by Brian Mooney
From beyond, masked by the dense jungle where the bloody business of hand-to-hand contest was still going on, there percolated, as through a thick and filtering veil, the deadly sounds of a desperate conflict. The muffled explosions, the sporadic rifle-fire and the peck-peck-peck-peck-peck of the ‘woodpecker’ had assumed a murderous intensity.
Masters looked haggard and worn. He had his walkie-talkie in his hand and would occasionally talk into it, alternately putting it up to his ear. He was in communication with our most forward elements. Alec Harper was with him, getting his briefing about taking over the assault from 3/4 Gurkhas. He was the commander of the column from 77 Brigade which Mike Calvert had sent over to help us in Blackpool. His 3/9 Gurkhas were intending to sweep us to the top. Ray Hulme was also with him. He had done his part by capturing and consolidating the clearing. The two of them were discussing the technique by which Ray Hulme’s 3/4 Gurkhas would disengage while Alec Harper’s 3/9 Gurkhas passed through them.
After a brief interval, the transfer was successfully accomplished. 3/4 Gurkhas were withdrawn to reserve. The time was about a quarter past eleven. I reported my patrol accomplished and said that our rear was clear of Japs.
‘OK,’ said Masters. ‘Your platoons can rest. Tell them to stay in the bed of the chaung, but to be ready to move into action. I want you to stay here, near my command post. Keep Dal Bahadur with you, so that he can run back with a message.’
‘Very well, sir. They haven’t had anything to eat or drink. Can they brew
up?’ ‘Yes.’
I sent Dal Bahadur back with this information and told him to brew himself a mug of tea and return. Then I glanced around curiously and began to observe.
Brigade Headquarters was occupying the spine of a knife-edge ridge. It was up this ridge that Ray Hulme’s 3/4 Gurkhas had fought their way that morning. To our left it dropped steeply in a precipitous cliff. It was not the sort of place that would have been at all easy to storm and formed an excellent defensive rampart. All our administrative units were placed evenly along it, starting (from nearest the chaung-bed) with Doc Whyte’s basha and medical tent, then Briggo’s signallers, then Rhodes James with ciphers, finally Jack Masters’s command post which was on the very edge of the clearing. Chesty Jennings’s RAF radio was right out in the open.
The path ran twenty or thirty yards to the right of this ridge. To the right again the ground sloped away gently into a shallow, saucer-like declivity and disappeared into the trees.
The clearing extended from the edge of the precipice where some bleached rocks protruded from the ground, and stretched for about two hundred yards towards the right and into the shallow declivity. At the right-hand edge, where the jungle began, it was full of cavernous shadows. Here – a most fitting location, for it looked like hell’s mouth magnified – was established our little colony of maniacs presided over by one of Doc Whyte’s medics.
It had started to rain. Dal Bahadur came weaving up the slope towards where I was standing. He was carrying a mess-tin full of tea, but I never got the opportunity to drink it.
At this moment, news came via reconnaissance that the clearing was menaced – the Japanese were counter-attacking from the left. Masters grabbed me and told me to bring up the defence platoons and dig in along the ridge. I used Dal Bahadur to transmit the orders to the defence platoons.
They came toiling up the slope under the burden of their heavy packs, feet slipping backwards in the mud, led by Thaman Bahadur. I detailed the places where I wanted the sections posted and stood beside the path watching them, trying to say something funny or encouraging to each one as he passed.
Tej Bahadur brought up the rear. As he came into the open from the thick forest, I plainly noted his change of expression. His face paled perceptibly and even his lips went white. He faltered markedly and hung back.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘It’s this place. This is it!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It’s the place I told you about. It’s where I’m going to get killed!’
Masters was watching me suspiciously, wondering perhaps why my platoons weren’t trotting smartly into action as on the parade ground. Under his penetrating scrutiny I lost my temper. I had always been vaguely uncomfortable because the other officers plainly thought I treated my Gurkhas too familiarly. Now I let fly at Tej Bahadur with an ill-mannerly explosion.
