鈥檚 when I got returned to the RAF and I got back with them).

There are other details that need filling in.

It was arranged that on July 4 1942, the AVG would disband. They鈥檇 been in active service for a year or more without any leave and they were getting pretty fed up. So the AVG or the 鈥楩lying Tigers鈥� were going to disband, the American 14th Air Force was going to take over, and General Chennault was going to be in charge. Except that the American politics cut in again, and they made this other General a four-star General one day ahead of him. So he was no longer the senior officer commanding in that area. Another thing was they tried to get all the pilots to sign on in the American Air Force but none of them would. So that鈥檚 when the Americans took over and they had no pilots. All the AVG pilots went back to America. I think most of them signed up when they got back and they鈥檇 had a leave. But they were all pretty fed up with the American Air Force. They left it in the first place; they didn鈥檛 like the discipline. General Chennault was a very remarkable man. Dad said that all the time he knew him, he never gave a direct order. He had a great personality. If he said something and he wanted it done, you鈥檇 do it. He had discipline without flag-waving and saluting. He gave two or three of them a dishonourable discharge, but otherwise he was no problem.

One of the things that happened at Cheng Tu was that dad鈥檚 regular duty every morning, was to go round all the radio stations, start up the generators and set them all, make sure they were on frequency and working and everything. He had an old bicycle to do this with. One morning he was cycling round, hit a rut, total collapse. All he could do was carry on, on foot then. After that he came back for his breakfast. As he was walking back, a big American Staff car crawls up alongside, and it鈥檚 the General. (He said 鈥淕et in. What are you doing out here this time in the morning?鈥� Well, I said 鈥淢y bike鈥檚 buckled鈥�. He said 鈥淚 shall be away for a time. You鈥檇 better take my car鈥�. So I had his car for a fortnight to drive backwards and forwards. Of course I had to do the station and I had to go down on the airport to check some of the radios. I used to do about sixteen hours a day. There were no watches like eight hours on and four hours off, you just did it because it was to be done. That was your job).

As I say, the AVG were going to be disbanded and the 14th Air Force was coming in, and the date of this disbandment was to be July 4th 1942, and to mark the occasion and to thank the Flying Tiger pilots, Madame Chiang Kai-shek who was their political Chief, who looked after their interests in China, gave a reception to which dad was invited. (And there鈥檚 my invitation).

Now Madame Chiang Kai-shek is a major, major political personality in the history of China, wife of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. (She spoke English with a slight American accent. She had a beautiful voice. She was lovely to talk to, to be honest). There were three sisters. The three sisters unmarried name was Soong. They were the Soong Sisters. Madame Sun Yat-sen, she was the widow of the ex-President, Madame Chiang Kai-shek and Madame Kung who was the wife of the Minister of Finance. Madame Chiang Kai-shek was the most well known. She had very high political connections in the White House. (I spoke to her several times when I went to that party. And then about a fortnight later I went to a party given by Madame Kung who was the wife of the Finance Minister).

Dad had a conversation with her and he actually told her that he was British. He said 鈥淚鈥檓 in the RAF, I鈥檓 an enlisted RAF man鈥�. She didn鈥檛 know. And of course, there was this point about the Chinese not wanting British personnel in China because of this question about the Burma Road being closed, and she actually challenged dad about this. Now this was a question for the highest diplomatic sensitivity. It was a question for the ambassador. Not for an AC2! I think what you told me anyway dad was that you said 鈥淲ell, the British didn鈥檛 have much choice. The Japanese were threatening to give the Germans U-Boat bases in the Pacific, unless it was done鈥�. Anyway, she was perfectly pleasant wasn鈥檛 she? (She was very nice. I went to parties and she came up, well I met her once or twice afterwards. She knew who I was).

Shortly after that you were returned to an RAF Unit, Cheng Tu. (Yes, well then the RAF had then been allowed to go up to get out. There were all sorts of stray RAF people and British servicemen who got into China one way or another. Most of them were chaps who had been left behind to clear up things at Rangoon, to put sand in the engines and all things like that. They eventually got permission for those to go up the Burma Road but most of them went round back into India).

