Authors: Fergal Keane
Trim, Lieutenant Colonel Jackie 198, 203, 206, 207
Turner, Henry 238
Ukhrul village 50, 166, 198, 335, 393, 396, 397–8, 399, 401
United States: air support xix, 23, 23n, 81–2, 129, 155, 171, 200, 304, 321, 322, 323, 339, 366, 368, 369
Britain, relations with xix–xx, 23, 23n, 76–9, 77n, 78n, 81–2, 117, 129, 155, 157, 171, 200, 224, 277–80, 304, 321, 322, 323, 339, 366, 368, 369
China, role in war within xx, 78, 112, 170, 171, 180, 280, 316, 323, 368, 427
Pacific war 110, 111, 147, 151, 290
USAAF 325, 368
Victoria Cross 359, 379, 432, 433
Wada, Senior Private Manabu 152, 377, 403–4
Walton, Lieutenant 165
Warren, Brigadier Frederick ‘Daddy’ 221, 385–6
Arakan 175
Dimapur, arrives at 185
encircled by Japanese 275
human cost of his decisions, awareness of 175, 185
Kohima garrison, seeks permission to withdraw 273
Kohima, attempts to relieve 275, 279, 284–5, 304, 311, 314, 338, 345, 350, 385–6
Kohima, on morale within 257
Kohima, ordered to return to 240, 241
Kohima, pulled out from 221, 222, 223, 224n
‘last, man, last round’ orders, Jessami and Kharasom, role in rescinding 212, 213, 213n, 257n
Laverty and 247, 252, 345
161 Commander 95
Watchtower Society 4
Watts, Captain Phillip ‘Dodo’ 259–60, 261, 267, 268
Wavell, General Sir Archibald 12, 12n, 49–50, 83, 88n, 407
Weedman, CQMS Fred 276, 277–8
Wellings, Roy 261
Whalen, Jimmy 321
White, Lieutenant Colonel O. G. W. 383
White, Theodore 2
Whyte, Pat 34–5
Williams, Brigadier A. Felix 47
Williams, Walter 308, 310–11
Williamson, Captain Michael 213
Willis, Dick 205
Willis, Margery 431
Wilson, Major David 174
Wilson, Sergeant William ‘Tug’ 285
Wingate, Brigadier Orde xx, 25n, 112–13, 112n, 149, 165n, 171, 180, 282, 368, 411, 459
Winstanley, Captain (later Major) John 98, 383
Alam Halfa 64, 65
Arakan 125, 129
background 60, 68, 358
bravery 137
Dunkirk 61
India, reaction to news of deployment to 68
Japanese solider, on behaviour of xviii
joins army 60
Kohima, relief of 358
Kohima, siege of 247, 309, 310, 311, 329, 334, 355
promoted to Major 125, 135, 136, 137
Ranchi training camp 92–3
Saville’s replacement, role in 95
wounded, falls ill and evacuated out of war 410, 430
Worth, Private Fred 243
Wright, Colonel Douglas Rawdon 52, 53, 54, 56, 347
Wright, Lieutenant John 244, 264
Wykes, Lance Corporal Dennis: Arakan 124–6, 127, 129, 135
background 99
Burma, role in pursuit of Japanese through 411–12
deserters, remembers British 360, 361
Dimapur 176
homecoming 425–7
India, arrival in 73
Japanese prisoners, attitude towards 418
Kohima, arrival at 240, 241, 243–4
Kohima, relief of 354, 356
Kohima, siege of 307–8, 330, 331, 338, 346
morale of battalion, remembers 220
Mountbatten, remembers visit of 123
post-war life 428
Rangoon barracks 415, 417
typhus 411–12
Yamagami, Lieutenant Hiroshi 164, 200, 207, 258, 259, 260–1, 286–7, 326, 389, 397, 424
Yamaguchi, Major 234
Yamamoto, Warrant Officer Isamu 205
Yamashita, General 106
Yamauchi, Lieutenant General
Masafumi 140, 141, 235, 289, 392
Yanagida, Lieutenant General 141, 235, 289, 304
Yandaboo, Treaty of, 1826 38, 38n
Yarnold, F. H. 18
Yeo, Major Richard 248, 285, 308
Yoshifuku, Captain 372–3
Young, Lance Corporal John McCulloch 160, 161, 213–14, 215, 216–17, 216n
Young, Gavin 440
Young, Lieutenant Colonel John 256–8, 266–7, 271, 298, 299, 301, 302, 304, 305, 311, 345, 350, 351, 352, 367, 396
Young, Major David 385
Zubza village 219–20, 275, 276, 286, 294, 316, 330
During the years it has taken to research and write this book I have been helped by a wide variety of people in several continents. I am grateful to Pfelie Kezieze of the Kohima Educational Trust. The Trust was founded by veterans of the British 2nd Division in 2004 – the 60th anniversary of the battle – as an act of gratitude to the Nagas. Also in Kohima, I wish to thank Aziebu Shaiza for his hospitality and insights into Naga traditions and culture. In Delhi Shubranshu Chaudhary made some all-important inquiries, and Toby Sinclair was skilled in making the seemingly impossible happen at the last moment.
