There was something of a story to Hew Dalrymple’s retirement from the Chindits. His was a small patrol, with his rear covered by another unit watching the track by which he was to return. There was a mix-up. The covering patrol left the track early, Japs came through, and David Rose’s old friend Hew met them when expecting no opposition.
‘June 3, reorganisation of perimeter force by Capt T D Ross. June 4, 42 Col sent out patrol under command of Lt. Wallace to patrol high ridge immediately above and beyond their positions. They engaged the enemy and Lt Wallace was killed. Sgt. Kennedy brought the patrol back safely.’
According to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Lieutenant Archibald Mitchell Wallace, of Dundee, age 25, was killed on 2 June. Archie Wallace had been in the process of occupying his new position when the Japs came in with a surprise attack. Other casualties were four wounded. A witness also places the Wallace incident before the Dalrymple wound, so we can assume the war diarist has the days transposed.
Headquarters staff of 14 Brigade were at Nammun, supposedly to take advantage of an airstrip there and co-ordinate supplies, but the airstrip was by no means monsoon-proof. On 6 June Brigadier Brodie left Nammun to take command of the Jocks on Kyunuslai, while G. G. Green led a force of 73 Column and one of 42 Column under Captain Ross, on a long patrol to investigate another mountain pass. The monsoon was going at full strength by now, and the men who had to live in the swamps around the Indawgyi Lake were falling victim to scrub typhus. This disease can take the strongest men down, and these Jocks were severely debilitated and in low spirits just from their working conditions. Everything was wet. Anything that could rot, did so. Anything that could rust, did so. They rested in stinking mud and walked all day in it. It was virtually impossible to light a fire. Whether or not there were Japs around the corner, they had to behave as if there were.
Green’s patrol saw very little action but almost every man was sick with dysentery and/or malaria. Even the men who had so far resisted, and who religiously took their malaria medicine, were now falling victim.
Back at Nammun, supply drops were coming in regularly, mostly K rations but supplemented occasionally with bread and bully beef and more frequently with rum.
Jim McNeilly: ‘When you rested in a safe area, you were getting respite from the Japs but not from the disease, and not from the general depression. Sometimes we would have a kirk parade, which was good for morale. Everybody went, whatever their religion, because the singing cheered you up. There we were, singing hymns in the jungle, while the typhus crept up on us. We didn’t know its name at the time but we knew what it did. You were all right one minute and away the next.’
The battle for north Burma was building up to a climax. While Stilwell’s Chinese headed down from the north towards the Kamaing-Mogaung-Myitkyina triangle, Stilwell ordered the Chindits to harass and disrupt the enemy from the south and make their way for the final assault.
So far, 14 Brigade, the most recently in, had lost 151 men to sickness; 71 had been killed, 95 wounded, and 27 missing. From 77 Brigade, 269 men had been evacuated because of sickness, while other casualties were 172 killed, 415 wounded, 84 missing, and 11 captured. Inevitably, as the fighting grew harder, the monsoon rained more heavily and disease struck ever more virulently, the worst was yet to come. At Blackpool, it had been generally known among 111 Brigade that this was the final job and would be followed by a return to India. By 6 June, with all the sick shipped out, the last men standing were at the north end of Indawgyi Lake waiting for their order to go home. Instead, they were told they were going to support Stilwell’s advance on Mogaung.
Fred Patterson: ‘We had been promised a return to India and possibly home leave. Instead we were reorganised. We only had sufficient men left to make up one column (out of the original five).’
All of what little there was of 77 Brigade attacked Mogaung. To block retreating Japanese, 14 Brigade was to follow the route the enemy would take, but in the opposite direction.
All through the month of June, the various fragments of Special Force manoeuvred, marched and attacked in the worst possible circumstances. The Japanese were well dug in, their defences fully prepared and their communications well established. They knew the Chindits were there, so there was no advantage of surprise, and the previous benefits of rapid mobility – the chance to hit and run – were gone because of the weather and the poor physical state of the men.
