Malayan Spymaster

by Boris Hembry

  Except for a brief attachment to the 4/3 Madras Regiment, at Barrackpore, I was to serve in clandestine forces of one kind or another for the remainder of the war.

  Stay Behind Party (January 1942 – February 1942)

  As it was late when we left the PD camp, Ronald and I decided to stay overnight in Seremban with our mutual friends Geoffrey and Eve Allan. Geoffrey was in the Posts & Telegraphs Department and was required to stay at his post until very nearly the bitter end to ensure that communications were maintained.

  During the drive Ronald was only able to fill in the barest background of the unit which I was joining and I got to know more in due course from Freddy Spencer Chapman. Early in 1941 the Special Operations Executive (SOE) had set up a small organisation in Singapore to prepare for guerrilla warfare in Malaya. This was No. 101 Special Training School (101 STS), under the command of Lt Colonel Jim Gavin. Six weeks after its formation it was joined by Major Spencer Chapman, who eventually took over command from Gavin. The school was established at Tanjong Balai, about 10 miles west of the city of Singapore, with its object to recruit and train personnel, European and Asian, civilian and military, in guerrilla warfare, intelligence gathering, sabotage and other such activities, as required by GHQ Far East. A royal marine officer, Lt Colonel Alan Warren, acted as liaison officer with GHQ.

  A plan to set up ‘stay behind’ parties had been proposed to the Governor Sir Shenton Thomas, early in 1941. Each party was to be commanded by either police officers or recruits from the Volunteers, who would know the languages and the countryside of the area in which they were to operate, and include Chinese, Malays and Indians. But after the inevitable delays the plans were vetoed because it was considered that any suggestion that the country might be overrun would have a disastrous psychological effect on the native population. Also it was thought that there would be an unacceptable drain on European manpower.

  This decision was only reversed in November 1941, a week before the outbreak of hostilities, by which time it was, of course, far too late to stand any chance of success. The first intake of Chinese, and then only 15, did not start training until 20 December. Two days later Freddy handed over command of the school and headed north to report to Colonel Warren in KL.

  Shortly afterwards Freddy, together with Major Angus Rose of the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders, Frank Vanrenen and another planter friend, Bill Harvey, had made the hit-and-run raid behind the lines which I mentioned earlier. This was in fact Freddy’s first experience of the Malayan jungle, and from about the second week in January 1942 until the end of April 1945, when we succeeded in rescuing him by submarine, it was to be his home.

  Ronald had met both Warren and Spencer Chapman and was full of praise for both. When we arrived in KL he took me straight to Colonel Warren’s office and introduced me to him and Freddy. I, too, took an immediate liking to both men. Freddy and I were to remain the greatest of friends until his tragic and unnecessary death in 1971.

  After some questioning, Warren expressed approval of me, told me that he would arrange an immediate commission for me in the British Army with the rank of second lieutenant, and sent me off for a medical. Having been pronounced fit I was briefed about the forthcoming operation, and detailed to take a commandeered lorry to collect stores – food, water, ammunition, high explosives – in preparation to driving with Ronald to the rendezvous with Freddy and the rest of the party at Tanjong Malim.

  Our party was to consist of Freddy, John Sartin (a regular army sapper and newly commissioned), Ronald Graham, Frank Vanrenen, Bill Harvey and myself (planters), E. O. Shebbeare (game warden), a forestry officer named Shepherd, Ah Lam (radio operator) and Joli, the last two being Chinese. To quote Freddy Spencer Chapman: ‘Sartin was a regular sapper and though I should always be chary of taking a regular soldier on a job like this, he had become sufficiently irregular after instruction at 101 STS, while Vanrenen, Harvey, Graham and Hembry were rubber planters with commissions in the Volunteers and absolutely ideal for such work; they had spent all their working lives in Malaya and spoke Malay and Tamil fluently.’

