Tank Tracks to Rangoon (11 page)

At 1900 Brigade HQ reported that the majority of 63 Brigade was safely away, and instructed B Squadron and the Essex Yeomanry to bring out the remainder on their tanks and gun limbers. No sooner had this move started than A Squadron reported that the enemy had started his attack, and that it was being led by tanks.

Captain Dumas at once returned to the position with four B Squadron tanks, and joined in A Squadron’s battle in the fading light. Hits were obtained on the enemy vehicles,
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without loss or damage to either squadron, and the Japanese broke contact.

Throughout the night 2 RTR continued to ferry the infantry northwards, passing through 7th Hussars’ position at Kyaukse, and going into leaguer at 0600.

The morning of 28th April found the Hussars’ C Squadron patrolling south from Kyaukse. SSM Ainley’s troop encountered
another enemy transport column, destroying several vehicles before the rest turned tail. The Japanese then brought up their guns, forcing C Squadron to withdraw slightly, and their dive-bombers, one of which destroyed a tank in Lt Allen’s troop with a direct hit.

During the night 7th Hussars’ leaguer was shelled, and the following morning the enemy mounted several heavy attacks on 48 Brigade’s position at Kyaukse. Everyone in 7th Armoured Brigade had a tremendous admiration for these Gurkhas, who were holding an excellent position on a big hill west of the town, fronted by a belt of sharpened bamboo stakes, each capable of disembowelling a man.

The Japanese came on through the artillery’s shell bursts and the Gurkhas steady fire until they were shot flat, and then they tried again. B Squadron added their weight of fire to the defence, and as each Stuart mounted three Browning machine guns, one in the hull, one co-axially and one in an AA mounting on the turret roof, the resulting fire-storm was more than flesh and blood could stand. The Japanese turned and ran, and after them went the Gurkhas, kukris swinging as they tore down the hill in a savage counter attack. When it was over, a quick body count showed approximately 300 enemy dead carpeting the ground. The Gurkhas had lost one man.

48 Brigade pulled out during the evening, covered by Lt Patteson’s troop. As the infantry were moving off, Patteson observed that the Japanese were beginning to deploy out of some woodland, and waited until they were nicely arranged before laying into them with his troop’s 12 Brownings. As they went down in heaps, Patteson felt a justifiable pleasure in balancing the account opened with his treatment at the Shwedaung road block.

Lt Palmer, meanwhile, had been sent back to Kyaukse to prevent the enemy following up the Gurkhas’ withdrawal.

‘The place was a ghastly sight. It was a wooden town and was on fire from end to end. There were dead all over the place, and the stench was appalling.’

During the day, C Squadron had been patrolling the road to the north to keep it open. However, the check imposed on the enemy was so severe that he was in no position to interfere with the withdrawal to the Ava bridge, which the rearguard, including 7th Armoured Brigade, crossed that night. As the tanks motored through the grey dawn light, a thunderous explosion
announced the destruction of the bridge, which was so badly damaged that it was beyond the capacity of the Japanese to repair.

Once beyond the Irrawaddy, it might have been felt that Burma Corps was safe from immediate contact with the enemy, but this was not so. The Japanese had pushed an amphibious force up the Chindwin, the Irrawaddy’s major tributary, and during 30th April this had all but captured Corps HQ at Monywa, and now had 63 Brigade cornered.

C Squadron 7th Hussars was despatched at once, followed by the rest of the regiment. The approach march was a long one, something like 140 miles, but C Squadron was in action almost as soon as it arrived.

By the morning of 2nd May, the regiment was six miles north of Monywa, but was in contact with neither C Squadron nor 63 Brigade. Lt Palmer’s troop was therefore given the difficult task of getting through to them.

I was told to establish contact with them and give verbal orders for them to withdraw immediately. We knew nothing whatsoever of the enemy’s movements. I decided to make a wide sweep out to the south-east and followed little-used tracks, few of which were marked. The country was close and I moved with considerable caution.

More by luck than judgement, as I had soon got rather lost, and also due to a bit of incorrect map reading, I hit the road running south-east from Monywa and met some Indian refugees who told me that there were tanks further up the road. I concluded these belonged to C Squadron and pushed on.