As the fight for the Kamaing-Mogaung-Myitkyina triangle went on, Special Force became weaker and weaker but stuck to its duty. On 11 June 77 Brigade reported that the attack on Mogaung had been extremely costly. On 16 June Calvert warned Stilwell that there was very little fuel left in the tank. The promised Chinese support had not arrived and, unless it did, the Brigade would have to give up. Very shortly, he’d be counting 500 men fit to fight, and that was all.
As ever, Stilwell was sceptical to say the least, largely because the casualty figures he had took no account of the physical state of the walking wounded and unwounded. The statistics said that Calvert should have had 3,000 or more on his strength, but the majority of those were in no state to battle with Japs. They were exhausted, monsoon-beaten, suffering from trench foot, sand-fly fever, malaria, jungle sores, and utter weariness. Similar messages were coming from 14 Brigade and 111 Brigade, which only served to irritate Stilwell even more.
Bill Lark: ‘When the mules got a sore, it would be infected and the flies would lay their eggs and maggots hatched out. That gypsy lad, he had a sore and found maggots in it. We used to leave them until the wound was clean and then pick them out with tweezers.’
Black Watch War Diary: ‘June 21, soft elements left Nammun village and halted in the foothills near the lake to await the arrival of the Battle Group from the pass. June 22, fairly hard going owing to the mud. 42 Col in front having difficulty finding correct track. June 23, very hard going owing to mud and hills.’
These were the parts of the Kachin range directly north of Indawgyi Lake which offered the easiest passage compared to the nine and ten thousand footers to the east and west. These were only around 3,000ft to 4,000ft above sea level, 2,000ft above Jock level on the ground, like the Scottish Highlands but steeper, covered in trees, and favoured with a couple of hundred inches of rain a year. Once over, they’d be in the valley through which the railway ran, which, the assumption was, they’d be able to block.
The mud on what passed for tracks was often up to their knees, the rain was non-stop downpour, and word came to 42 Column that the village up ahead was home to 200 Japs and some elephants. A Burrif scouting patrol found that the Japs had left, so the Jocks gave themselves a twenty-four hour stopover. When the locals heard what was intended as a route, they pointed out that in their view – and they should have known – the way was impossible for man or mule. Brigadier Brodie disagreed and went on to look. The consequence was a lot of hard work.
War Diary: ‘June 24, REs now building steps up the hills, the only possible way of getting over the range.’
It wasn’t just the engineers, naturally. Jim McNeilly: ‘In the monsoon we had to build steps up every hill. It was a chance to rest between shifts, which you took turn and turnabout. We all chipped in. We had to build the way up, and then actually get up it with the mules. Very tiring.’
Bill Lark: ‘One lad who was behind me kept saying he wasn’t going to make it. So I said, “Give me your rifle and hang on to my mule’s tail,” and we got him along that way.’
War Diary: ‘June 29, after a wait of four days, Col moved out to tackle the job of getting up the hills, four men being detailed to each mule. Track littered with all sorts of broken harness and dead mules from previous Cols which had used the track. Going hard for everyone as the steps are so high. Col bivouac in Nawku village.’
Starting at 05.00, elements of 42 Column reached the top of the Nawku Pass at 19.30, losing four mules and a wireless set. Perhaps the villagers had been wrong about being able to get through, and the Brigadier
was right.
Stilwell, meanwhile, was becoming increasingly dissatisfied with Special Force. He had won some of his arguments with Lentaigne but the pressure was mounting from the higher command, Slim and Mountbatten, for the evacuation of the whole Force. There was yet another conference on 30 June. Lentaigne said most forcefully that the Chindits must be relieved. In particular, he said that 77 and 111 Brigades were in a ‘very exhausted state and their stamina so lowered that they were unable to resist disease and sickness. Only about 350 men of these two brigades are really effective.’ They had done their duty. Mogaung had been taken by the remnants of 77 Brigade (26 June), which had almost obliterated itself in the process. The Chinese could see to the rest of it.
Stilwell replied that there were enough men left to do some sort of damage, with no need to keep sick men in the line. The region around Mogaung was not clear of Japs, and any that were there could be sent to reinforce the enemy garrison at Myitkyina. Further, there might be a counter-attack on Mogaung. The area had to be secured and held. We had the advantage there and we had to keep it. Special Force must remain, to do what it could.
