Another Man's War
Page 34
‘To the African, singing’: D.F. Mackenzie, ‘Songs of the “Happy Warriors”’, Victory, 23 July 1945, p. 9.
‘High spirited, gay, fond of joking’: Howard Jardine, ‘Introducing the West African’, Madras War Review, 15 June 1945.
‘there have been three cases of rape’: Letter from Captain S. De Glanville CAO Arakan Hill Tracts, 26 February 1944, ‘My Dear Brigadier’. This letter is part of the collection of documents from British officials involved in trying to restore British administration in the Arakan during the war. It is kept in the Public Records Office in Kew. PRO WO 203/309.
They killed three people: Robert Mole, The Temple Bells Are Calling: Memories of Burma (Pentland Books, 2001), p. 199.
‘the pungent scent of the West Africa Coast’: Inspiration for the smell of the West Africa Coast from Bull, Palm Oil Chop.
‘He came to me, shook my hand’: Isaac Fadoyebo, A Stroke of Unbelievable Luck (Madison: University of Wisconsin–Madison, African Studies Program, 1999), p. 57.
11. Great awakening
‘This war has brought about a great awakening’: Kakembo, An African Soldier Speaks, p. 20.
‘The men were in high spirits’: n.a., ‘Wounded Nigerians From Far Eastern Theatre’, Nigerian Daily Times, 25 April 1945.
‘appreciate the grimness of the ordeals’: n.a., ‘Heroes from Burma’, Nigerian Daily Times, 25 April 1945.
‘various stages of deformity’: n.a., ‘Sir Gerald Whiteley Welcomes Nigeria’s War Wounded From Burma Front’, West African Pilot, 25 April 1945.
‘he read as much as he ate’: n.a., ‘Tough-Talking Chief Enahoro’, Drum magazine, August 1959, quoted in Sally Dyson, ed., Nigeria: The Birth of Africa’s Greatest Country (Ibadan: Spectrum Books, 1998), p. 158.
‘the angriest young man’: Ibid., p. 157.
‘So long as the British Empire remain steadfast’: n.a., Nigerian Daily Times, 20 August 1945.
‘the achievements of the West African soldiers’: Lieutenant General Burrows quoted in Nigerian Daily Times, 20 August 1945.
‘uphold the traditions of their fathers’: Hugh Stockwell, Arakan Assignment; The Story of The 82nd West African Division (New Delhi: Roxy Press, c. 1946), p. 2.
‘felt an intrinsic pride’: n.a., ‘Welcome Heroes!’, West African Pilot, 25 April 1945.
‘an electric shock’: Sylvia Leith-Ross, Stepping-Stones: Memoirs of Colonial Nigeria 1907–1960 (London: Peter Owen, 1983), p. 119.
‘Having fought for liberty’: Kakembo, An African Soldier Speaks, p. 46.
‘we could only imagine as the worst monsters’: Waruhiu Itote, ‘Mau Mau’ General (Nairobi: East African Publishing House, 1967), p. 14.
‘ “At least if I die in this war” ’: Ibid., p. 10.
‘a good looking young man, diligent’: John Nunneley, interview, 20 December 2009. When I met Nunneley in his home in Richmond, he was eighty-seven years old and still sprightly. I had sought him out after reading his haunting account of the Japanese retreat after the battles of Kohima and Imphal in his book Tales From the King’s African Rifles. After the war, Nunneley campaigned for reconciliation with Japan. He died on 27 July 2013, aged ninety. The Daily Telegraph ran this obituary: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/10331623/John-Nunneley.html.
‘Gandhi taught us’: Plaut, Africa and The Second World War.
‘The whole area appeared under-populated’: Hamilton, War Bush, p. 316.
‘One cannot help but wonder’: Ibid., p. 318.
‘Man will kill himself’: Ariyo, Oju Mi Ri Ni India, p. 88; in Yoruba and translated by Yinka Oke.
‘a devastating blow’: Richard Ryder’s papers in the Rhodes House collection of officers’ papers. RHL, MSS.Afr.s 1734, Box X, R. Ryder.
One policeman was stabbed: Private diary of Headley Vinall, courtesy of daughter Margaret Scord.
‘they started being less punctilious’: Hugh Lawrence, interview, April 2013.
‘given up all hope of being employed’: The letters to Hamilton from his former soldiers are in his private papers in the Rhodes House collection of officers’ papers. RHL, MSS.Afr.s 1734 (168).