In Britain my thanks are due to: Dr Simon Robbins and Margaret Brookes of the Imperial War Museum; Michael Ball, Head of the Department of Printed Books, at the National Army Museum; the National Archives in Kew; the School of Oriental and African Studies; the Centre of South Asian Studies, Cambridge; Dr A. R. Morton, Archivist, Sandhurst Collection, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst; Bob Cook, Curator, Kohima Museum, York; the late Colonel H. B. H. ‘Blick’ Waring, Curator of the Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment museum, Maidstone; Paul Loseby and Philip Crawley of the Burma Star Association; the late John Colvin for his generous advice over a memorable lunch at the very beginning; Gordon Graham MC, Kohima veteran, for his sage observations on the manuscript and for alerting me to pitfalls; to my friend Michael Shipster for introducing me to Kohima and for being the best of travelling companions in the Naga Hills.
Mrs Diana Keast of Marlborough gave unstintingly of her time and memories of her brother Lance Corporal John Harman; I am also indebted for their assistance to Patrick Laverty, son of the late Lieutenant Colonel John Laverty, and to Roger Richards, son of the late Brigadier Hugh Richards, who allowed me access to his father’s papers and correspondence. Roland Powell read the manuscript closely, highlighting errors of fact and arguing with my judgements whenever he felt I had been less than fair. His immense knowledge of Kohima and the Burma campaign, combined with a first class literary eye, helped me beyond words. Louise Byrne helped trace survivors of the battle and spoke to scores of individuals and their families, gaining their confidence with her unassuming and courteous nature. Laura Thornton, the granddaughter of a Burma veteran, researched part of the V Force story and the work of the Royal Air Force.
Seeking to chart the Japanese experience of the battle and retreat would have been impossible without the assistance of Yuki Sunada. As the granddaughter of a Burma veteran she approached the job with devotion and insight, and opened the way to a Japanese world that would otherwise have been closed to me. To her I owe an enormous debt of thanks. My thanks are also due to the late Mr Masao Hirakubo who gave me hours of his time and provided many useful contacts in Japan; Mr Shuichiro Yoshino, 31st Division Veterans Association, was most helpful in directing me to survivors of the battle; Mr Goro Sato, the son of the late Lieutenant General Kotuku Sato, gave generously of his time and memories, as well as giving me access to his family photograph album; Kyoko Murukami spent many hours translating documents for the book, including Lieutenant General Kotuku Sato’s handwritten account of Kohima; thanks are also due to the staff of the National Defence Archives in Tokyo and the Amarume Museum, Yamagata Prefecture.