  I spent a couple of days assembling the stores. I also insisted in having the lorry painted khaki, as I was not particularly keen to be seen driving around in a bright red and blue ammunition truck. Gavin was a great help, and without his ability to pull strings and rank to overcome various quartermasters’ objections, I doubt whether I would have been able to get half what we needed. Even with the enemy only a matter of hours away the Army still insisted on all the appropriate requisition forms being signed before the issuing of stores and equipment. I signed – and was to lose them in their entirety within three days.

  Ronald and I stayed at the KL Station Hotel. As the town was being evacuated and all the usual places of entertainment closed, we found the evenings rather boring, except for the excitement of the air raids. It was amusing to see the hotel servants disappear as soon as the sirens went, leaving us to get our own meals. The Station Hotel and offices was a large imposing building, whitewashed, built in a very distinctive Moorish style, and an obvious target for the enemy bombers. I suppose we took unnecessary risks in not seeking shelter with the hotel staff, but we felt a stiff upper lip had to be shown. Anyway, we helped ourselves to very adequate free meals.

  On 5 January we set off for the RV at Tanjong Malim, Ronald in a car as escort, I driving the lorry that was overloaded with our stores. Vanrenen and Spencer Chapman had already reconnoitred the point of entry into the jungle and the best place to unload the stores. These consisted of canned foods and water, the wireless transmitter, explosives and other demolition devices, hand grenades, and many thousands of rounds of ammunition. Freddy, in his wonderful book The Jungle is Neutral, said that it was quite unsafe to drive by day since the Japanese had complete control of the air and used to fly up and down the road bombing and machine gunning any vehicle they saw. I can confirm this. We left KL shortly after tiffin, I sitting on top of several tons of high explosives and ammunition, and at times appearing to be the sole target for the whole Jap air force. We constantly had to stop and bale out to take refuge in a roadside ditch, but unaccountably were relatively unscathed.

  Some miles out of KL one of the lorry tyres was hit by machine-gun fire and rather than stop and change the wheel I continued driving on the rim until we reached a roadside RASC depot established in some rubber. Here, to my utter amazement, I found Bob Chrystal and Robby Robinson (the latter also a planter from Sungei Siput). Someone produced a bottle of Scotch, so we had several stengahs and discussed what had happened to ourselves to date and the whereabouts of our respective wives (all safe, thank God), while the damaged wheel was being changed. I also told Bob and Robby of our present intentions. Little did I realise at the time that our apparent keenness for the task in hand had persuaded both of them to volunteer for similar work. I do not remember being particularly enthusiastic, but I may well have pretended a false optimism. But it was from this chance meeting on the roadside that the epic story stems of Bob’s three and three-quarter years sojourn in the jungle. Poor Robby died of malaria, but Bob survived, in spite of a recurrence of his duodenal ulcers, several near-fatal accidents, starvation and lonely wanderings through the jungle, to live a happy and contented life with Babs in Australia for more than 32 years.

  Ronald led the way after the wheel change, by which time it was dark. After a harrowing journey finding our way through a constant stream of blacked-out traffic coming in the opposite direction, and another puncture which I again chose to ignore, we limped our way into Tanjong Malim where we were met by Frank at the deserted police station as planned.

  I was delighted to see Frank again, and felt that we were at least trying to keep our ends up and that the envisaged party could more than hold its own against the enemy. This confidence, of course, could not have been more misplaced. In the event the whole scheme was a total shambles and, in the final analysis, led to the beheading in Pudu Prison, KL, of my three very gallant friends Frank
, Ronald and Bill.

  Frank had arranged accommodation in the rest house. He told us that the Army had informed him that we had the best part of a week to get our stores off-loaded and into the jungle, so we felt able to relax and enjoy a bit of a party with a tin-miner friend, John Weekly, and others of the Perak ARP, who were also staying the night on their way south. So, reasonably contented with our lot, we bedded down for the night, and were able to remove most of our clothes – a relief we would not know again for almost four weeks.

