大象传媒

How I heard about the bomb

On VE Day I started my real war. I had been in the TA, so by then I鈥檇 had over 6 years鈥� service, but apart from a busy time in the Heavy AA at Dover in 1940 my involvement with the enemy had been nil. In India, after a long struggle I got into V Force, which had been involved in short-range penetration behind the Japanese lines since 1942. By 1945 it was long-range penetration that was required, so it was that on that day I was parachuting with a brother officer and two radio operators into Burma on the Siamese (Thai) border east of Moulmein.

We joined other officers, and air drops provided us with arms for the Karens who volunteered to join us. We were confined to collecting intelligence - guerilla fighting was going on much further north. In early August I went to set up a post to count the traffic on the road to Siam. We were betrayed by a villager who was afraid that his village would be punished by the nearby Japanese. They took us by surprise early one morning - our group of a dozen or so left one side of a clearing as the Japanese entered the other side.

A few days later it happened again. By that time my radio had gone wrong so I had no communications. I decided to return to our main body (not knowing that they had moved). We set off back the way we had come so optimistically a little while before. On the second day, after we had got over the main range westwards, I slipped onto my knees whilst wading across a rocky chaung, with the water well up my thighs. I caught my shin a hefty crack on a rock. It hurt a bit, but I was more concerned about how much water had got into my kit. At the first halt I looked at it and disinfected the small area of broken skin. I cleaned it again at night and it looked all right, though it kept me awake for a time. Next day we had a six-hour march ahead of us including quite a stiff climb I managed it but the leg began to hurt and I was glad when we reached a hut where I decided to spend the night.

When I took off my soaking clothes I found that my right leg from knee to ankle was double the size of my left. Half an hour later I couldn鈥檛 put my foot to the ground. I had a slight headache so I took my temperature. My second shock of the evening - it was 102潞, and my pulse was 120. The thing for a fever was a sweat, so I set about getting one.

There was no hot tea, but I had hot water, put in half what was left of my precious rum, and took three aspirins. Some time earlier we鈥檇 been offered water-proof jackets by Calcutta. What idiot thought they were any good to us I don鈥檛 know but in our ignorance we said 鈥淲hy not?鈥�. When they arrived they were obviously made for Europe in the winter; heavy, and warmly lined. I felt reluctant to throw away such a beautifully made garment, though I was often close to doing so when I thought of its weight in my pack. It was worth all the effort of carrying it around just for the four days I wore it then.It brought me out in a tremendous sweat and I fell into a sleep filled with horrifying nightmares. I woke and found I鈥檇 only been asleep an hour or so. There was nothing to change into, so I stayed in the same clothes and did my best to keep warm. My temperature was down by just one degree. I had drunk all my water and dragged my way past sleeping bodies, looking for some. I couldn鈥檛 find any anywhere in the hut, and I lay thirsty all night and listened all night to the chaung rushing by outside and out of reach.

In the morning I sent all but two of my levies to a hut a few miles away, where they would be safer and less conspicuous. My interpreter, Saw Donald stayed, and made me chicken soup for every meal for days. My leg started discharging a little. It was so hard I couldn鈥檛 tell bone from muscle and it was too sore to press and probe. When I pressed my thumb in it took quite a time for the indentation to come out again. On the second day I couldn鈥檛 even stand upright on my left leg because of the pain, and to add to that I developed a very sore throat.

Some of my levies made a litter out of a bamboo pole and a blanket. I held on as well as I could whilst they carried me some five hundred yards, up and down steep slopes, to a dirty little taungya hut right away from any tracks where I felt much safer. (I was glad I didn鈥檛 know then that it was in such a hut that one of the officers in our group of four had recently been caught and killed)

My sore throat got worse. I decided to try some M & B 693 powder. I took it three times a day. I gargled with potassium permanganate,.The chicken soup continued; bananas were brought, but they were still green, and eggs, but they could not be eaten whilst I was on M & B. After five days my temperature was down to my normal 98潞 and I felt much brighter. I took a little more M & B for luck and hobbled with a bamboo crutch down to the chaung where I lowered myself into the water. The leg was still swollen but I was on the mend.

I was well enough to appreciate my surroundings; tree-clad hills, foaming white water rushing down a rocky chaung, and supplies of food from the villagers - pork, duck, eggs and bananas. Were it not for the fact that the Japanese from Kawkareik, about eight miles away, were sending out daily patrols to look for us, I could have enjoyed convalescing in those surroundings.