‘Our World War II veterans must be made to enjoy’: n.a West African Pilot, 10 July 1945 quoted in G.O. Olusanya, ‘The Role of Ex-Servicemen in Nigerian Politics’, Journal of Modern African Studies, vol. 6, no. 2 (August 1968), p. 227.
‘every white man we saw’: Somerville, Our War, p. 319.
‘looking back…in comparison with the tumults’: Basil Davidson quoted in Plaut, Africa and the Second World War.
‘I am opposed as there is always a danger’: Private diary of Hugo Marshall, 1 March 1948, courtesy of his grandson Peter Cunliffe-Jones.
the same tactics, and often the very same personnel: Wendell Holbrook, ‘British Propaganda in the Gold Coast, 1939–1945’, Journal of African History, vol. 26, no. 4 (1985), p. 360.
‘every soldier who went to India got new ideas’: Plaut, Africa and the Second World War.
‘It was as if a dead man was back’: Fadoyebo, A Stroke of Unbelievable Luck, p. 60.
12. The cries turn to laughter
‘Your son went…The cries turn to laughter’: Quoted in Ariyo, Oji Mi Ri Ni India, p. 96; in Yoruba, translated by Yinka Oke. The original text reads:
Omo nyin re Soja
E mi sunkun
Abode soja
Ekun d’erin o.
‘He was shot with another soldier’: Adedeji Onafade, interview, Emure-Ile, Nigeria, 16 January 2013. She estimated her age to be eighty-four.
‘There was joy on everyone’s face’: Thomas Olajide Adegbola, interview, Lagos, 24 January 2013.
‘Let us just thank god that I’m alive’: Isaac Fadoyebo, interview, Lagos, 29 November 2011.
‘I was not prepared to have my leg further mutilated’: Fadoyebo, A Stroke of Unbelievable Luck, p. 61.
‘unexpected and premature departure’: Ibid., p. 61.
‘careless and fond of going out’: Ibid., p. 5.
O Levels, and then A Levels: In the British system of education, pupils typically took up to a dozen subjects at O Level at the age of fifteen or sixteen. They still take A Levels at the end of secondary school, typically in three or four subjects, and A Level results tend to determine whether and where a pupil goes to university.
‘The town was very quiet’: Esther Salawu, interview, Lagos, 22 January 2013.
‘the tumble of houses’: Leith-Ross, Stepping-Stones, p. 165.
small-time gangsters known as jagudas: n.a., ‘In Praise of Lagos’, Drum magazine, December 1960, quoted in Sally Dyson, ed., Nigeria, p. 272.
Aduke Alakija: All Aduke Alakija quotes come from an interview in London, 30 April 2013. She had just celebrated her ninety-second birthday.
‘inter-racial bonhomie’: Elspeth Huxley, Four Guineas: A Journey Through West Africa (London: Chatto and Windus, 1954), p. 188.
‘utterly different…a proud assertive people’: Margery Perham, West African Passage: A Journey through Nigeria, Chad, and the Cameroons, 1931–1932 (London: Peter Owen, 1983), p. 25.
starting to feel out of place: Leith-Ross, Stepping-Stones, p. 167.
‘created and fostered by our own politicians’: Nelson Ottah, ‘Tribalism Is Nigeria’s Deadliest Enemy’, Drum magazine, February 1960, in Dyson, ed., Nigeria, p. 191.
‘Never has there been such a delirium’: Bayode Rotibi, ‘It’s Our Last Lap to Freedom’, Drum magazine, September 1960, in Dyson, ed., Nigeria, p. 238.
‘Nigeria, we hail thee’: ‘Nigeria We Hail Thee’ was Nigeria’s national anthem from 1960 to 1978, when it was replaced by ‘Arise O Compatriots’. Both anthems are in English.
‘genius’: n.a., ‘Lumumba’s Offensive Speech in King’s Presence’, Guardian, 1 July 1960, http://www.theguardian.com/world/1960/jul/01/congo.
‘Nigerians, in their hour of triumph’: n.a., ‘How We Celebrated Independence’, Drum magazine, January 1961, in Dyson, ed., Nigeria, p. 278.
‘I think w
e rushed independence’: Aduke Alakija, interview, London, 30 April 2013.
‘Officers began to retire’: Chinua Achebe, There Was A Country (London: Allen Lane, 2012), p. 48.
