Spit and Polish

by Carl Muller

  A verger rushed to the vicar. ‘It’s a real air raid,’ he said hoarsely, ‘the Japanese are bombing Colombo.’

  Father Hardy ignored him. The collection could not be interrupted, Japanese or no. Worshippers paled, fidgeted nervously. They gave, numbed, not caring how much. All they wanted was for the exercise to end, for the vicar to tell them what they feared.

  No sooner was the collection over, Father Hardy cleared his throat. In a loud voice he announced that Colombo was under attack. ‘I want you all to lie on the floor,’ he said.

  Everyone did, but the vicar never lived down the incident. The collection, to him, had been more important than any bomb the Japanese cared to drop. Why had the Japanese to be so, so inconvenient!

  The Colombo military airport bristled. Every plane there was, even those that could hardly stay in the air, let alone manoeuvre in a dog fight, took off to meet the enemy. And it was all owed to the pilot of that lone Catalina, Squadron Leader L.J. Birchall, who had radioed warning.

  Birchall, later decorated with the Distinguished Flying Cross and given the OBE, had been on a routine reconaissance. Even as his plane was shot down, he bailed out, only to be seized by the Japanese. Questioned, he insisted that he had had no opportunity to report his sighting. Thanks to Birchall, Colombo did not become another Pearl Harbour.

  The Japanese raid lasted twenty minutes. They did not like head-on collisions. They had sought to flatten an island which they supposed was both ill-equipped and ill-prepared, and were rudely awakened to the fact that this island could bare its teeth with effect.

  The Japanese had had less trouble with India initially, when they assured Subhas Chandra Bose the freedom of India from British rule if he helped them win the war there. They regarded Bose as their Fifth Columnist and, as we know, Bose, as the head of the Provisional Government of India, declared war on Britain and the United States in July 1943. Yet, over sixty thousand Indian troops were held in Japanese P-O-W camps. The relationship there was anything but sweet.

  And Japan had to take Ceylon. The island had much to contribute to the Allied war effort. Rubber trees were double tapped. Ceylon’s entire tea production went on contract to the Board of Trade in London. Ceylon was also a vital stepping-stone to the Middle East.

  In the fighting that followed, twenty-five Japanese bombers were shot down and the defenders lost as many planes. Harbour and dock installations were damaged, and at sea, two British cruisers and a destroyer were sunk by low-bombing aircraft. Yet, a British Squadron Leader, C.J.T. Charles Gardiner, said in summing up, ‘God was with us; otherwise we could not have possibly got away.’

  There was much elation in Colombo and London. The attackers returned to the carriers, mission unaccomplished.

  They had not done the island any real damage. One of their pilots had actually dropped a bomb on the lunatic asylum! The air defences of Ceylon remained unbroken and the fleet by and large safe at sea. The Japanese decided to steam north-east, leave Ceylon’s waters. Obviously, to them, Ceylon was in a high state of preparedness—or so they thought.

  London attributed the success to the foresight shown by the chiefs of staff and the presence of mind of the two admirals in charge of the island and the Eastern Fleet. The air defences of Ceylon were the key to the Indian Ocean. The Japanese had failed to force the lock. For the first time since the start of the Japanese onslaught, a major assault had been repulsed.

  Luck (or was it God?) played a great part indeed. Admiral Somerville, watering in Addu Atoll, received the news of the raid, decided to hunt down the retiring Japanese fleet. There was no one to tell him that he was outnumbered two to one. Somerville was possessed by the thought that the danger to the Indian Ocean and Britain’s communications with India and the Middle East remained ... as long as the Japanese continued to rove the sea unchallenged. He had little carrier strength, even less gunpower as he steamed vengefully on, intent on meeting, giving the Japs what-for.

  Luck, did I say? Yes, luck indeed, that Somerville was ordered to pick up survivors of the sunk British cruisers. The Japanese admiral Nagumo, steamed north-east, into the Bay of Bengal, thinking to wait, bear down on any British force that dared come against him. The two did not meet.

  Had Nagumo met Somerville he would have gained an important victory—a victory that would have given Japan control of the Indian Ocean, isolated the Middle East and even brought down the government of Winston Churchill.

  Somerville was ordered to withdraw his battleships to the African coast. Nagumo turned his anger on Ceylon’s north-east coast. He despatched his bombers to hit Trincomalee.