At Harper Collins my editor Arabella Pike was a wise, encouraging and patient presence who was always proved right in the end, and without whom much valuable time would have been spent floundering in the wood instead of seeing the trees; Michael
Upchurch at HarperCollins did much of the hard work needed to pull the manuscript the last crucial yards to completion; my agent David Godwin has the happy knack of knowing precisely when to insert his presence and when to leave well enough alone. I would, on several occasions, been lost without him. At the BBC Sarah Ward Lilley, Jon Williams and Francesca Unsworth have been the soul of understanding and support. In Ireland, where much of this book was written, I am indebted to the hospitality of my friend John King who gave up his hilltop studio overlooking Ardmore Bay to allow me space and quiet. At home in London my thanks are due to Dr Niall Campbell and Christina Garcia Llavona whose work on war trauma provided many valuable insights, and to Dr John Taylor of Toronto who answered my queries on the physical wounds of war. My friends Rob, David, Cecilia, Gordon, Paul, Fred and Ava all helped me to stay the course. Above all I am grateful to Daniel, Holly and Anne. Anne helped me to excavate the life of Charles Ridley Pawsey and was always the first to read and offer wise comments on the manuscript. The book would never have been completed without her. Nobody around me knows better what comes home from the wars.
FERGAL KEANE
was born in London and educated in Ireland. He is one of the BBC’s most distinguished correspondents and an awardwinning broadcaster and author. He has reported for the corporation from Northern Ireland, South Africa, Asia and the Balkans. He has been awarded a BAFTA, been named reporter of the year on television and radio, winning honours from the Royal Television Society and the Sony Radio Awards, most recently for his BBC Radio 4 series
Taking a Stand
. Keane has won the George Orwell prize for literature and the James Cameron Prize. He is the author of a number of bestselling books including
Letter to Daniel
and his memoir
All of These People
. He lives in London with his wife and two children.
A note on sources
The main documentary material sourced from archives and museums is abbreviated as follows: National Archives of the United Kingdom – NA; National Army Museum – NAM; Imperial War Museum – IWM; Royal Military Academy Archives – RMAA; National Institute for Defence Studies, Japan – NIDS; National Diet Library, Japan – NDL. The sources of all other quotations and significant points of information are to be found in the footnotes and endnotes. The classic book on the battle written by a participant is Arthur Swinson’s account
Kohima
(Arrow Books, 1966), now sadly out of print. Captain Swinson kept a daily diary and after the war had access to the senior British Generals. He wrote his book while the main participants were still alive and I had the sense that there was material he felt obliged to exclude. I discovered that he had left his papers to the National Archives who had in turn given them to the Imperial War Museum, where they were presented to me with the words every writer longs to hear: ‘You seem to be the first person to have asked for these.’ The papers contained a wealth of material, including correspondence with senior generals and extracts from their diaries. This unpublished material helped cast an invaluable light on the extent of the pressures, political as well as military, facing the British command. I am indebted to Arthur Swinson’s widow, Mrs Joy Benson, for permission to quote from his work. The papers of Brigadier Hugh Richards, who commanded the Kohima garrison, illuminated not only the conduct of the battle but the deep rift which
emerged afterwards between some of the leading figures in the defence. His son Roger gave me access to this trove of letters and narrative accounts. These included different drafts of his account of the battle. They were delivered to my home in a Second World War issue brown suitcase belonging to his father. Other words which proved immensely helpful to an understanding of the battle were Brigadier C. E. Lucas Phillips
Springboard to Victory
(Heinemann, 1966), Major A. J. Barker’s
March on Delhi
(Faber, 1963) and Major Anthony Brett James’s
Ball of Fire – the Fifth Indian Division in the Second World War
(Aldershot, Gale and Polden, 1951). Leslie Edwards’s
Kohima – the Furthest Battle
(The History Press, 2009) provides an illuminating day-by-day survey of the fighting from existing records; John Colvin’s
Not Ordinary Men
(Pen and Sword, 1994) is rich in detail and suffused with nostalgia for an idea of Britain that vanished in his lifetime. On the Burma war as a whole Louis Allen’s magisterial
Burma – the Longest Battle
(J. M. Dent, 1984) provided important insights into Japanese thinking about the battle. Allen was an intelligence officer who interviewed high ranking Japanese after the war. For an insight into the thinking of Lieutenant General William Slim, commander of the 14th Army, Robert Lyman’s
Slim, Master of War
(Robinson, 2004) is indispensable.
Extracts from C. E. Lucas Phillips,
Springboard to Victory
appear by permission of the Random House Group Ltd.