‘What nonsense,’ I upbraided him, ‘to say such at thing at a time like
this!’
‘But it’s true,’ he wailed, wringing his hands.
‘Please don’t cause any more embarrassment. Everybody’s looking at us. Just get out there and dig your slit-trench. After a little time I’ll see what I can do for you. Now go!’ Unwillingly he went.
All at once three DC-3’s appeared overhead and started supply-dropping. Their advent was accompanied by one or two explosions. As an artillery-man I ought to have understood their significance. Some Japanese 75’s were ranging on us, but I completely failed to appreciate it. One shell went off in the bamboo thickets at the foot of the cliff where we were digging in, and another burst beyond us in the jungle near where our madmen were accommodated.
If only I had marked their fall of shot I should have realized that they straddled the clearing with deadly accuracy. I would have taken the proper precautions. But since nobody took the slightest notice of them, and Chesty Jennings continued to talk the DC’s down, I too followed suit.
Now Tej Bahadur abandoned digging his slit trench and came over to me. We talked on the edge of the clearing, almost in secret, at the fringe of the wood.
‘Well, what is it?’ I asked him a little more sympathetically, seeing as we were no longer observed. ‘What do you want me to do? I can’t let you run away. We all have to do our duty.’
‘Yes, sahib. I realize that. But I feel dreadfully ill. It’s very near now. I know it is. It’s within a couple of minutes. Will you please let me go to the rear and take shelter among the mules?’
He was so distressed that I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t like to refuse him. All the same I was going to find it pretty hard to justify if Masters found out.
‘I tell you what,’ I said, hitting on a sort of compromise. ‘Go back to where Thaman Bahadur posted you. Have you finished your slit-trench?’ ‘No, sahib.’
‘Well, finish it. It can’t take you all that long. When you’ve done so, go back down to the mules and brew up by yourself and smoke a cigarette.
Will that satisfy you?’
His face brightened considerably, and he actually smiled. ‘Yes, sahib. Thank you. It will satisfy me well.’
He turned on his heel smartly and saluted. As he marched out into the open, a slender shaft of sunlight illuminated him. Then the Jap 75’s came down and he was killed.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Taking Point 2171
I couldn’t for the life of me make out what was happening. Don’t forget that I hadn’t been in Blackpool, and consequently had not experienced that terrible shelling. In fact, I’d never been shelled in my life. I had for so long been protected by deep jungle far from any road that being subjected to artillery bombardment was something I didn’t expect.
Instead of taking cover as everyone else had, I staggered about as if stupefied. Then, after the first rounds of gun-fire had descended on the clearing and subsided, everything went quiet.
The DC-3’s abandoned their supply dropping and buggered off, and Chesty Jennings’s RAF signallers abandoned their radio sets. Only one parachute, remote like a luminous bubble, floated gently to earth. It landed in the centre of the clearing with a thud and lay there neglected – not a soul made any attempt to go to collect it.
Even the sounds of battle from uphill in the forward zone seemed lulled. It was as if my own shock and surprise had communicated itself to nature. Gingerly I ventured out into the open. The clearing which had been so full of movement only moments ago was now completely deserted. Gone w
ere the groups of gossipy soldiers eagerly retrieving the supply drop. Gone were my Gurkhas digging their slit-trenches among the stones and the dirt. It is amazing how closely you can hug the ground when your survival depends on it.
Only the maniacs at the bottom end of the clearing were stirring. The bangs and bursts of the explosions seemed to have excited them beyond bounds, and they showed signs of becoming unmanageable.
Then the second round of gunfire descended. I saw one of Chesty Jennings’s sets disintegrate under a direct hit. The other was lifted bodily by the concussion but dropped back into its place. It continued relaying dottily. The nasal American voice of the Dakota pilot demanded ‘What the heck?’ through the abandoned earphones.