  21

  Of Armchair Voyages and Dust-ups and Morse-coding in Talaimannar

  Ryan’s ham-like fist shot out; a piston of a fist and it moved blurringly. Light-blue coat sailed back, buckled jarringly against the ping-pong table, permitted himself a small, broken groan, and collapsed.

  It took three men, Barnett and the two police officers, to keep Ryan under control.

  ‘Bleeding bastard!’ he howled, ‘pointing his finger at me. Let go! I’ll pull his balls off!’

  Darley fled, doubled up, hooting like crazy. He sat in the regulating office and laughed so much that the regulating petty officer summoned an SBA.

  Barnett was the hero of the hour. When the contents of a firebucket had been liberally sprinkled on light-blue coat and the Surgeon Lieutenant confirmed that the vicious heart punch would have no permanent effect, everybody clapped Ryan on the back and congratulated Barnett, while the officers of the law scratched their heads and asked what of the other accused waiting his turn in the PO’s mess.

  ‘Take him—take both and go. You want him to get a hammering also? Both buggers are lying. I told you they have been put up to this.’

  The officers nodded. They were full of praise for this ‘Navy method’ and when light-blue coat was told that von Bloss and Nugawira had been with him all the while he made a sort of bleat, the sound a goat would make on being sodomized by an Arab, and lay back. Everything in his world was falling to pieces and his diaphragm seemed to be in the clutches of a mad foundryman.

  The S/A met a warrant charge, went to jail for a spell and was discharged from service. Light-blue coat and his partner also went in for eighteen months. Ryan swore that he only tapped him and what the hell was wrong with the pansy anyway? Von Bloss and Nugawira emerged from the cloud with sighs of relief.

  Nugawira said, ‘One thing I like to know . . . who was the fellow going to pick as me?’

  That, regrettably, would remain a mystery.

  The passing months found them firmly anchored on land. This, to their chagrin, was most disheartening.

  ‘What the hell is the use of this uniform if we don’t go to sea?’ Sims would growl.

  As an opinion of some merit, this was wholeheartedly endorsed.

  Taking a bus home would tangle them in sometimes quite unreal situations.

  ‘Hello, sailor boy,’ someone would say, ‘been to England? Tell me, is Bedford in the north or south? This fellow says south.’

  Or, ‘Been abroad?’

  Or, ‘Ever been to Singapore? Banda Street? Sha! The brothels...’

  One of the boys was a regular romancer. He was well up on his geography too, and was most convincing about the places he never visited.

  ‘England? Grand old place, men,’ he would say quite nonchalantly.

  His fellow traveller would perk up.

  ‘I’m lucky to have really done the round. Actually this is the first time I’ve been ashore for any real length of time . . .’

  His listener would give a gusty sigh. ‘Lucky for you. I have to think twice even to go to Kandy.’

  ‘Ah, but it’s no picnic I can tell you. Lot of hard work.’ And the look on his face is so smug. He revels in the scene he paints. ‘Not like working on the big passenger liners. A warship is different. But it’s a real chance to go to all sorts of places. What’s your name? I’m sure I’ve seen you somewhere before. You
live in Wellawatte?’

  The man ignores this. He asks, ‘And what about the Trucial Coast?’

  ‘Trucial Coast? Oh you mean Aden and places? All over I went. Basra, Bahrain, Oman, Yemen. All very rich. They’re digging for oil now. You must see Aden. Big town is Crater . . .’

  ‘And how about Africa?’

  ‘Kilindi, Nairobi, Zanzibar, right down to Jo’burg. That’s what we say for Johannesburg. Why, I’m sure I have seen you somewhere before.’

  ‘Oh, I must get off. Can you ring the bell—thank you . . .’ and leaning a little closer, the man hissed, ‘see me in the PO’s mess tomorrow. Come right in and ask for Chief Petty Officer Jansen, right?’

  ‘I went home in a bloody panic,’ he told the boys the next day while they hooted and drummed their heels on their lockers.

  ‘So what happened, you bloody idiot?’

  Oh, quite a lot had happened. The poor chap had been brought before a gathering of chief petty officers and petty officers, formally introduced to one and all as Sindbad the Sailor and made to relate the story of his many voyages. It had been a gruelling morning. He had then been given a drink of water and booted out.

