Merdeka Rising

by Rory Marron

  ‘We must never let that happen!’ Lamban said firmly.

  Sarel smiled cynically. ‘Of course not!’

  At the sound of footsteps behind them, they turned. A Black Buffalo in militia uniform saluted Sarel. ‘Sir.’

  ‘Well?’ Sarel asked sharply.

  ‘Our main force has assembled to the northwest, ready to move. One battalion is keeping the British sentries occupied as instructed.’

  ‘Good,’ nodded Sarel. ‘We move tonight. It’s time to give them some easy pickings. Spread the word that there’s food—and women—at Ambarawa and only a hundred Dutch soldiers.’ He stood up. ‘Tomorrow morning we’ll let Major Shirai demonstrate his loyalty to the revolution. Who’s this?’

  ‘Lamban, at last! I’ve been looking everywhere for you!’

  A figure was scrambling up the bank. Two Black Buffaloes escorting him stood watching, waiting for instructions.

  ‘Kerek!’ Lamban grinned.

  Sarel looked at him inquiringly.

  ‘He’s a friend from my village. I can vouch for him.’ With his white shirt, long shorts and short hair Kerek looked as though he had come straight from a class at the pesantren. Lamban waved the escort away.

  ‘Loyal lieutenants are hard to find,’ Sarel said quietly. ‘Train him.’

  Kerek reached the top of the bank panting. Lamban embraced him. ‘You’ve finally left home!’

  ‘Yes, three days ago—I sneaked away!’ Kerek was staring at him in admiration. ‘You look so different. Like a real warrior!’

  Lamban laughed. ‘This is Bung Sarel, one of our senior commanders.’

  ‘I’ve heard of you!’ Kerek beamed.

  Sarel nodded politely. ‘Welcome, Bung Kerek! You are here just in time for the battle!’

  ‘I’m ready!’ Kerek’s eyes blazed.

  ‘Not before we get you a gun!’ Lamban said quickly. Kerek was armed with only a keris. Lamban carried a klewang sword, two keris and a Thompson sub-machine gun.

  ‘Your parents and sister are well…’ Kerek said unsure if he ought to continue.

  ‘Good,’ Lamban answered uncomfortably. He had barely given them a thought for weeks. ‘I will see them soon enough. Now, how did you find me in just three days?’

  ‘First I asked where I could find Lamban of Sadakan. When people did not know you I asked where I could find the most skilful fighter! Someone told me about a Black Buffalo known as “Death Shroud”. I knew Taruna forged you a keris with that name. It had to be you!’

  ‘Well done,’ said a smiling Lamban.

  Sarel laughed and clapped Kerek on the shoulder. ‘Soon,’ he said warmly, ‘that name will spread terror among the Dutch! now let’s get you something to eat…and then a rifle!’

  Hotel van Rheeden, Ambarawa

  Fifty cheering, armed youths escorted the Ford station wagon as it crept slowly towards the Hotel van Rheeden. An excited, almost hysterical voice blared alternately in Javanese and Malay from a loudspeaker mounted on the car’s roof.

  Rai and Miller watched uneasily from the hotel’s veranda. Miller looked at his watch. It was close to midnight. Ambarawa was all but controlled by the pemuda and relations with them were already at breaking point. Ominously, local women and children had been seen leaving the town throughout the day. Tension was rising by the hour. Earlier that day, the Gurkhas had seized a number of cars at roadblocks and returned them to their Dutch owners. Ferocious arguments had ensued but the local police had sided openly with their fellow countrymen, accusing the Gurkhas of working for the Dutch.

  A couple of hours before, Miller had led an emergency patrol to a nearby kampong. A local stall-holder who had ignored a pemuda warning and served the Gurkhas had been made to watch as his wife and two young daughters were clubbed and hacked to death. Afterwards the man was shot dead. The Gurkhas had driven the youths from the kampong but on their way back they had come under fire.

  The Ford drew nearer and Miller caught some of the words. ‘My Malay’s poor,’ he said quietly to Rai, ‘but I don’t like the sound of that.’

  Rai nodded once. ‘Sunwar speaks good Malay, Miller-sahib.’ He beckoned to a sentry by the hotel’s entrance and the soldier trotted over to them.

  ‘Well, Sunwar, what are they going on about?’ Miller asked, not taking his eyes from the street.