I soon met Pat Howard-Dobson’s troop, who directed me to Sqn HQ. John Congreve was very pleased to see us as he was under the impression they were completely cut off. I was taken to the Brigade Commander. I briefed him on my orders and explained that I had worked my way round without seeing any Japanese. He was very worried about getting his wounded away, and I called up the regiment and they organized a bullock-cart convoy which was brought down to us under escort by Basil Young.

At 1700 the Brigade started to pull out. C Squadron, who only had a few tanks, left Shorty White to stay with me. Our two troops then carried out a series of leap-frogs to cover the withdrawal and we had only slight trouble from some mortaring and a few rounds of anti-tank fire.

We rejoined the squadron at Yeu and soon snipers started up from the river area. It looked as if the enemy were following up quickly. We moved up the Yeu road about ten miles where we leaguered. During the night, Ray Nickel, whose troop had been missing, came in. He had been wounded and his troop sergeant
killed. Basil Young, who had covered our withdrawal, had had a bad time and had destroyed one of his tanks which had broken down.

7th Hussars were now operating in a particularly nasty neck of the woods, which swarmed with dacoits. During the day, three members of an A Squadron tank crew were stabbed to death by villagers who were pretending to barter. Unfortunately for them, the vehicle commander shot his way out with his pistol, and soon returned with the entire squadron and a company of West Yorkshires. The infantry attack flushed the dacoits out of their village and under the tanks’ guns; too late it was realized that the running mob contained women and children, and innocent people died before the firing could be stopped. This unhappy incident upset 7th Hussars more than anything else during the long retreat.

Next day, B Squadron, patrolling the Monywa-Yeu road, had a further brush with dacoits.

‘The roads were a horrible sight,’ recalls Palmer. ‘They were crowded with civilian refugees, many of whom had been killed by dacoits. The Burmese had been quick to take their revenge on Indian shopkeepers and moneylenders. On one occasion I was told of a dacoit gang and followed them. We found them fleeing. They numbered about 50/60 and we had a real holiday, killing and wounding a very large proportion of them. We also put in a certain amount of work destroying Burma Division’s MT which had been abandoned. We even found a 3.7-inch AA gun apparently in working order, and put this out of action.’

Meanwhile, 2 RTR, whose squadrons had been dispersed on various tasks over a fifty-mile triangle, had concentrated and moved into a lay-back position at Budalin on 2nd May. A Squadron was sent down to Alon to cover the river, and a little later C Squadron arrived to protect their left flank. Some Japanese barges were engaged on the river, but at this stage of the war the Stuarts’ 37-mm gun did not fire HE ammunition, and the small, neat hole made by the AP shot did not do a great deal of damage.

By now, the troops trapped in Monywa had made their way out, and 2 RTR’s role was to cover their withdrawal to the north and act as rearguard. By approximately 1830 the infantry were clear, and A Squadron began to pull back from the river bank to the road. As they did so, small arms fire was opened on the tanks from very short range, showing that the enemy had been
moving up through the close country undetected throughout the day.

When A Squadron was clear, C Squadron returned to the road from their position to the east, and during this move one tank shed a track in the heavy going. The situation was now beginning to deteriorate rapidly, and the enemy was now adding artillery fire to the constant sniping. Leaving one tank as escort for the cripple, whilst the crew effected repairs, Major Rudkin ordered the crews of both vehicles to rejoin the squadron when the job was finished, instructing them to move parallel to the road.

At this point a Japanese armoured car engaged the squadron from a position 300 yards down the road, but scurried away into the scrub when the tanks returned the fire.

The regiment then withdrew at very slow speed up the road for the next four hours [wrote Major Rudkin]. The speed was governed by the marching infantry in front, who had animal transport with them. At about 0200 C Squadron were ordered to take up a position just south of Budalin with a mixed battalion of infantry while the remainder of the regiment leaguered about three miles to the north. Two guard tanks of C Squadron were placed on either side of the road and the remainder of the squadron formed a very close leaguer about fifty yards further back.