As soon as I felt up to it I moved to yet another hut, so that as few people as possible knew our precise whereabouts. I was very conscious of the dangerously short warning we got at Kwingale, and the barely adequate one the next time..

That afternoon the headman of Katoeta came with the news that all the people in Kawkareik who had been arrested - many Karens suspected of helping us, including Saw Taw Naw, had been put in jail - had been released. It had taken five days for news of the releases to reach me, six miles away, so frightened were the villagers of travelling. There were distorted rumours of a six-month armistice, that the Japanese had announced that there would be no more bombing, and other strange stories. The last news I had had on affairs in the outside world had been on 29th July, and even then there had been news that the Japanese had taken over three hours to discuss a call for unconditional surrender before turning it down. It seemed to me that something could have added to the growing pressure on them and it seemed quite credible that hostilities had ceased. I was by no means sure enough to do anything about it though. I asked for every scrap of information to be brought to me. (The first atomic bomb had been dropped on Hiroshima on 6th August 1945, and the second two days later on Nagasaki. The actual official surrender of Japan was not signed until the 23rd September.)

Early next morning - 24th August - an ex-forest ranger was brought to me by the headman. He had been arrested for spying, and was one of those released six days earlier. He told me that there had been a message from Moulmein, and all the Japanese soldiers were very upset, and a proclamation had been read to the townspeople saying that the Japanese had decided to make peace for six months as the Americans had broken international law and dropped a gas bomb which had killed 350,000 Japanese women and children. The Emperor had decided to make peace to save further loss of life.

It seemed a strange jumble of information but clearly it had some foundation in fact and I announced my intention of going into Kawkareik to see what was happening. Nobody thought it a very good idea - they all wanted to send someone into town to 鈥渓isten鈥� for a few days first. Even Donald was perturbed, though he didn鈥檛 say much. Having been denied the opportunity to do some ambushing and play a really active part in the war I was determined to do something I could remember afterwards. I told the levies I intended to lead the first British Force into Kawkareik and anyone who didn鈥檛 want to come could stay behind. They all came.

It was quite a pleasant change to be able to move along main tracks in daylight. We passed through Myohaung, the first big village, without incident, and then crossed miles of paddy to Taubingon, a large village about two miles from Kawkareik, almost a suburb. The guide suggested we spoke to the headman and I asked to be taken to his house. Instead I was taken to an elder鈥檚 house and he had to send for the headman. Instead of saying 鈥淎 British officer wants to see you鈥�, he sent to say 鈥淭here are some men to see you鈥�. The headman arrived with two Japanese and when they saw us they all turned and ran towards the town. They seemed to think we were dacoits. To add to the confusion one of the elders said that he鈥檇 heard nothing about any armistice. On hearing this the porters who had been carrying some of our kit from Katoeta turned and fled. Despite my leg, which was very sore, I had to carry my pack and to add to our discomfort it simply pelted down with rain. I felt very bedraggled and scruffy as I approached the town.I noticed that our radio operator - a trained soldier - had moved to the front and was very alert, with his carbine cocked and ready. Everyone was jumpy and I was scared that someone would be unnecessarily quick on the trigger. We reached the first houses where we had been told Jap soldiers were billeted and there they were, sitting at the windows or under the porches. They didn鈥檛 move and I breathed a sigh of relief. Some of them grinned - at least I assumed it was a grin though I鈥檇 never seen a Japanese close enough before to know what his grin looked like! - others looked morose. I stuck my chest out and tried to look like a conquering hero!

When we reached a traffic control point there was a sentry. He spoke a little Burmese and through an interpreter I asked to be taken to the garrison commander. He led me to a house just across the road. There I met a lieutenant and repeated my request. He asked me to come in and sit down. He must have been an intelligence officer and was apparently under the impression he was interrogating a prisoner! I stated that I was informed of the armistice and had come from the hills to establish my headquarters in Kawkareik until the arrival of the main British forces.