  The young rifleman listened to the harangue. ‘He says the British have been defeated at Surabaya…it’s everyone’s patriotic duty to rise up and throw out the whites and their Indian servants.’

  Miller sighed in exasperation. ‘Nice to know we’re appreciated! I’d better pass it on.’

  Lt-Col Edmunds sat at the hotel manager’s desk and listened in silence to Miller’s report along with Major Timothy Duncan.

  Edmunds shook his head gravely. ‘There might be something to the claims. Signals have been picking up some of 49th Brigade’s radio messages. They were facing heavy opposition and they requested urgent reinforcements.’

  ‘I’ll tell the men to be on their guard,’ said Miller. ‘Not that they aren’t already with these fanatics around.’

  Duncan interrupted, ‘Sir, we’ve got platoons scattered all over. Here, the hospital, the schools and so on. Shouldn’t we put the internees in larger groups?’

  Edmunds shrugged his shoulders in frustration. ‘Yes but do it tomorrow. I don’t want them out in the open in the dark.’

  ‘You’re probably right,’ Duncan nodded thoughtfully. ‘I keep thinking about the reports of roadblocks and large groups of Indos in the east.’

  ‘Me too, Tim’, Edmunds nodded. ‘If they’re accurate it won’t be long before we’re surrounded. HQ Batavia has asked if we can make a dash to Semarang.’ He turned to Miller. ‘John, you’re the only pilot we’ve got. Can you handle the plane the Japs left at the airfield?’

  Miller stood up enthusiastically. ‘The trainer? Yes.’

  ‘If the damn thing is safe, I’d like you to see if the road is still open.’

  ‘I had a look at it yesterday, Sir. It’s a bit tatty but it seems sound enough. I’m a bit rusty though!’

  ‘Just like riding a bike isn’t it?’ Edmunds asked, raising his eyebrows. ‘I’m sure it’ll all come back in a couple of minutes!’

  They all laughed nervously, well aware that the mission could easily prove a death sentence.

  ‘Well then,’ Miller said heading for the door, ‘I’ll give the engine the once-over just in case. I’ll take her up at dawn.’

  Miller coaxed the Tachikawa Ki-17 bi-plane along the dirt strip runway. Its engine spluttered briefly as it rose into the hazy orange dawn sky then settled. Two low circuits of the airfield gave him the feel of the very basic controls.

  Ambarawa, nestled beside the large, almost circular lake looked tranquil. The water reflected a deep, iridescent aquamarine. Miller swung northeast to follow the road towards Semarang some twenty-five miles away. Low, pale-green hills, stacked with flooded rice terraces shimmered to the north and south. In the distance, Semarang’s church spires stood out in brilliant white against the vast, rich blue of the Java Sea. For the first time in days he relaxed, losing himself in the breath-taking view. Much of the landscape reminded him of the hill country in central Assam where he had spent his childhood summers on his father’s tea estate.

  Something across the road caught his eye and he took the plane lower. There were five roadblocks in all. From the air they resembled a series of hurdles on a racecourse. Some were substantial, incorporating vehicles and sandbags, others were more simple barriers made with oil drums. He circled them all at 1,000 feet, ignoring pot-shots and making notes on a pad tied to his thigh.

  His task completed, Miller resisted the urge to buzz the last roadblock and turned the Ki-17 around. As the airstrip appeared below him he saw several vehicles nearing a railway crossing south of the town and went on to investigate. British flags on the roofs identified an internee convoy. He put the biplane into a climb and continued south-west.

  As Magelang
came into view he was distracted by the graceful, grey stepped dome of Borobudur looming out of the trees just twenty miles away. He suddenly regretted not having a camera with him. A reflected flash of sunlight on a windscreen below ended his reverie. ‘You’re not a tourist today, Johnny,’ he said testily to himself. He eased the plane lower.

  The enemy column had evidently rested overnight and was reforming for the short march to Ambarawa. It stretched back for nearly a mile. At the head was an advance guard of an armoured car, six troop carriers and a dozen cars. The bulk was following on foot or bicycle with dozens of supply carts.

  Miller circled over the station as a tram draped in red and white banners was disgorging yet more fighters. Another tram, with dozens of figures clinging to its roof and sides, was less than a mile behind. To his dismay he estimated there were at least five thousand pemuda heading for Ambarawa.