Suddenly the mad Gurkhas took to the limelight and rushed crazily onto the set. They started to shed their scanty garments until they were naked. Then they began to dance with a dizzying speed among the bursts.
As the projectiles from the Japanese guns hurtled into the bottom of the clearing, they exploded against the dark background of the jungle in showers of sparks. The Gurkhas, with shrieks of joy, chased after them. You could see the spray of splinters glowing red hot and pretty as firecrackers as the projectiles burst. The salvo of shots landed dead among them, but not a Gurkha was hurt.
I scrambled from my knees where I had been knocked sideways and rushed desperately back. I suspected that something was going on for which I had failed to make allowances. I wanted to find someone from Brigade Headquarters who would tell me the truth.
After a frantic search I found Rhodes James. He was crouched over his code-books in the primitive birth-and-burial position alongside some of Briggo’s signallers. They had all flattened themselves into the ground and looked like a group of tomb-victims when first disinterred by the archaeologist.
‘What are you doing?’ I yelled, glowering at him. On his face was an expression of terror. ‘I’m taking cover.’
‘Why?’
‘We’re being shelled.’
So that was it! Now everything fell into place. Gradually I began to comprehend the various components of what until that moment had been an indistinct blur.
Soldiers were crouching here and there upon the slope and soon I had sufficiently recovered my composure to be able to distinguish them and to mark their faces and expressions. One or two began to raise their heads. Another salvo of shots, however, quickly put paid to their scrutiny.
A shell slammed into the radio sets, setting them jumping and quivering (the radios seemed doomed to attract an awful lot of punishment), and another two or three landed athwart the signallers.
The Japanese 77 millimetre gun is a quick-firing weapon of high muzzle velocity and flat trajectory not unlike the Bofors. It is easily manoeuvrable, extremely accurate and fires a shell weighing about eight pounds. As a consequence, it is ideally suited to close engagements but it suffers from compensatory disadvantages. In the present instance, these amounted to a large number of failures. On account of the sloping nature of the ground which slanted away from their line of fire, a high proportion of the shells were landing on their shoulders instead of on their noses. This resulted in the fuses designed to ignite on impact failing to trigger and the shells not going off. At least this was the obvious explanation. Alternatively, the ammunition may have been damp.
Suddenly, on the ground about twenty yards in front of me, there was a terrific thump. It was accompanied by a frightful hissing noise. Then a horrible slithery thing whooshed towards me through the bushes and came to rest in the mud. It landed plumb between my legs.
My first impression was that something revolting had aroused itself – some hitherto unrecognized creature of the jungle – some species of snake.
The object, whatever it was, kept spinning – spinning with vertiginous speed. The rapidity of its revolutions in the mud made sizzling noises like a frying egg. I was convinced that it was a living thing.
Then, all at once, it stopped. In its expiring moments it exhaled a thin spiral of smoke as from a burning cigarette. There was a pronounced smell of cordite. I was gazing at an unexploded shell.
In their dumb immobility these duds could be more dangerous than live ammunition. You could never be sure that their explosions would not be delayed. I left that location quickly and made sure not to come back.
In its way, the occurrence was just what was wanted. It aroused in me a proper appreciation of realities and alerted me to the responsibility of my position, namely a preoccupation with my men – something which had temporarily fallen into abeyance.
‘My darling!’ I thought. ‘My beloved Dal Bahadur! What can have become of you!’ It was only with my realisation that we were being shelled, that I recognized the danger he was in.
To my shame, I confess that I didn’t really know where Dal Bahadur had gone. He was always very independent. The last I remembered of him had been when I sent him back to call up the platoons. Where was he? Nobody seemed to have any idea.
I dashed down to the mule-lines in the chaung bed in an attempt to find him. ‘Where’s Dal Bahadur? Have you seen Dal Bahadur?’
‘He went forward, sahib. We thought he was with you.’
I began to panic. Everything pointed to the same conclusion. I urgently wanted to learn the truth, but was detained by the mule-drivers.