  Early the next morning Frank, Ronald, Ah Lam and I set off in car and lorry to a point north east of Tanjong Malim where a track led off to a Chinese-owned tin mine and kongsi. This track had already been reconnoitred by Freddy and Frank when they had also established contact with some Chinese who were expecting us. In exchange for money, rice and opium – the latter two commodities we had found abandoned at the police station – the Chinese, under their headman Leu Kim, had agreed to help us unload and stack our stores under cover in the kongsi before moving them deeper into the jungle.

  The first mishap occurred near the kongsi. The lorry, the punctured tyre now down on its rim, became impossible to steer. Trying to negotiate a sharp bend in the track I lost control and ended up in a deep ditch. However, we were well off the main road and Leu Kim’s coolies were able to unload and move the stores to the kongsi without too much trouble.

  Leaving Ah Lim to keep an eye on the stores, Frank, Ronald and I recced a track leading off into the jungle. We followed this for a mile or so until it ran parallel to a large pipe which carried the water supply for Tanjong Malim down from the hills. We came across an atap hut, probably used by the Water Board labour, and decided that this should be our initial base and that we would arrange for the coolies to carry the stores up and hide them in the vicinity.

  The four of us returned to Tanjong Malim in the car, satisfied that the stores were well hidden, that, given the week which the Army had promised us, we were well ahead of schedule, and expecting that Freddy and the rest of the party would be waiting for us at the police station. We were disappointed but not particularly disconcerted that they were not, as the night was young and we were confident that they would turn up before long. We began to worry when midnight had arrived but they had not. However, we turned in for the night on the floor in the cells, sure that Freddy would arrive in the morning, but unable to sleep because of the noise of the never-ceasing stream of traffic heading south; ominously like an army in headlong retreat. We had scarcely laid down our heads when we were roused by a British officer shouting to enquire who the hell we were and what the hell were we doing? We told him. He then confirmed what we had suspected. The Slim River line had broken and the only British forces between us and the Japanese were two Bofors anti-tank guns sited on the bend in the road about a mile to the north of us.

  So, here we were. No leader, no plan, no maps, no codes, no radio crystals, no explosives expert. No nothing – or words to that effect.

  Not quite the start to the operation that we had envisaged.

  But we decided to carry on with establishing our supply dump in the jungle, all the time hoping that Freddy and the others would turn up. We quickly loaded the car with more rice and opium and with not a little fear and trepidation set off northwards again for our track, passing the anti-tank guns a mile up the road, much to the surprise of the gunners, who expressed their views concerning our sanity in typically British Army fashion. I am sure they did not realise it, but their nonchalant steadfastness in the face of the enemy did much for our morale. We unloaded as quickly as possible and headed back to Tanjong Malim for another load, fully expecting to be fired on by our own guns in mistake for the enemy as we rounded the bend. We stopped to warn the officer commanding the guns that we would be returning. He stressed the need for haste as the enemy’s forward troops were within a couple of miles.

  On our way back, having loaded the car with everything that we could, as we knew that this was to be the last such trip, we stopped and chatted to the British Army rearguard. The young officer and his Lancashire gunners seemed quite unperturbed. Very recently I saw a photograph of two Bofors guns, and the description beneath read: ‘Anti-tank guns sited on the main road near Tanjong Malim, protecting the withdrawal of the British forces.’ I am certain that these were our two guns, as the bend in the road in the picture seemed familiar. It made me wonder what happened to these very brave countrymen of mine.

  We handed over the rice and opium to the Chinese and were happy to see our stores safely under cover in the mine godown. Ah Lam gave the instructions for them to be moved the following day deeper into the jungle to a site which we would recce. Then, having immobilised the car, we four set off for the hills. We had not gone very far when we heard the explosions which signified that the road and rail bridges at Tanjong Malim had been blown – and with them any hope that Freddy and the rest of the party could join us.