‘comrade in adversity…big hearts’: Fadoyebo, A Stroke of Unbelievable Luck, p. 37; Isaac also used these phrases to describe the Japanese in conversations with me in Lagos and Emure-Ile, Nigeria, in April 2011.
‘We would picnic under the trees’: Nike Ajayi, interview, Emure-Ile, Nigeria, 16 January 2013.
‘alive with girls, cars’: Sam Uba, ‘Irrepressible Lagos’, Drum magazine, July 1967, in Dyson, ed., Nigeria, p. 169.
‘He’s a human being’: Tayo Fadoyebo, interview, en route from Lagos to Emure-Ile, 15 January 2013.
‘I live a simple and contented life’: Fadoyebo, A Stroke of Unbelievable Luck, p. 5.
‘If you build on a faulty foundation’: The quotes from Isaac about the problems of Nigeria come from long conversations between us in Lagos on 29 November and 3 December 2011.
13. Into a ravine
‘The shining, beautiful car…into the ravine’: Leith-Ross, Stepping-Stones, p. 176.
‘I thought they would fix my leg in hospital’: Isaac Fadoyebo, interview, Lagos, 29 November 2011.
‘At least that was the number a couple of months ago’: John Adolie, interview, London, January 2013.
The 1921 census…The United Nations: Statistics from Alistair Sommerland, Lagos Island: A Short History (British Deputy High Commission, Lagos, 1998); Kaye Whiteman, Lagos: Cities of the Imagination Series (Oxford: Signal Books, 2012); and UN World Urbanization Project, ‘World Urbanization Prospects: The 2011 Revision’, p. 7, http://esa.un.org/unup/pdf/WUP2011_Highlights.pdf.
14. Here you left us
‘Wait and look…Here you left us’: Quoted in Ariyo, Oju Mi Ri Ni India, p. 85; in Yoruba and translated by Yinka Oke. The original text reads:
E duro ke e wo ihin
Enyin ero ti nkoja
Lati iha iwo orun Afrika
Lati ile tutu Yuropu
Lati inu orun gangan India
Lati ona jinjin Australia
Ni a ti wa fie mi wa le’le
Ni ese mefa sisale ile yi
Ni egungun wa sun
Bi e de’le, e ba wa wi fun
Awon wonni ti a ko ba ni ipin
mo laiye pe
NIHIN NI E FI WA SILE SI.
some 185,000 Japanese soldiers were killed: Izumiya Tatsuro, The Minami Organ, transl. by Tun Aung Chain (Translation and Publications Department, Higher Education Department, Rangoon, 1981), p. 206.
It wasn’t just Rangoon that was in ruins: Details from Michael W. Charney, A History of Modern Burma (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), p. 58.
‘the rules of the game had changed’: Balwant Singh, Independence and Democracy in Burma, 1942–1952: The Turbulent Years (University of Michigan Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies, 1993), p. 6.
‘The speech done, he gave away the awards’: Ibid., p. 22.
‘almost without exception, lazy’: Mole, The Temple Bells Are Calling, pp. 246, 250.
‘the African could speak no Burmese’: Ibid., p. 235.
‘The Africans have been officially warned’: John H. McEnery, Epilogue in Burma 1945–1948: The Military Dimensions of British Withdrawal (Staplehurst: Spellmount, 1990), p. 56.
‘the last great manifestation’: Ibid., p. 56.
‘The Burmese had been a proud people’: Mole, The Temple Bells Are Calling, p. 289.
‘In a way…the Second World War never really stopped’: Myint-U, The River of Lost Footsteps, p. 258.
supplying ten thousand rifles: Ibid., and John F. Cady, A History of Modern Burma (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1958), p. 598.
‘Even to a child’: Wendy Law-Yone, interview, London, June 2013. See also Wendy Law-Yone, The Golden Parasol: A Daughter’s Memoir of Burma (London: Chatto and Windus, 2013).
‘it was as if someone had just turned off the lights’: Myint-U, River of Lost Footsteps, p. 294.
15. Natives of Arakan
‘Mohammedans…natives of Arakan’: Francis Buchanan-Hamilton, Asiatic Reseaches (Asiatic Society Calcutta, 1801), vol. 5, p. 237.