After struggling through swollen rivers and over jungle-covered hills, the Cams and the raggle-taggle rest of 111 Brigade reached their RV, expecting to be provisioned and rested before an assault on Mogaung. That they made it there at all was partly due to three magnificent elephants and their mahouts, performing all manner of stirling duties.
Fred Patterson: ‘Most days they gave us a two-hour start. They looked big and clumsy but their ground speed was amazing. One of them gave our mules a rest by carrying our wireless and generator, but an elephant loves water, which fact had been overlooked, so it lay down in a river we were crossing and that was the end of our wireless.’
It was soon the end of the elephants too, when they were shot at by someone in a light aircraft who must have imagined they were in Jap employ. This was not part of the bargain, the mahouts decided, and off they went.
Without elephants, more bad news came. The Brigade was to join with a column of Gurkhas and turn back to the south east, to clear the Japs from the Mogaung valley as the town had already fallen to 77 Brigade.
Mountbatten and Lentaigne drew one concession from Stilwell. There would be a medical survey. The sick and ‘unduly weak’ would be taken out, while the rest would concentrate on aiding the assault on Myitkyina, keeping Jap reinforcements and supplies out by patrols and roadblocks.
War Diary: ‘July 1, a day spent in checking equipment and trying to repair and improvise girths for the mules. July 2, patrols, which were out in the direction of Pumkrawng, reported that conditions were worse than the Mokso side of the hills (which they were then climbing) and that it would be impossible to proceed at all.’
So, the locals were right, but the Brigadier wasn’t giving up just yet. Perhaps he knew of Wingate’s edict: ‘No patrol will report a jungle to be impenetrable, until it has penetrated it.’
On July 3, to enable 73 Col to move off, 42 Col gave them all their girths, so they (42) were now dependent on a supply drop of girths before they could move. 73 Col and Brigade HQ moved off but their progress was very slow. Arriving at point 3177 recces were sent off to the east, cutting their way through the jungle, but after a time it was found that it was quite impassable for mules. There was nothing left but to retrace their steps to Nawku, bivouacking for the night at point 3177 in pouring rain. 42 Col sent a patrol to Latang where Japs had been reported digging in around the village.
The patrol, led by Lance Sergeant Todd, came under fire from the dug-in Japs, and the Burrif scouting out front was killed. Todd took his men round the flank, recced the village and attacked the Japs from behind, killing a number. Back at the bivouac, L/S Todd was made full Sergeant Todd. The War Diary describes this incident as ‘a slight skirmish’.
‘July 4, 73 Col returned extremely tired, covered in mud and soaked to the skin. Successful supply drop today included large quantity of gifts. Cols now mobile, where mud allows. The following plan was decided at a conference of the Brigade Commander and Column Commanders. All soft skins, under command of Major Watson-Gandy, to return with mules to Mokso and proceed to Lakhren, and thence across the hills to Pahok where the Battle Groups would join them in about three weeks’ time. The Battle Groups would proceed without support weapons, wireless etc. to the area of Namkwin Chaung to join a Col of 7th Leicesters who had mules with them, and proceed to the original operational area from there.
‘July 5, the rear colns and support plns of 73 and 42 Cols combined into one body and left the Battle Groups at Nawku at 06.30 hrs. Their intention was to join up with Battle Groups at the village of Pahok on the other side of the hills. The march to Mokso was completed in a day. The first signs of foot-rot began to show at this time. The Battle Groups remained in Nawku today preparing for the move tomorrow.
‘July 6, 73 Col Battle Group moved off with Brigade HQ, followed an hour and a half later by 42 Col. The route was along the first boundary track then SE to Namkwin Chaung, a distance of 16 miles. It took the Cols five days to cover this indescribable piece of country.’
Contrary to the conference, arguments in 42 Column reversed the decision not to take wireless. They regretted it in some ways, having to carry such heavy equipment through the worst conditions anyone had ever encountered, but at least they did have some contact with the world beyond the mud. Minds were changed also on the subject of mules, and some were taken to carry the expected sick and wounded, although the animals slowed progress even more.