They flew a Commanding Officer into Cheng Tu to form a Unit called 鈥楻AFChin鈥�, (RAF, China), to which dad was sent, and he went. When he returned to this officer in Cheng Tu he went to be debriefed to find out what had been going on and what he鈥檇 been up to, the officer told dad that the AVG had actually sent through a couple of commendations. (But the officer said because they weren鈥檛 from the Forces of a recognised ally, they couldn鈥檛 be put on my records, and there they are. Normally they鈥檇 have been kept in RAF records. One鈥檚 from the Communications Officer and the other one from General Chennault, and the two small one鈥檚, I think one鈥檚 Chennault and the other is for Long John we used to call him, he was Chief Communications Officer. But they couldn鈥檛 be put on my records, the RAF wouldn鈥檛 accept them so they gave them to me).

Anyway, Cheng Tu, dad was put in charge of a radio station, at a little village called Hog Men Pu and had quite a lot of interesting things there. One of the things that kept happening was that the Chinese, who were dirt-poor, kept on stealing stuff. They kept on stealing radio aerials. Well, there was no glass, they didn鈥檛 have glass windows, they had linen over the windows, and they used to put their hands on get things. The main thing they were stealing was the wire from the transmitter aerials, so not realising, dad or somebody told the Chinese authorities, who went down to the thieves market in the local town, found it, latched onto somebody who may or may not have been the thief, but who now had the wire, marched him back to the scene of the crime, and shot him and left his body lying around 鈥� till it began to smell and everybody complained, then they came and took it away.

(There was constant pilfering from the radio station so they rigged up high-tension cables across the windows and they wired up also all the metal utensils on their cooking range. If the Chinese tried to grab them he鈥檇 get an electric shock, he鈥檇 get a high-voltage shock. Of course, that was right out in the wilds).

Dad was there for just over a year. In August 1943 鈥楻AFChin鈥� was disbanded and a convoy was formed to drive back into India. They drove from Cheng Tu to Kunming over the mountains. Dirt tracks and cold, and slept in the back of the lorries we did then. In Kunming they were put into Dakotas and flown over the hump. The hump being the eastern end of the Himalayas. The Dakotas couldn鈥檛 get altitude to clear all the summits so they flew through the valleys. They landed at a place called Dibrugarh.

That鈥檚 right, and that was the wrong airfield and you had to transfer to another airfield and then you had that crazy American pilot who was showing off. He went hedgehopping with a load of RAF blokes who were going to an airfield about thirty miles away. (When he got out he said 鈥淎ah! Did you see that? I nearly caught a cow on the wing鈥�, and a bloke called out 鈥淚 thought we had a cow in the cockpit鈥�. I always remember that).

They landed in Dibrugarh which is in Assam and then they were loaded onto river boats and went down the Brahmaputra to Calcutta back then finally after two years back in Calcutta again, and went into Barrack Pore and went into routine Garrison duty just servicing radio equipment. (We had the main radio station there at Pore, and looking after the teleprinters. We had about thirty T87s, big old transmitters and from there it was basically routine with a couple more years 1943/44 a couple of leaves in the Himalayas at hill stations Darjeeling and Nain Tal. There鈥檚 two nice stations Nain Tal was beautiful and the life in Calcutta was quite reasonable. RAF personnel were allowed into the European clubs and the racecourses). After that it was just a matter of seeing out these three years of war service.

In October 鈥�44 you had your final leave at Kurseong and then you were sent back to Bombay, waiting for a boat. You had to wait around in the transit camp at Bombay for a berth and then you were shipped on the Mooltan across the Arabian sea and up the Red sea. (I spent Christmas Day 鈥�44 in the Suez Canal at Port Said and transferred to the Strathmore. That was the P&O Liner, a lovely ship that was too. Round Gibraltar, and of course she was sailing without convoy because the Mediterranean by then was clear of enemy activity. And then I went to a radio station up at Leighton Buzzard, an offshoot from Bletchley).

(And that was the end of my Royal Air Force service).

You can see it鈥檚 not a five-minute story and it鈥檚 an out-of-the-ordinary wartime experience. (Well it enabled me to meet lots of interesting people. How many AC2s get to drive a General鈥檚 car - for himself? Or talk with the wife of the President of the Chinese? There was no real what you call military discipline with them (AVG), but they all did their job very well. They didn鈥檛 go on watch and just stop; they鈥檇 work for hours if it were necessary to do it. It was an unusual kind of discipline. It was more self-discipline. I know they drunk a lot and had wild ways and that but they always did their job properly and conscientiously. The fitters and the engineers, although they were a bit wild, they were very conscientious with their work, and I鈥檒l say that).

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