‘What’s going on up forward, sahib? Are we winning?’
‘Yes – yes – I suppose so,’ I answered, but my mind was on other things. ‘We’re being shelled. 3/9 Gurkhas are going for the top. Their storming parties are already attacking. It’ll be in our hands by nightfall. Defence platoons are digging in on the plateau. If only I could find Dal Bahadur!’
I felt guilty lingering where no shells were falling and where it was safe. I sought frantically to break away. The shelling was becoming more persistent, and as the bombardment increased I set off up the slope.
A shell exploded on the ground in front of me and half-a-dozen more went off to my right and my left. They seemed to burst right in my face. But it was like peering through a plate-glass window when someone throws a bucket of water at you. Nothing happened. I wasn’t wounded. I wasn’t even touched. I simply slipped, made a desperate attempt to recover my balance, and fell. Perhaps it was the blast which knocked me over – perhaps it was my haste.
I picked myself up, panting with excitement, bathed in perspiration, and covered in mud.
‘Dal Bahadur!’ I yelled. ‘Where are you? Dal Bahadur!’ I wept. I sobbed. The echoes mocked me.
‘Dear God!’ I prayed. There was only one alternative to his having absconded without leave and it began to occupy my thoughts to the exclusion of everything else. ‘Dear God! Don’t let it happen!’
I came out into the open again. The clearing was suddenly bathed in sunlight. I stumbled on Bhim Bahadur. He was crouched, with some other members of the platoon, in a shallow depression.
‘Have you seen him?’ I shouted. ‘Which way did he go?’
No one dreamed of asking me whom I was referring to.
‘No, sahib,’ Bhim Bahadur articulated shakily. ‘No sahib.’
‘Then who’s that?’
I pointed to a person in a prone position lying on his back right out in the open, his face covered with a hat.
‘It’s Tej Bahadur, your excellency. He fell right at the beginning.’ ‘Then go and help him. He may be wounded.’
‘No sahib,’ Bhib Bahadur interjected. ‘Begging your honour’s pardon – but he’s dead.’
I walked towards the edge of the clearing, trying not to give away any of my feelings. It was where the stony spine of the cliff projected and the land fell steeply over a precipitous ridge. It was from such a vantage point – the most exposed one – that I could accurately assess where the firing was coming from.
I pretended to be absorbed in this occupation but my eyes were dim. I peered myopically into the misty panorama of broken country before me, but without being able to distinguish a thing.
At
my back were my men. At my feet, undulating away from me in hundreds of inconspicuous hills and ridges from one of which the Japs were aiming at me over open sights, stretched the mocking and anonymous distance. It seemed to reflect the tormented state of my emotions at Tej Bahadur’s death.
‘Dear, pimply melon-face,’ I reflected bitterly. ‘So you were right – you finally bought it. And God knows how many more of you there may not be!’ The prospect of sustaining many such casualties was terrifying. I turned away, muttering more such thoughts beneath my breath.
Totally preoccupied, and without really being aware of where I was going or what I was doing, I moved imperceptibly to my left.
I had searched all the most improbable places for Dal Bahadur with a sort of unyielding obstinacy – and without success. Now I approached the only spot where I was likely to find him. It was where I intended establishing my platoon headquarters. My mind was concentrated on other things. It seems almost unforgivable, yet it is often thus in moments of crisis.
But what was this? There was something there, between the rocks. ‘Dear God!’
I suddenly remembered the search I was engaged upon and experienced a rush of agitation. It was so violent that I could scarcely control my trembling.
‘Don’t let it be true – don’t let it happen!’ I babbled dementedly.
A little bundle of rags was lying there as if someone had taken off his clothes. Now why, I wondered, should anybody do that? Suddenly I caught the glint of naked flesh.
I breathed his name. ‘Dal Bahadur!’ My words were almost inaudible among the whisk of the shells as they whammed past – for they were still coming – or the whoosh of the wind. Yet he heard me.
