211141 Raymond Arthur Squires Royal Navy HMS Ness Sumatran Incident
This short wartime anecdote -even sixty years after the event - I still see as a harebrained venture to say the least. Although at the time it was a very serious incident, especially to the villagers involved, I have treated it rather flippantly because I still think of it as an ill-conceived misadventure, bordering on ridiculous
Once the war with Germany was over the frigate, HMS Ness, was ordered out to the Far East.
Well, thankfully, and because the Americans dropped their atomic bomb on Hiroshima, we did not reach Singapore until after the Japanese had officially surrendered.
Sadly this did not mean that the fighting had stopped. Japanese renegade snipers made Singapore dockyard a very hazardous place to be, as were the nearby islands that were still in Japanese hands. Hordes of Japanese servicemen still fought on in their sworn service to the Emperor and totally disregarded the ceasefire. On the islands of Java and Sumatra these fanatics just carried on destroying jungle villages and killing their occupants.
Our job – we carried fifty members of the RAF regiment – was to seek out these extremists and neutralise them, destroy their ammunition dumps and try to bring a modicum of normality to the demoralised natives.
During our rest periods, between these undertakings, we tied up alongside other Royal Navy warships at Emma Haven in Sumatra. It was during one of these seventy-two hour layovers that our captain received an order to send an armed party to a village that was under siege from a Japanese raiding party.
The event started one early afternoon. I was indulging in a bit of rum-induced dozing on the fire-step of the ship’s for’ard four inch gun when, through the rum fumes, I indistinctly heard my name being called over the ship’s tannoy … ‘Radar Plotter Squires, report to the First Lieutenant on the quarter deck immediately.’
Well despite being slightly ‘rummied’ I lit out very nimbly for the quarterdeck wondering what the hell I could have done wrong to warrant the senior executive officer’s attention.
Once there, and to my utter disbelief, I saw that I was expected to join a line-up consisting of two of my Radar colleagues, three ‘hard-case’ seamen (hard case describes people who are always in some kind of trouble with naval authority; also known as Skates) a Leading Hand who always gave the impression that he was in an advanced stage of delirium tremens and finally, the ship’s Midshipman.
I fell in line just as our First Lieutenant (also known in naval slang as Jimmy The One) clattered down the ladder from amidships. He then stood legs apart and asked for our close attention… without using any swear words! This in itself alarmed us. He was speaking as though, for once in his life, he actually liked us. He oozed bonhomie and goodwill as he went on to address us as gentlemen. This second dose of epithet-free and uncharacteristic politeness frightened us even more.
He then began to do his Mountbatten bit. Hands clasped behind his back he began to pace the quarterdeck as he spoke to us again, ‘Gentlemen,’ he said again, ‘you have been chosen for a special mission.’ He paused for effect.
The immediate effect was rampant fear.
‘Each of you will be armed with a rifle, a bayonet and twenty rounds of ammunition.’
Physical collapse drew closer.
‘Midshipman Archer will lead you.’
Nineteen years old, Midshipman Archer visibly swelled.
Fourteen legs turned to jelly because we all knew that Midshipman Archer was still - to say the least - quite inexperienced.
‘Jimmy-the-One’ went on, ‘I have chosen Midshipman Archer for his unswerving devotion and bravery.’
Midshipman Archer glowed and swelled even further.
We looked slack-jawed in his direction and, even without the gift of prophecy, knew we could be in deep, deep faecal matter.
Without breaking stride ‘Jimmy-the-One’ went on to say that he had borrowed a large motor launch and its crew from one of our bigger neighbours – a cruiser. He then revealed to us that in this launch we would proceed up a nearby river to a village he had marked on a map with an X. As he spoke he took from his pocket a map and emphasised his words by prodding the said map with a large, Australian, horny forefinger.
He paused for moment to give us a strangely triumphant look that indicated to me that he classed us as expendable and if we weren’t successful he would not be heartbroken. We Radar bods knew that he preferred seamen lookouts up in the Crow’s Nest armed with binoculars, to the hit-and-miss experimental Radar equipment. The other four members of the party were seamen who constantly abused the articles of Naval Discipline.
‘Our latest information,’ he went on, ‘is that a party of marauding Japanese soldiers have captured a Junk that was delivering essential supplies to the village.’ He looked at us one by one and smiled. ‘The village chief managed to send a runner to headquarters for help. The junk is now in Japanese hands and is still moored alongside the village jetty.’ He smiled again to display his tombstones. ‘Your job,’ he twirled an emphatic forefinger at us, ‘YOUR job is to retake the junk, capture the Japanese if they are still there, leave some of the cargo of rice with the villagers then bring the junk and any prisoners back here so that the junk can be restored to its rightful owners and the Nips put in the ‘bag’. Got that? Any questions?’