  That evening Frank and I went back down to the kongsi to collect stores for our immediate use and to arrange for the rest to be brought up the following morning to the dump site that we had selected. We broke open obvious food cases and loaded our haversacks with a good supply of tinned fruit, raisins, chocolate, tea and a couple of bottles of whisky. The tins were very heavy and with the grenades, ammunition belts and Tommy guns we carried, the journey back to camp was hard work, as the path was steep and made very slippery by recent heavy rain. The plimsolls we wore did not help. Frank, for all his toughness of spirit, was a small man and did not have my strength for portering, so found the going very wearing. Before we left Leu Kim gave us firm assurances that the stores would be brought up as instructed and that the whole job would be completed by nightfall.

  We had a scrap meal and lay down to sleep on a raised platform that Ah Lam and Ronald had constructed with bamboo. Unfortunately the whole thing collapsed, probably due to Ronald’s stentorian snores, landing us all with a painful crash on to the ground. Only Frank saw the funny side of it.

  At daybreak Ronald, Frank and I made our way back down to the kongsi to supervise the loading of the stores, leaving Ah Lam with instructions as to what to do should he suspect there was anyone else in the vicinity. Knowing the Japanese habit of using jungle paths to outflank roadblocks we believed that it would not be too long before they could stumble on our hut. Leu Kim came out to meet us with tears in his eyes – I think genuine – and with the news that his porters had decamped in the middle of the night, taking with them absolutely every item of stores. The Chinese had panicked when they heard that the Japanese were in control of Tanjong Malim and had let it be known that anyone found harbouring or helping Allied soldiers would be summarily shot. Leu Kim denied all knowledge of the coolies’ whereabouts.

  So now we had no food reserves nor wireless set.

  But we did have each other. We had common sense. We had advantages that were not possessed by British troops, or even the enemy for that matter, in that we had knowledge of the native population and their languages. We had a compass. We were not afraid of the jungle, or its inhabitants, animal or human. And in Frank we had a natural leader in whom we had great confidence.

  Nevertheless, we were very disconsolate when we returned to the hut to break the news to Ah Lam, to hold a postmortem and to decide what we were to do next. The operation, the raison d’être for our present situation, was obviously now a non-starter. We knew that there were other ‘stay behind’ parties in the field but, for sound security reasons, we had no idea of their whereabouts, so it was out of the question to try to join up with them. (Incidentally, Freddy had preferred the term ‘stay behind’ to the original official ‘left behind’ party, as the latter sounded too much like abandonment, but we were beginning to think that the first idea was rather more appropriate to our present circumstances!)

  After a meal of bully beef, biscuits and hot tea we all felt much better. The situation was serious but not without its humour. Anyway, nothing could be gained by sitting on our backsides f
eeling sorry for ourselves. We felt confident that we could extract ourselves from our present situation and catch up with the withdrawing army. (Our confidence was, of course, entirely misplaced, as we had omitted to allow for the fact that the Army travelled, for the most part, in lorries on metalled roads, and was in headlong retreat.)

  Frank, quite rightly, decided that it would be unwise to delay our departure from the hut as not only was our presence there known to the Chinese mining coolies, who might betray us for a reward, but it was also possible Japanese would use the track. We gathered what few stores remained and went deeper into the jungle, the last man doing his best to disguise our tracks. We found a small clearing and, not having had much over the past 72 hours we decided to try to catch up on some sleep. This proved impossible because the mosquitoes were hellish. In any case we were soon disturbed by a lot of chattering of a sort that was not usually associated with disciplined troops on patrol so, feeling sure that they were not Japanese, I went to investigate and found a party of Chinese who were fleeing from Tanjong Malim, which was now under the control of the enemy in strength with tanks and heavy artillery, and intent of getting up to Fraser’s Hill by jungle paths.

  We discussed constantly the possible reason for Freddy’s failure to join up with us, and came to the conclusion that the unexpected and precipitate retreat of the British Army, and the blowing of the bridges at Tanjong Malim could be the only explanation. This added to our disquiet about the planning. The more we talked about it the more certain we were that we had been the victims of slapdash planning, over-optimism regarding the ability of the British Army to hold up the Japs, and inappropriate or poor equipment.