The Cameronians were experiencing the same horrors. Marching on yet another last job, it took them five days to cover twelve miles, and they could cover no more without a rest for their feet, skinned and raw, and an attempt at recuperation for their skeletal frames. They did take a small village from the Japs, but patrols were largely futile. No movement was possible except along what might have been tracks before the monsoon, and all such were closely watched by the enemy.
On 1 July, 111 Brigade was ordered to advance, led by the Cameronians into an attack on a high point held by the Japanese. Next day, after reviewing the situation and counting about ninety non-disabled, the Cams’ commanders agreed that this order could not be carried out. The only option was to report the Battalion as unfit for action.
For the next two weeks they would be placed on light duties, helping to build an airstrip near Kamaing, by laying brushwood and then metal mesh on a piece of swamp with a hill at one end and trees at the other. They also lent a hand with evacuees, before the last march that really was the last, 24 July, thirty miles to the nearest Dakota airstrip and out by aircraft. Fred Patterson had already gone, one of five men knocked down by malaria and crammed somehow into an L5, one of whom was discovered, as they began their take-off run, to be lying on the control wires.
As Fred said, ‘How we cleared that hill only the good Lord knows.’
War Diary (with soft skins): ‘July 7, more aircraft arrived but not the numbers that were required. The colns were still short of everything bar K rations. A sick convoy went off to Indawgyi Lake, mostly cases of chronic feet and typhus. July 8, quite a good drop of clothing but still short of (mule) fodder. Major C V Watson-Gandy commanding rear coln told Brigade Major ‘No grain, no move’ for 2nd Battalion. July 9, goods arrived. We stocked up and started for Lakhren, a village about 23 miles from Mokso and situated at the top of the Indawgyi Lake. The going was extremely difficult.’
War Diary: ‘July 10, moved at 07.00 hrs. After lunch we left the main track and turned in through the jungle but there was very little improvement. Bivouaced by a large chaung at 18.00 hrs and brewed up.’
For the battle groups, the last part of their trek involved chaungs and gorges which, out of monsoon season, would have been a relatively easy stage. Where chaungs would have been dry, they were now rivers. One was 2ft deep and, as 42 Column waded along, the level rose another 2ft and the flow increased beyond the ability of the men to stand. They took refuge o
n outcrops of rock and waited an afternoon and a night for the flood to abate, with their few mules all but submerged.
War Diary: ‘After very slow and extremely hard going through some of stickiest mud yet experienced, 73 Col arrived at the RV across Namkwin Chaung and met up with the 7th Leicesters. The whole area was muddy and filthy.
‘July 11, 42 Col followed the track made by 73 Col and reached the RV about mid-day. Supply drops frequent and most things issued from Brigade dump. Most people now suffering from foot-rot due to perpetual wet mud and sand from the chaungs. (with soft skins) Ponies are all being used for casualties with foot-rot. Reached bivouac area at 15.30.’
A two-day rest was ordered for the battle groups, with laundry done as best they could. Two days was nothing like enough, of course. They needed months, not days. Some of the Jocks’ feet hardly resembled feet at all.
War Diary: ‘July 12 (soft skins), six more miles to do today. The going got better and reached bivouac area. We are now in contact with rear Brigade by wireless. July 13, feet are worse still. Moved at 07.00 but had not gone 400 yards when we met Cameronians and Brigade was 1,100 yards away. After an hour we were all in our allotted areas.’
Fred Patterson went in search of an old Black Watch pal, Peter Reid. ‘They told me he had gone out with the recce party the previous evening and had been found with typhus and covered in leeches in the morning. He’d been taken to the hospital.’
Peter Reid, 21, from Kinlochmoidart, died on 15 August and was buried at Digboi in India.
David Rose had reached Calcutta and hospital, his prickly heat still giving him hell, though his bullet wounds were healed. The Matron came to see him. She turned out to be one of the nurses who had looked after him while he was recovering from his Somaliland wound.
Jocks in the Jungle Page 16