Here we settled for the remainder of the night feeling fairly secure with infantry screens about two hundred yards out all round us. At this stage I had lost contact with the two tanks who were trying to make their way back by travelling parallel to the road and east of it. The last wireless message, at about midnight, reported that they were making good progress. I warned the infantry that there were still two tanks out which might be expected to come in during the night.

At 0400 the sentries heard tanks moving towards the leaguer up the road from the south. The NCO commanding one of the guard tanks, assuming they were the two missing tanks, stood in the middle of the road, and when the first tank was about thirty yards away, waved it to slow down and prepared to guide it in. To his horror, he heard excited Japanese voices coming from inside the tank, but before he could do anything about it, the tank opened fire, knocking out one of our guard tanks with the first shot. The second guard tank opened up on the enemy within a few seconds, but was unable to see very much owing to the darkness.

On the first shot from the guard tank, the Japanese tanks turned round and vanished into the dark, leaving one of our tanks blazing. The crew inside this tank had no chance and were all so badly burned that they died soon afterwards. The whole episode took but a minute, but in that time the remainder of the squadron had mounted and started up their tanks. When it got light, we found
parts of a Stuart on the road where the Japanese had been, so we knew that the shots fired by the second guard tank had at least winged the Japanese, who were obviously using tanks captured from us earlier in the campaign.

Between 0500 and 0800 all infantry in the area came in and withdrew northwards. At 0800 the noise of a tank engine was heard, but nothing could be seen owing to the thick scrub. C Squadron was disposed on the road ready to meet any threat from the east, but eventually one of the tanks which had been missing from the day before emerged from the scrub, and was lucky not to be fired at by the remainder of the squadron. The second missing tank had overturned in a nullah during the night, and was burnt after its petrol had been siphoned into the fit tank, which was running short. SSM Philpotts, the tank commander, stated that he had been forced by very bad going to take a very wide detour to get back. For most of the night a friendly Burmese had ridden on his tank and guided him, dodging enemy patrols after first light. The crew of the abandoned tank were carried back by the fit tank.

For the next two days 2 RTR covered the withdrawal through Yeu, contact with the enemy being gradually broken, and then the whole of Burma Corps began converging on Kalewa, where the Chindwin was to be crossed. The route had been prepared by tea planters, working day and night with local labour, and was very rudimentary.

It was only about twelve feet wide, through thick and hilly country. In many places, there were ravines on one side, and the surface being soft, many vehicles were lost over the side; broken down vehicles were also pushed over the side to keep the road clear. There were many sharp corners and many soft river beds, all of which accounted for more vehicle casualties. The many inexperienced drivers in the column added to the holdups and breakdowns.

Eventually, after twenty-four hours in which we covered fifty-four miles, the regiment formed a leaguer about eleven miles from the ferry on the Chindwin. On this march, for the first time during the whole campaign, mechanical trouble was experienced with the tanks. Three tanks had engine seizures beyond hope of repair, and they were abandoned after being destroyed. Many others started to show signs of poor compression and other symptoms of excessive wear. On average all tanks had by now exceeded by at least double the prescribed engine hours without engine overhaul. Little time had been spent on maintenance for eleven weeks, during which time many tanks had covered about 2,400 miles. It was a remarkable tribute to the American Stuart that so great a distance had been covered with little maintenance and it was not until now that we had had to abandon a tank through mechanical trouble.
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7th Armoured Brigade had now reached Shwegyin, and parties from both regiments were sent down to the river to construct rafts on which the tanks could be shipped across. Unfortunately, although the Chindwin at the ferry point was only four hundred yards across, the landing on the opposite bank was four miles upstream, and as civilian ferry boats were the only means of evacuation, the journey took time; in fact a full week had been allowed for Burma Corps’ transit.

Major Llewellen Palmer persuaded a ferry boat captain to tow one tank across on a raft, but this so slowed the vessel down that the crew threatened to strike if ordered to tow another. This was the only tank to reach India with the survivors of Burma Corps, and we shall hear more of it again much later in this story, for it had many miles to travel yet, bearing on its side the strange legend, The Curse of Scotand’
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