Jocks in the Jungle

by Gordon Thorburn

  For the next twelve days, the Jocks stayed in the Pungan area. Patrols were sent out, blocks were set up on the Pahok road, and routes were cleared and improved so that sick convoys could have an easier passage. There was an increase in supply drops, with fresh meat and vegetables to supplement the K rations and, in a seemingly irrelevant gesture, G. G. Green had Bill Lark’s bagpipes sent over.

  Physical deterioration in virtually all of the men, and the sickness, especially typhus, was such that the Battalion reached its lowest ever point of capability. The remaining medics did a count. The answer was that from the original 800, two officers and forty-eight other ranks could be classed as fit enough for work. Among them was Bill Lark:

  ‘The little group of three of us, me, the mule sergeant and the mule vet, who was a sergeant as well and not really a vet but he understood about mules, used to make a special breakfast. I had a square tin from somewhere, and put our rations of biscuits in a bag and hammered them into crumbs, and a fruit bar or two crumbled up, and some water, and I used to cook it all up on a little stove which was a bully-beef tin filled with flame-thrower fuel. The result was like a pudding, something to fill you. So my two mates used to do a bit more of the mule stuff and I suppose I took on that role a little, of cook to the three of us, and I had a cooking place under the village hut (at Pungan) where we were assembling before Labu.

  ‘Beside it I had a small pit where we kept our bully beef tins ready as stoves for the use of, covered with a bit of old sandbag, and I put my hand in to get a tin to make a brew. There was something in there which wasn’t a tin. I pulled the sandbag back, and there was a socking great snake in there, lying all peaceful, so I got my bayonet and gave him such a whack, and he shot past me out into the open, and I shouted “Snake!” and the other lads finished him off. I suppose I must have slowed him down a bit.’

  War Diary: ‘July 25, the Yorks and Lancs passed through to a harbour a little further on. A party of REs went forward to bridge a chaung so that sick could be evacuated and the soft skins who were expected in a few days could join the Cols.

  ‘July 28, the first sick convoy passed through on the way to Pahok.’

  No man could have been but deeply moved by the sight of this convoy. Those just clinging to life were on ponies and mules, while those in slightly better condition were clinging to the animals or each other. As Jim McNeilly said, it reminded you of those pictures from the First World War, when lines of men who had been gassed and blinded staggered along with a hand on the next man’s shoulder.

  Bill Lark: ‘A lot of the men had typhus, and one symptom is that you go deaf, so this Canadian doctor said he wanted the piper to come down and play at the sort of hospital they’d set up. Men were dying, but the idea was to instil the will to live in those who weren’t dying yet.’

  This moment is mentioned in the official medical report of the whole expedition:

  ‘116 cases or 2.1 per cent of the total evacuation from sickness were admitted to hospital from this cause (typhus). Interrogation of medical officers after their return from Burma would indicate that a further 49 cases were diagnosed but were not flown out owing to recovery or death occurring before evacuation of the patient could be undertaken.

  ‘The majority of the cases (77 per cent) belonged to 14 Brigade, in which sporadic outbreaks occurred from the beginning of May to the second week in August. In the other brigades, cases commenced to appear intermittently during the last 2 months of the campaign but mainly in July.

  ‘The type of terrain in which these cases were infected varied considerably. The area in which infection must have occurred in the first outbreak, estimating the incubation period as 12 days, was mainly scrub jungle interspersed with open paddy-fields. The second minor epidemic broke out during the occupation of a village in which the troops were static for almost a month. However, the greater part of it was overrun with elephant grass and this location more closely resembled a jungle clearing than an inhabited locality. The third and most explosive outbreak could be traced to infection occurring during the occupation of a chaung (Black Watch and 7th Leicesters at Namkwin Chaung) in which the banks of the river were covered with thick elephant grass. In general from the evidence available, the type of terrain in which the majority of cases became infected was open country abounding in elephant grass and in the neighbourhood of water. No cases occurred in dense bamboo jungle, only in the scrub variety.