Rangoon, now known as Yangon: As explained at the front of the book, in 1989, when the military government renamed Burma as Myanmar, Rangoon became Yangon. Since then, governments, international organisations, human rights campaigners and journalists have agonised over which names to use. Myanmar and Yangon are now more widely used, but, for the sake of consistency with the rest of the book, I have stuck to the old names of Burma and Rangoon, and hope this does not cause offence.
‘sowing hatred among the people’: Back page of New Light of Myanmar, 18 June 2011.
‘In any town in India the European Club’: George Orwell, Burmese Days (London: Penguin, 2009), p. 14.
‘we should like to see less veiled hostility’: Edward Law-Yone, ‘Not For Europeans Only’, The Nation, 24 May 1951, courtesy of Wendy Law-Yone.
where the attack on the 29th CCS had taken place: See IWM 03/787, notes by John Hamilton on Isaac Fadoyebo’s An Unbelievable Stroke of Luck; and Hamilton, War Bush, p. 123.
‘All valuables were confiscated’: Kamdar, Motiba’s Tattoos, p. 107. The Indians of Burma suffered a similar experience to that of Indians forced out of Idi Amin’s Uganda in the early 1970s, only the expulsion from Burma was on a much larger scale and did not achieve the same degree of international notoriety.
‘It’s awful when I look back’: Wendy Law-Yone, interview, London, June 2013.
About 250,000 Muslims fled: Martin John Smith, Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity (London: Zed Books, 1991), p. 241.
new Citizenship Act: For contrasting interpretations of the 1982 Citizenship Act, see Human Rights Watch, http://www.hrw.org/node/109177/section/8; and see Derek Tonkin, ‘A Fresh Perspective on the Muslims of Myanmar’, 7 July 2013, http://www.networkmyanmar.org/images/stories/PDF14/The-Muslims-of-Myanmar.pdf.
freedom of movement was restricted: Chris Lewa, ‘North Arakan: An Open Prison for the Rohingya in Burma’, Forced Migration Review, a project of the University of Oxford Refugee Studies Centre, http://www.fmreview.org/en/FMRpdfs/FMR32/FMR32.pdf.
‘new Palestinians’: Smith, Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity, p. 241.
‘No doubt they felt insecure’: Singh, Independence and Democracy in Burma, p. 100.
16. Impregnable
‘Arakan is a second Venice…impregnable’: Letter from Father Farinha quoted in C. Eckford Luard with H. Hosten, ed., Travels of Fray Sebastien Manrique 1629–1643: A Translation of the Itinerario de las Missiones Orientales (London: Hakluyt Society, 1926), p. 172.
Maung: A pseudonym to protect his identity.
‘the golden roofs of the palace’: Willem Schouten, ‘Voyages’, quoted in ibid., p. 218.
at least 160,000 people lived in Mrauk U: Ibid., p. 217.
Moe Kyaw: Again, a pseudonym to protect his identity.
‘bats are numerous’: Enriquez, A Burmese Wonderland, p. 69.
17. For our children to be free
‘If ever an army fought…for our children to be free’: Slim, Defeat Into Victory, p. 183.
Buddha travelled from India using levitation: Myar Aung, Famous Monuments of Mrauk-U: Useful Reference for Tourists and Travellers, transl. by Ah Lonn Maung (Yangon: Middle Line, 2007), p. 119.
‘I have greatest admiration for their tenacity’: Peter Murray, ‘The British Military Administration of North Arakan 1942–43’, p.4, http://www.networkmyanmar.org/images/stories/PDF13/peter-murray-1980.pdf.
In Sittwe, Rakhines burnt most of the Rohingyas’ homes: Human Rights Watch, ‘The Government Could Have Stopped This’, August 2012, http://www.hrw.org/reports/2012/08/01/government-could-have-stopped.
the army and police either looked the other way: Human Rights Watch, ‘All You Can Do is Pray’, April 2013, http://www.hrw.org/reports/2013/04/22/all-you-can-do-pray.
Epilogue
‘a Nigerian… he was always thinking of this fellow’: Almamy Tom Kanu, interview, May 2013.
About the Author
Barnaby Phillips is a senior correspondent for Al Jazeera English, which he joined in 2006. His documentary Burma Boy won the CINE Golden Eagle Award. Previously, he was for fifteen years a correspondent for the BBC, reporting primarily from Africa, including three years in Nigeria. Phillips grew up in Kenya and Switzerland, and now lives in Islington, North London. This is his first book.