  Carloboy too had his shore-going mishaps. Two seedy characters, very much under the influence and stiffening the air around them, regarded him with alcohol-laden contempt.

  ‘These buggers in their blurry youniforms. You know?’ one asked the other.

  ‘Yesh—hic—yesh.’

  They stared at Carloboy who looked away stonily. His father, old Sonnaboy had always maintained that drunks must have some leeway. ‘They don’t know what the hell they’re doing,’ the old man had said, ‘Just let them be.’

  Carloboy had thought this good advice.

  ‘Only blurry ha—harbour shailors. Ask to see if went outshide the breakwater. Only—only big show.’

  ‘Helluffer—hic—helluva Navy.’

  The rest of the passengers listened avidly. A nice young thing began to giggle and Carloboy saw red. He gripped one of the drunks by the back of the neck and made a general announcement that he had no wish to bandy words with reptiles, but if, however, said reptiles wished to bandy fists outside the bus, he would be most happy to oblige.

  The other man hauled himself up and swung a fist. Carloboy used his free hand to plaster the man in the face, breaking the bridge of his nose. Blood spurted, spraying the white front of his singlet. The bus erupted as the stricken man slumped back, bloodying the seat and the front of his trousers.

  Carloboy went berserk. He dragged the other up, hauled him to the rear of the bus while ladies gave little shrieks and men rose, then edged nervously back to their seats. The bus stopped and a frantic conductor leaped off as Carloboy dragged his victim out. Inside, others were hustling Bleeding Nose out. Satisfied that both his tormentors were sprawled on the kerb, Carloboy leaped in as the bus roared off. He took a seat feeling slightly foolish. It was no fun being the object of attention all the way home. Also, his uniform was a sorry, blood-spattered mess. His sister Marie saw him enter and had hysterics. He grinned and dumped his singlet in a bucket at the well.

  ‘What happened?’ Sonnaboy asked.

  ‘Hit a bugger. Only one shot I gave him. Don’t know where all the blood came from.’

  His mother glared, bit her lip. ‘Can’t even come quietly home,’ she muttered. ‘Going to fight. Like the father.’

  Sonnaboy poured himself a drink. ‘Like a small peg? There, the bottle is on the dinner wagon.’

  ‘No. I’m going to bathe. Must wash the singlet also.’ He cut a lime in half in the kitchen. It would remove the blood stains.

  Barnett was his usual lunatic self the next day. ‘Parting,’ he told them, ‘is such sweet sorrow.’

  ‘He’s off again,’ said Bijja.

  ‘I heard you,’ Barnett carolled. ‘No, my sons, I’m not off. You are. Ah, I see the puzzlement on each ugly pan. You, von Bloss, Daft, Sims, you are to be complete signalmen. Complete, did you hear? Wait—’ he raised a hand as Carloboy made to speak. Actually, Carloboy wished to make protest, for every time Barnett said anything, supposedly for the good of all, there had to be a catch. ‘Tell me, von Bloss, tell me truly, what is your receiving speed on the buzzer?’

  ‘That’s a telegraphist’s business, Yeo. We are signalmen.’

  ‘Oho! Hearken to the dimwit. In his ignorance does he open his mouth and all over the land is heard the sound of a fart. A signalman, let it be known, is a signalman when he is a complete signalman. Or, some say, a complete idiot. That is a matter of no small debate, I assure you. You, my sons, must know everything about everything. How much of a signalman are you? Let me give you the big picture— semaphore, mirrors, Aldis, Very’s lights, flares, flags, yardarm hoists, codes and ciphers, aircraft signals, local harbour signals, tide signals, boat signals, X and Z codes, radiotelegraphy, radiotelephone, light buoys, identification, ball hoists by day, bearing signals, distress procedures . . . hah! I see that your eyes have now retreated a yard behind your ears!’

  They stared at him speechlessly.

  ‘You three, forget the visual signals you think you know all about. A telegraphist is a telegraphist, but a signalman is also a telegraphist. Today is the tenth, isn’t it? Yes, the tenth of September. You will be good, efficient telegraphists by the fifteenth, for on that fateful day, me hearties, you depart for Talaimannar—’

  ‘Wha-aat!’

  ‘Talaimannar. Small place. Palmyra palms. Good toddy, I believe.’