  ‘The first cases to appear were generally diagnosed as glandular fever, being mild with little more than complaints of headache, feeling out of sorts, and some glandular enlargement. Several of these cases, especially during this early period and at a time when the possibility of typhus had not yet been fully appreciated, remained ambulatory throughout the whole of their attack, and recovered; this even occurred later when the disease had been fully recognised and diagnosed.

  ‘It was not until the onset became more abrupt with a high temperature, which failed to respond to quinine, that typhus was fully suspected. Thereafter the severe constitutional upset, the red bloated face with intensely congested conjunctives; the prolonged fever without the intermittency of malaria, pyrexia, and the appearance of a macula-papular rash on the trunk 3 or 4 days later, left no doubt regarding the diagnosis in the minds of the medical officers.

  ‘The progress of these cases caused generally grave anxiety. Pulmonary complications were generally severe, mental depression so profound that the patients appeared to have no desire to recover. This apathy was counteracted in the Black Watch to a very considerable extent when someone conceived the idea that the sound of the pipes might do much to dispel this apathy. Moreover, in the absence of specific treatment little could be done for these patients under the existing circumstances. Proper and efficient nursing was quite out of the question. Protection from the monsoon had to be improvised with indifferent success; fever became unbearable in the warm moist climate, and some patients lapsed into delirium; water was warm and brackish and great difficulty was experienced in forcing these patients to maintain their water and salt balance and avoid dehydration; diet was restricted to articles upon which the patients had existed for many months and which now produced intense nausea; the number of nursing orderlies was limited and they could not cope adequately with the number of cases.

  ‘Under these circumstances, and in men already debilitated with prolonged marching and recurrent attacks of malaria, it is not surprising that mortality from this disease reached the high figures of 29.7 per cent . This high death rate was quickly appreciated by all ranks, and the subsequent fear of contracting the disease resulted in a substantial decrease in morale.’

  Monsoon rains had delayed the soft skins’ move out from their harbour until 21 July.

  Diary states:

  ‘July 22, probably the hardest day’s march of the whole campaign. We covered two miles, climbing to 2,000 feet. Bivouacked beside the 7th Leicesters whom we had caught up.’

  There was no move the next day but they marched on the 24th, then stuck for two days. A makeshift hospital was put up where the sick would be left behind and news came that they were to join the battle groups at Ngusharawng, in the Pungan district, rather than Pahok.

  On 25 July Stilwell called for another conference to clear up ‘misunderstandings’. General Wedemeyer represented Mountbatten. Stilwell and Lentaigne made reluctant compromises. The very last remnants of 77 Brigade, some muleteers, were to be sent out immediately. The attack on Taungni would continue, and 14 Brigade would cover 111 while casualties were evacuated. Both 14 and 3rd West African Brigades were to stay in, fighting for Stilwell until after the fall of Myitkyina, but Lentaigne would keep Stilwell informed of their status.

  After the usual time lag, the newspapers at home caught up with the action. This was the Scottish Sunday Mail:

  ‘Lively Offensive Kept Up. Special Force troops (are) patrolling north of Taungni . . . adding to their recent outstanding work in wiping out strong pockets of resistance in the hills, N an
d NW of Taungni. Operating in the most difficult jungle country and in incessant monsoon downpour, they have been driving the enemy relentlessly south . . . men of the Black Watch and Yorks and Lancs regiments swept into the village of Nugusharwng, 7 miles NW of Taungni, on the morning of July 20. The Japanese fled taking their dead with them.

  ‘An Associated Special Correspondent with the Allied Forces in N Burma says that the Chindits operating in (the) Mogaung (Valley) in future will not be referred to as Chindits, but as the 3rd Indian Division or by regimental associations.’

  On 27 July the Jocks’ soft skins managed four miles in seven hours, to find ‘huge ration and clothing dumps left by 111 Brigade’. Half an hour after they arrived at this point, Mawyang, there was a minor miracle. An aircraft dropped their mail. Letters from home. Alas, many of the addressees were no longer able to read their letters.

  On 29 July after ten hours’ marching, the Jocks were reunited.