  Ambarawa Station

  A bell rang shrilly and the heavy gates slowly began to rise. Rai acknowledged the signalman with a wave from the passenger seat of the Isuzu T-94. The three-tonner rocked forward over the level-crossing, the driver trying not to jar the women and children crammed in the back.

  Rai’s watch said seven forty-six. He was a little behind schedule but that was not what was bothering him. Ambarawa was strangely quiet.

  Up in the signal-box, Lamban watched from the shadows as four Isuzus crossed the rails ahead of an assortment of overloaded cars.

  As a battered Oldsmobile saloon nosed forward Lamban nodded to the signalman. ‘Now!’

  Reluctantly the man reached for a lever. Again the bell rang. Seconds later, the gate came down, missing the front of the saloon by inches. The driver, a twelve-year-old boy, sounded the horn.

  Rai heard and stopped the convoy. He jumped down and began to walk back towards the crossing. By now the boy was out of the car, shouting and gesticulating at the signal-box. Then, still shouting, he started to climb on the gate. A single shot rang out and the boy pitched backwards. A woman’s scream inside the car was immediately drowned in bursts of fire from the station buildings, the freight yard and roadside houses.

  Rai spun and sprinted to the front lorry. Behind him there was chaos. In the vehicles women and children were screaming in terror. The Gurkhas were returning fire but they were exposed and hopelessly out-gunned.

  ‘Go! Go!’ Rai shouted.

  The driver crashed through the gears and the Isuzu lurched forward. Rai leant out through the open door to look back at the crossing. Beyond the gate cars were backing away.

  ‘Ahead!’ The driver yelled urgently.

  Rai turned and saw two pemuda in the middle of the road taking aim. A burst from his sub-machine gun cut them down. The T-94 barely bounced as it ground over their bodies.

  In the distance, mortar fire rumbled over the town.

  ‘Keep your foot down!’ Rai yelled. ‘Don’t stop till we get to the school!’

  Hotel van Rheeden

  ‘And that’s about it, Sir,’ said Miller finishing his report. It had not been positive. ‘If we moved in at least company strength within the next two hours we could probably punch through with heavy casualties but once enemy reinforcements arrive…’

  Colonel Edmunds and Major Duncan were looking doubtful. The Colonel cleared his throat. ‘Hmm. You’re assuming the bridges aren’t mined.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Miller admitted. ‘I can’t vouch for the bridges.’ He glanced through the open window. Little groups women and children were relaxing or eating breakfast in the hotel’s overgrown shrubbery.

  Edmunds shook his head in exasperation. ‘Internee numbers here are swelling all the time. Almost two thousand have come from Magelang in the last three days. Plus another seven hundred from Banjobiroe. That brings the total to over eight thousand! Protecting them is a full-time job for two regiments, never mind two companies!’

  There was a sharp knock on the door. A havildar entered and saluted crisply. ‘Excuse me, Colonel-sahib, lookouts report armed Javans are entering the shops and houses opposite. Also, C Company has reported activity near the school and hospital.’

  ‘Thank you, Hav.’

  Edmunds looked sombrely at Miller and Duncan. ‘The locals must have been encouraged by the news of reinforcements.’ The words had barely left his mouth when they heard shooting.

  ‘It’s to the south, near the station,’ said Duncan.

  Miller went quickly to the open window to listen. Several internees were sitting in the garden. ‘You’re right. Damn! The first convoy from Magelang is due at the crossing anytime now!’

  Three high-pitched whistles sounded high overhead. ‘Take cover!’ Miller yelled into the garden, then dived for shelter behind the desk.

  Crump! Crump! The ground shook as two mortar shells exploded along the side of the hotel. Crump! A third blew up a shrubbery. Those in the garden rushed inside screaming.

  ‘Swine!’ Miller spat. ‘They don’t care who they kill!’

  Shots blazed from across the street. Windows in the hotel shattered and ricochets zinged along the hallways. Seconds later a Bren gun in the lobby hammered out a reply.

  ‘Get the internees into the basement and interior rooms!’ Edmunds shouted urgently. ‘And do something about those bloody mortars!’

  Kate was busy in the infirmary, applying a new dressing to a middle-aged woman’s leg ulcer, when the distant shooting started. She went to the window. Below her, mothers were shouting anxiously for their children, then gathering them up and rushing for their huts. In stark contrast, a few Gurkhas were calmly preparing firing positions along the walls. Others were issuing weapons to the Japanese work party.