Having asked my name he said 鈥淗ow do you know that the war is over?鈥� This was a teaser - I certainly didn鈥檛 want him to know how little I knew. 鈥淔rom leaflets dropped by our aircraft.鈥� This was a guess. We had heard a plane last night and picked up a lot of leaflets, but they were all in Japanese. 鈥淗ow do you know what was in the leaflets?鈥� I took the initiative; 鈥淚 am not at liberty to disclose the name of my interpreter.鈥� The whole conversation was interpreted from English to Burmese to Japanese so I had time to think out my answers.The next question was 鈥淗ow many men are there in the British forces?鈥� 鈥淚 see no reason why I should answer that question.鈥� 鈥淎s you do not wish to discuss military matters we will talk of other things. Before the armistice the British and Japanese, they hate each other very much, now the war is finished we can be friends.鈥�

The arrival of tea and cakes saved me from answering. A major came in and we were introduced, and he, with oriental politeness expressed regret at the hard time we had had in the hills (I must have looked even worse than I thought!). I found later that this officer was head of the Kempentai - the secret police - and that he had left immediately afterwards for Moulmein, perhaps fearing that I should inflict the summary justice that he deserved for the treatment he had meted out to the locals for over three years. I had not heard then of the massacres of over 400 villagers at Kalagon as a reprisal for help they had given us. (This was later the subject of a War Crimes Trial).
Tea over, I was taken to the main headquarters to see the colonel in command. As I walked through the streets, accompanied by the lieutenant and followed by my eighteen levies (now considerably more confident than they had been) I tried to give the local people the impression that the British had arrived and that the Japanese would soon be gone. People came to their doors and the bolder ones - mostly Indians - made timid salaams. I acknowledged these as ostentatiously as I could as I guessed it would annoy my escort.

At the Hq I sat in an office downstairs while the colonel, who was out, was sent for. Various warrant officers came in and out - some perhaps just to look at the strange visitor - and it was hard to think that they, or people like them, had chased and all but caught us barely two weeks ago. They all saluted a small box on a mantle-piece and a Burmese interpreter told me that it contained the ashes of eleven soldiers who had been killed.The colonel arrived after about twenty minutes and I was taken upstairs.

We shook hand and a polite greeting was translated each way. He offered me a cigarette and I decided it was easier to accept than refuse through two interpreters. Things seemed to be under control so I put my cards on the table and said that I had lost touch with my Hq due to radio problems and had decided to come to live in Kawkareik until I could get in touch by runner with the rest of my party. I asked if the British had occupied Moulmein yet and he claimed he didn鈥檛 know. It was hard to believe that he had no wireless communication with Moulmein. He said that Mountbatten and the Japanese commander were meeting in Singapore.I asked how many men he had in Kawkareik and he said 鈥�2,500, but don鈥檛 let that worry you鈥�. Twenty-five could have caused us problems so I didn鈥檛!

I told him I required accommodation and rations until I could make my own arrangements. Food was very scarce, he said but he could send up firewood, rice, salt, candles and matches. He asked if we all ate pork and beef, and when I said yes, he said he鈥檇 see what he could do. We stood up, bowed, and he pressed two packets of cigarettes on me as I was escorted out by a captain. I collected my levies and we were led to a huge dilapidated house on the Myawaddi road. I told the levies to behave themselves circumspectly - the colonel had suggested that our troops did not mix, and I heartily agreed - and got out of my wet clothes.

Within half an hour a huge crowd had gathered outside and I had to go to the window and make the first of many speeches. Then the people swarmed inside with gifts of food (the colonel had said that food was scarce - either he was lying or it was very well hidden from his foragers). There were chickens, ducks, eggs, butter, milk, vegetables, fruit - some of which I didn鈥檛 recognise - and a complete beef curry for all of us. An unforgettable and unrepeatable experience. Crowds stood in the doorway to watch me eat. I felt the way animals must feel in the zoo! I took out a pencil to write a message and a fountain pen was thrust into my hand. Fortunately it was soon dark and people went home.

I suffered badly from indigestion all night.I lay reflecting that precisely six years after I had been embodied in the territorials I had become the first free Britisher to enter a town in southern Burma since March 1942. Was that worth six years of my life, I wondered? In all the excitement I had almost forgotten the major implications - the war was over and we鈥檇 all be going home soon.

It was late September before we were allowed into Moulmein. I arrived home just in time for Christmas leave. I should not have enjoyed myself so much had I known that the new Labour Government was going to abandon the loyal Karen people to their fate under a Burmese government that, 60 years later, is still killing those Karens who have not yet been forced into the refugee camps in Thailand.

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