The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1945-01-19
CHAPTER x

Back at the field I found that
Payne had loaded the transport with
forty sick or wounded Ghurkas. In
fact, we had to keep more from get
ting aboard by threatening them
with our guns, for after all, we had
the same small field for taking OIL
we'd had for landing. Johnny swung
the ship into the wind and we were
off in some six hundred feet. We
went in many times again, after
the Ghurkas had heightened the run
way slightly, and we finally moved
out most of the soldiers before the
monsoon rains ran us out. But III
never forget Captain Payne's feat in
that first landing of a transport at
Fort Hertz.
Following the defeat of the Allied
armies down in southern and CEN
trail Burma, the refugees poured to
the North and to the Northwest.
Those to the Northwest tried to walk
out by the Lido Road, which was
nothing more than a game tran.
Many of them died, and of those
who came out many died after enter
ing India. I heard stories of bod
les by the hundreds, almost buried
in the mud, all along the trail from
Burma to India. Those who kept
coming North from Shwebo up the
railroad to Myitkyina finally wound
up on Myitkyina's small field, anx-
iously waiting for aerial transporta-
ton over the remaining one hundred
and ninety miles to Dinjan.
Some of the loads that ferry pilots
packed into those DC-3's would have
curdled the blood Of the aeronauti-
cal engineers who designed the ship.
The CAT, or DC-3, as the airlines
called the Douglas transport, was
constructed to carry full load OF
twenty-four passengers or six thou
sand pounds. The maximum altl-
tude was expected to be about $4,000
feet-but we later went minimum
of $4,000 across the hump, and some
times we had to go to 2l,5OO to miss
the storms and ice. Carrying the
refugees, we broke all the rules and
regulations because we had to. There
were women and children, pregnant
women, and women so old that they
presumably couldn't have gone to
the altitude that was necessary to
cross into India. There were hum
dreds of wounded British soldiers
with the most terrible gangrenous
infections. At the beginning we used
to load the wounded first, those who
were worst off; but later, when we
realized that with our few trans
ports we'd never get them all out,
we took only the able-bodied. That
was a hard decision to make, but
we looked at it finally from the the
ory that those must be saved who
could some day fight again.
I remember one of the bravest
men / have ever seen, who helped
us load and control the refugees on
the field at Myitkyina. He was a
big, bearded Sikh officer, one of the
aristocratic British colonials. He
must have been six-feet-two, a fine
looking man. He worked religious
ly with the refugees and soldiers,
always efficient, always trying to
send those out who should have
gone. can see him now, standing
there in his tattered uniform, with
his turban perfectly placed on his
dark head, his beard waving in the
wind from the idling propellers. He
would patiently herd the passengers
into the transport, sometimes hold
ing hysterical people back physical
ly, and in more crucial times pull
ing his pistol, but never becoming
fustered or excited. / sometimes
think he was the greatest soldier I
have ever seen. Day after day, as
the Japs moved North and ever clos
er to Myitkyina, he would be there,
doing his thankless job.
When the end came, and I knew
that the field would be taken in the
next few hours, / went to him and
explained the situation. ! found,
however, that he knew more about
it than I knew myself. The refugees
had told kim, he said, and he knew
this was the last day we could land
there. So ] asked him to get aboard
my ship and leave for India; after
all, he was an officer and could best
be usad when once again the British
entered Burma.
ThA Sikh officer refused with ma
jestic pride. His orders had been
to stay there and supervise the evac-
uation of those refugees, and he con-
side<ed that trust sacred. We had
to leave him, and when ] last saw
him he was herding the ever-increas-
ing numbers of stricken people on
to the North, towards Fort Hertz and
the blind valley that led inevitably
TO the impossible mountains towards
Tibet. ! guess the Japs finally got
him. But / know how he must have
died, with that pistol in his hand,
and finally just the knife-and I
kcOw that several Japs died be-
fore they killed him.
The winds from the Indian Ocean
grew stronger, and the monsoon sea
son began. And oh boy, the rains