  War Diary: ‘The soft skins – sadly depleted in numbers through sickness – rejoined the Col in the afternoon and evening. The REs also arrived back. July 31, sickness on the increase and typhus is taking its toll.’

  The assessment of the strength of 14, 111, and 3rd West African Brigades at this time showed that of 11,200 men – the total originally flown in with the replacements added as they went along – there remained 3,400. Total for the three brigades of killed, wounded, captured or missing was 1,300. Already evacuated or scheduled for it were almost 7,500. Those left and supposedly fit were in the lowest spirits, exhausted, and not much better in physical health than the ones checked in by the medics. Mental health could break down too.

  Jim McNeilly: ‘Yes, it happened, self-inflicted wounds, even the ultimate. Malaria combined with depression. The army didn’t recognise depression, but those days and nights in the monsoon, and feeling useless, marching this way and that and getting nowhere, well, it got to some men. Can’t blame them. How can you blame them? It was totally demoralising. I knew one laddie quite well, great big man, footballer, played for Scotland schoolboys, and I asked him, “What’s wrong?” And he just said, “I’m ill,” and turned away and walked off into the trees. Never saw him again.’

  A day or so’s march away from Pungan, Labu was an important village for control of the main Japanese northbound supply line, the Indaw railway. This was to be the Jocks’ last objective. They would reinforce the equally depleted Yorks and Lancs who were already in the area, and they spent the first days of August resting before moving up on the 4th of the month.

  War Diary: ‘August 5, both Cols moved forward at 07.30 hrs intending to pass through the Y&L and push on to Labu. At about 09.30 hrs firing broke out on the right apparently from a small enemy force on a hill operation. Mortar fire was brought down on them and 42 Col Rifle Coy moved forward and linked up with the Y&L. There was sporadic firing all day.

  ‘August 6, about mid-day 73 Col recce pl was ordered forward along the track to Labu. Some three hundred yards behind the Y&L perimeter they hit a strongly dug-in Jap platoon. After calling up the 42 Col Rifle Coy, the recce platoon withdrew after suffering four casualties.’

  All that was left of the 42 rifle company were three very weak platoons and just one platoon officer, Lieutenant Wynne. On that afternoon of 6 August, their assault progressed a little but they had to give up. Douglas Donald Wynne, on attachment from the Seaforth Highlanders, was killed attacking a machine gun. At nightfall, 73 Column rifle company relieved them.

  Next morning, they and any other remnants of 73 Column tried to flush the enemy out. There were three officers – Major Ross, Lieutenant R. J. Noble – who had been until now animal transport officer with the soft skins and a strong leader in their long march – and Lt. A. Gibb, previously RSM, commissioned in the field two weeks before.

  A scouting party found the Japs had retreated a little from their positions of the day before, and so an early attempt was made to capitalise. It was 06.45, 7 August 1944, almost six months since they landed at Aberdeen airstrip.

  Jim McNeilly: ‘The Japs were very well set and they blasted us straightaway. A machine gun opened up and I was hit in the leg which smashed the bone, and we had quite a few more wounded although not in my section, but the Sergeant said keep going, get that machine gun. One man lost both his legs, and we had to be taken back to the hut where the medics were. They rearranged my leg how it should be and tied my two legs together with string. I had to have it redone when we got back to India.’

  The Japanese often issued reports and general instructions to their troops, which had to be learned by heart. Here is one such, and very appropriate it is:

  ‘The hostile forces are skilled in approaching by crawling, and they often get within 15 yards of our troops without being detected. They open surprise fire with very rapid-firing automatic weapons and deal destructive blows. However, they do not charge; their grenade throwers approach and toss grenades or shoot them with grenade rifles. If our positions are held strongly, the opposing forces will retreat after a short time, or they may send combat details around our flanks to attack with grenades and automatic weapons.’

  Mortars and more pressure forced the enemy off the ridge and into a back line of deep trenches from which they could not be shifted, and by late afternoon it was stalemate. Colonel Green ordered one last push and called up Pipe Corporal Lark.