  ‘But Yeo—’

  ‘Your drafts have come. There, in the wilderness you will bloom like the roses you are. Or is it cactus flowers. Hard to tell just looking at you, but I shudder at the thought of closer scrutiny.’

  Drafted to Talaimannar! Carloboy could only gape. The other end of the country? Hot, dry, white sand, not a girl in sight. And Morse Code!

  ‘The goats, I’m told, are most attractive,’ Barnett murmured.

  They gave him a withering look. He beamed, then trotted off.

  ‘Who is CO “Elara”?’ asked Sims. ‘Elara’ was the name of the naval shore base at Talaimannar.

  ‘Lieutenant Gunasakes.’

  ‘That’s not so bad. And who else is there?’

  Carloboy chuckled. ‘Nathali! Nathali is there.’

  ‘Mus’ be a real mad crowd. All the rotters get pushed out to “Elara”.’

  Carloboy scowled. ‘Thank you very much. I suppose we are jut ripe for the place.’

  Sims grinned. ‘Could be fun. And if there is a crazy mob there, join them, I say.’

  ‘I don’t like it at all,’ Daft moaned.

  ‘Oh shut up! How long will we be stuck there?’

  ‘Who knows? Like the other side of the moon, that place. Might be forever. Once you go there, everyone forgets you.’

  Todwell was most solicitous. ‘So cheer up, I’ll keep your ends up here. Now, If you will give me your girl friends’ names and addresses . . .’

  A well-aimed pillow shut him up.

  22

  History—Trincomalee

  Undoubtedly, Trincomalee is one of the most magnificent natural harbours in the world. It flourished as a seaport in 1598 BC and it is marked on Ptolemy’s ancient map of Lanka, where it is called Gokanna. It was also Gonagamaka to the ancient Sinhalese.

  The wrecks are there too. Shipwrecks of all periods—from an unknown Portuguese warship to hulks of World War II. The inner and outer harbours are dotted with several small and mostly uninhabited islands and the many coves and bays are of singularly charming aspect.

  The British found Trincomalee simply splendid. Long before Hitler, they had come to Ceylon, ousted the Dutch. The Dutch had come in much earlier to oust the Portuguese.

  The Portuguese built a fort in Trincomalee in 1623 (first known as Fort Trikenemalle). They built it of hard stone from an old pagoda. The King of Lanka, too, had begun to build a fort on the Ostenburg hill which is within today’s naval dockyard. When the French and British came thr
eateningly ever nearer, the King abandoned the fort he was building and retired to the central hills. The Dutch took it over, made use of it to fight off the invading British.

  Built on the Ostenburg ridge, this small fort is practically unknown today. It is hidden under heavy undergrowth. The Dutch concentrated on Fort Trincomalee which they had wrested from the Portuguese in 1640. They gave it yet another name: Pagoda Hill.

  In 1671, the French arrived in Trincomalee. They had plans to grab the town, to expand their territory, command the Eastern world. They made small headway. When the British landed troops in Back Bay and made a surprise assault on Fort Trincomalee, the Dutch fled to Ostenburg. Three days later, Admiral Edward Hughes called for Dutch surrender.

  The British were pleased. They now held Fort Trincomalee, a marvellous promontory very like a peninsula. On each side were sandy and rocky bays. Why, they could command the entire east from here. They renamed it Fort Frederick, after Frederick Augustus, Duke of York and Albany, second son of King George III.

  The British took Fort Ostenburg after a short, fierce skirmish. It was a good hole-up place. The Dutch had underground quarters for their officers and a part of it was a residence for commanding officers of garrisons.

  By 1800, Fort Ostenburg was armed with fifty British guns. At the onset of World War II, the British Admiralty used the Fort as a wireless station. The many outer buildings which the British constructed are now the married quarters of sailors of the Sri Lanka Navy.

  Japanese Admiral Nagumo was determined to send Ceylon a message. The raid on Colombo had not been to his liking, but there was Trincomalee, seat of British naval power. He could not simply steam away.

  The people of Trincomalee never thought that they would be attacked. News of the Colombo raid had come in, but that was Colombo, hundreds of miles away, another coast. Most of the population had found employment under the British Admiralty and the War Department. The farmers, the producers, were happy. There was a ready market for their produce—vegetables, rice, poultry, fish.