  First she heard, and then saw the convoy racing out of the town and across the open ground towards the school. Several Japanese rushed to open the gates. As the lorries swept through, she caught glimpses of distraught, shocked faces of the passengers.

  Gwen, Juliette and Anna came in at a run. ‘Quick!’ Gwen shouted. ‘Lots of hot water and bandages!’

  Within minutes the injured were being brought up.

  Major Miller arrived with five Gurkhas with minor wounds. ‘We were lucky that the road to hear was clear,’ Miller said sombrely. He was staring out of the window. Seven women, five children and two Gurkhas had been killed in the ambush. Another seventeen internees had a range of gunshot wounds. ‘Doctor, I'd like to put a man here. There’s a commanding view of the approach.’

  ‘Of course, Major,’ Gwen said, forcing a smile.

  Miller addressed them all. ‘I’ve been in contact with Colonel Edmunds at Magelang. He’s conferring with our HQ in Batavia. Reinforcements will be leaving Semarang soon.’

  ‘But we have trucks here…’ Juliette said quickly. ‘The sick and wounded could leave.’

  Miller shook his head. ‘There are too many roadblocks.’

  ‘Excuse me Major,’ Gwen asked calmly, ‘just how many revolutionaries are there?’

  ‘Oh…er,’ Miller mumbled, caught off guard. They noticed his hesitation and he sighed in confession. ‘We estimate about four thousand.’ He gave up any pretence. ‘Please keep it to yourselves. It’s true we’re out-numbered but we’ve got sound defensive positions,’ he said with a slightly forced bonhomie. ‘The relief column will fight its way through. They should be here by late this afternoon. You won’t believe it but some of them are Japanese!’

  Kate felt her chest tighten. Suddenly she was sure Ota was coming to Ambarawa.

  ‘Then—’ Juliette stammered. ‘Then we are trapped?’

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ he said firmly. A short, awkward silence followed until one of the wounded groaned and Gwen went to help. Miller left them.

  Kate went back out on to the veranda. Over to her right she could see Duncan directing Nagumo and the other Japanese as they placed sandbags around a machine gun behind the gate. Juliette and Gwen came and stood by her. Nagumo said something to his men and they laughed together. Duncan clapped Nagumo on the shoulder and hurried away.


  ‘I don’t believe it!’ Gwen said bitterly, her cigarette shaking in her hands. ‘Now every fucking Jap’s a good Jap!’

  ‘Gwen!’ Kate shot back sternly. ‘We all have to fight! Now’s not the time for—‘

  ‘Oh, isn’t it?’ Gwen shrieked. ‘When will it be fucking time? Those bastards are already getting chummy! I don’t see any of them suffering! Look at them, walking around bold as bloody brass! When will the bastards get what they deserve? Or is it better to forget the torture and starvation!’

  ‘Gwen, stop it! Please,’ pleaded Juliette. ‘They’re helping us!’

  Gwen covered her face with her hands and burst into tears. ‘I—Oh, I’m sorry,’ she sobbed. ‘I don’t know what came over me.’

  Juliette embraced her. ‘I do, chérie,’ Juliette said gently. ‘You’re exhausted. Come and rest.’

  Later, Kate slipped out for some fresh air. She walked aimlessly, head down. Thoughts of Tjandi, the Guttman house, the Sakura and Ota mingled in her mind. Now she felt guilty about leaving Semarang. Because of her Ota was in danger again.

  ‘Konnichi-wa!’

  Startled, Kate looked up and saw Nagumo inclining his head in a slight bow. Without realising it she had wandered almost to the main gate.

  ‘Konnichi-wa, Nagumo-san,’ Kate replied politely.

  Nagumo turned back to issue more rapid instructions to his men. Kate wanted to say more but she was too embarrassed. Instead, she walked on, Gwen’s comments about ‘good Japs’ heavy on her mind.

  When she returned to the infirmary Gwen, Juliette, Anna and Rukmini were waiting for her.

  ‘Ah, here you are!’ Gwen said, now back to her usual self. ‘The Reverend Mother has asked for some help at the convent. I thought two of you could go—just for a few hours—in shifts. I’ll be going there later. We thought drawing lots would be fair. Is that all right with you?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ said Kate.

  Gwen held up three straws pulled from a mattress, levelled their tops but hid their lengths with her fingers. She smiled. ‘Long straws stay here with me.’