  Jim McNeilly: ‘We used to kid him on, Piper Lark, calling him the minister and Brother Lark. He was devout, and had been since Palestine. Never fired a shot, as far as I know, but he was some man for all that.’

  Bill Lark: ‘I was on the path, had to be. I couldn’t play the pipes in the jungle, I’d have got in a tangle. There were men on either side, our men, in among the trees. Maybe the Japs could see me, I don’t know, I never saw them. I just played, but I can’t remember what I played, probably “The Black Bear.”’

  If anyone ever has doubts about the effect that the skirl of the pipes can have on Scottish soldiers, even in the direst circumstances, the story of the next few minutes will surely dispel them.

  Bill Lark: ‘One of our lads said to me afterwards about Corporal Walter Graham, that we called Watty, who heard the pipes and said to his section, “Come on boys, we’re going in.” They’d all been miserable up to that point, pinned down, not knowing what was going to happen. One of them said, “What about the Japs?” So Watty said, “Fuck the Japs, we’re going in.”’

  They did go in, led by Lieutenant Noble. Not all of them still had a bayonet to fix, but they went anyway.

  Bill Lark: ‘One fellow said afterwards, it was the pipes that did it. Another said aye, the Japs could na stand it.’

  The last word on the battle for Nabu should go to a member of the Yorks and Lancs, name unknown, who saw the whole thing:

  ‘We were still held up and it was decided to call up some of the Black Watch column which was behind us to help out. Imagine our amazement when we heard the sound of the bagpipes, followed in a few minutes by bayonets-fixed Jocks who went down the track towards the Jap positions with the piper giving forth with all his might. The lads charged, screaming and so on, and the Japs took off. I strongly suspect it was the pipes that frightened them, not the bayonets. That piper, unarmed except for his pipes, was as near a hero as anyone I ever knew.’

  War Diary: ‘August 7, 73 Col joined battle early in the morning and by the evening with spirits high and pipes playing had cleared the enemy from the village.’

  The Scottish Daily Record, almost two months later, saw the episode in a more dramatic light:

  ‘Bayonet Charge On Japs With “Hampden Roar”.

  With bagpipes skirling madly, and with a roar reminiscent of Hampden on International Day, the Black Watch routed a Jap force in the recent Burma fighting with one of the fiercest bayonet charges in history.

  ‘This taste of cold steel in the Highland fashion completely demoralised the yellow men and, as the Black Watch padre from Aberdeen said afterwards: “It was undoubtedly the mo
st thrilling action of their whole North Burma campaign.”

  ‘This was the blow that drove the enemy out of the hills flanking the west side of the Mogaung-Mandalay road and railway, to secure those strategic heights while the all-British 36th Division advanced on Taungni and Pinbaw, south of Mogaung.

  ‘ ... within a few hundred yards of the village, enfilade fire made further progress impossible. So Lieut. Jack Noble, of Dalkeith, was ordered to take his platoon on a flanking move to the left, with the object of clearing strong machine-gun nests . . . all was set for a final attack.

  ‘A last dramatic touch was the calling for the pipes, which struck up the regimental march, “Hielan’ Laddie”.

  ‘“I gave the order to fix bayonets,” said Lieut. Noble, “and with all the automatic weapons up in the front, we went in at the double. We gave them everything we had, and the Japs got up and bolted rather than face our bayonets.”

  ‘Shortly afterwards, the men who had gone in with the bayonet joined other members of the company in a simple but impressive funeral service, conducted by the Padre, Captain the Rev. S. B. Mair.

  ‘As the padre read out the names, Pipe Corporal Wm. Lark played “The Flowers of the Forest”.’

  The Battalion stayed in Labu for ten days. The sick and wounded were evacuated and the Battalion was reformed out of its columns and into more orthodox dispositions. They managed to make two rather sparse companies:

  ‘August 16, B Coy under Major Frazer paraded for drill in the morning but after about ten minutes a supply drop on the parade ground, the only open space in the jungle, caused the parade to break up. On the following morning the time of the parade was changed and so, fortunately some thought, was the supply drop.