A pregnant silence followed his question. Even the ‘hard-case’ seamen – who, when rum-driven, would willingly take on half of Liverpool’s football supporters - blanched and remained dumb. Sending just eight of us under the command of Midshipman Archer to take on an unknown number of desperate Japanese soldiers was, as far as we were concerned, far worse than Lord Cardigan’s decision to send the six hundred into the valley of death.
Taking our silence to mean agreement he rubbed his hands together and told us that we should never forget that we had been chosen for this duty from the entire ship’s company. Before he dismissed us he ordered us to change into our best tropical uniforms, draw our weapons and always to remember that we were British and should be disciplined and smart even under fire. As he walked away I swear I could hear him whinnying with delight.
Once aboard the launch and revelling in his new responsibility, Midshipman Archer wanted us not only to stand to attention on the plunging deck of the launch but to even shoulder arms. He quickly changed his mind when one of the hard-case seamen muttered sinisterly, for all to hear, that if he overbalanced he would fall overboard alone.
It took five hours before we reached the mouth of the river and once there we did try to stand to attention as the village and junk came into view.
We sent up a united sigh of relief when the seaman in the bows shouted, ‘I can’t f***ing-well see any Japs on the f***ing junk.’ He was right! But even so, with an overlying feeling of dread, we all prayed for an ambush free landing.
When we drew up alongside we clawed our way up the side of the junk, ran across the deck screaming - with gut-clenching fear - before jumping down onto the rickety jetty. From here we ran towards the village waving our guns and bellowing whilst we fought the onset of stress-related diarrhoea
When we reached the village outskirts we were brought to a skidding halt by the upraised hand of the village headman.
‘Where are the Japs?’ we all bellowed. Well…the hard-case seamen did most of the bellowing, we radar chappies tried to keep a low profile.
‘F***ing blimey! Is this you all?’ The headman shouted indignantly in Pidgin English. ‘I ask for many hundred bastard British soldier.’
Our fearless Midshipman drew himself up to his full height, saluted, then in haughty tones declared that we were the Royal Navy and didn’t need many hundred soldiers. (Proof, if proof were needed, that he was a complete idiot). He then demanded that the headman tell us where the Japanese had gone so that we could pursue them. I for one trembled with relief when the headman said, ‘When poxy Nips hear I send for many soldier,’ he banged his chest and then gestured towards the jungle, ‘they take this many bags of rice,’ he held up five fingers, ‘then pissing off. We also have rice now, so you take rest and that f***ing bleeder-Junk and go away.’ (From whom do isolated people learn such language?)
By this time the entire village had assembled to giggle at our pathetic show of force as the headman shouted that at least – he held up his hands three times to indicate thirty – f***ing Japanee f***ing wankee soldier had raided his f***ing village.
One of the seaman suggested to the Midshipman that we should take credit for putting the Japs to flight. Sadly, our brave leader didn’t wish to pursue this admirable suggestion. Then gathering up what dignity remained to him he ordered us back to the jetty where we helped to make fast the Junk to the launch before the ancient and badly leaking vessel was towed down the river and out to sea.
The trip back to Emma Haven took over twelve hours because of the rough sea and an unravelling tow rope that parted about every ten miles or so.
To be fair, us radar men thanked providence over and over again for the presence of the ‘Skates’ who, despite being troublesome, were very knowledgeable seamen and every time the tow rope parted they managed to do a bit of effective knotting, splicing and binding to get us underway again, while we radar softies took shelter on what passed on the Junk for a bridge and tried to establish friendly relations with the vast population of giant rats that inhabited the vessel.
We also prayed that the Junk would not fall apart before we reached Emma Haven, or that it would not half-fill with sea water and slowly wallow along for the next six or seven days, or even fill right up and sink, for I didn’t fancy the idea of resting on the seabed in my best tropical suit.
Somehow despite suffering hunger, seasickness, exhaustion and extreme tetchiness, we returned unharmed although the Junk had wallowed and yawed alarmingly and had sprung many leaks and reduced the tow rope to a quarter of its original length. We made it solely due to the muscular efforts of the ever pragmatic, knowledgeable and lively seamen.
The captain greeted us aboard and enthusiastically congratulated us on our achievement BUT… and I wasn’t alone in this, we couldn’t help feeling that ‘Jimmy the One’ seemed to be not only baffled by our survival but also deeply disappointed.
Sailing the old wreck back to Emma Haven turned out to be a fruitless exercise anyway, because the next day it snapped its moorings as, inch by inch, plank by plank, it sank in about twenty fathoms of water.
A diver from the nearby cruiser later discovered that because of our many mishaps - the heaving sea and the swelling-up of the sea-soaked bags of rice - the vessel’s planking had opened up and caused irreparable damage to the hull. His report added that we had been extremely lucky to keep her afloat long enough to return to Emma Haven.
So the old Sumatran Junk, or what was left of it, its rice cargo and its community of super-rats, perished, while we nearly-but-not-quite warriors thankfully lived to tell the tale.
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