Through the Jungle of Death: A Boy's Escape from Wartime Burma
272
Through the Jungle of Death: A Boy's Escape from Wartime Burma
272eBook
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Overview
"As uplifting a testimonial to human courage as any to emerge from World War II."--Daily Mail (London)
"A tale of hair-raising adventure, survival, love and loss, shot through with rage, polemic, unlikely humour and a rare spiritual sensibility."--Telegraph Magazine (London)
"Unique and heartfelt . . . a tale of human resilience and bravery in the most desperate circumstances."--The Irish News
"Written with simplicity, understanding, and surprising good humour. It deserves to be read."--The Times Educational Supplement (London)
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780471189114 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Trade Paper Press |
| Publication date: | 03/14/2002 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 272 |
| Sales rank: | 914,304 |
| File size: | 1 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Chapter 1
Soldiers of the King
The men who ruled the British Empire when I was a boy had an obsessive liking for military parades. They treated us to these archaic martial spectacles with tedious regularity because Maymyo, the town to the north of Rangoon where my family lived, was a garrison station. On the King's Birthday, Armistice Day, Jubilee Day, Empire Day and a dozen other suitable days, long columns of armed troops would emerge from their barracks, rifles and bayonets bobbing above the leafy hedgerows as they marched about like so many giant hairy caterpillars.
Since all the men in my family were in the army, my sisters and I would often go down to wave at them as they marched and countermarched on the dusty parade-ground. Row upon row of soldiers in columns of three ranks, uniforms sharp with starch, polished buckles twinkling on green webbing. Their ankles were wrapped with puttees and on their heads were forage caps or broad-brimmed bush hats or pith helmets sporting the large green pompom of the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry.
We knew several KOYLI soldiers since my father used to invite them to our home for dinner or Sunday lunch, feeling sorry for these men who were so far from their homes in England. But I remember these troops for another reason--it is the catchy marching tune their rumbustious brass band played with such panache that still evokes the unique mood and quality of those precious peacetime years. Almost sixty years on, I need only whistle it and the child comes alive, clear-eyed, in his sister's arms, head thrown back in ecstasy at the tumult of the band, cheering the rows of marching soldiers.
Maymyo was a pretty hill station, 3,500 feet up on a plateau in central Burma, where retired military and government officers spent their last days in peace and elegance, soothed by a pleasantly temperate climate. Their bungalows and the picturesque gardens surrounding them reproduced in every detail the cottage gardens of England at the turn of the century. Even nature was harnessed to the cause of nostalgia with the construction of rides through the forest, a Botanical Garden with lakes, and exclusive golf, polo and tennis clubs. And to complement these reminders of 'home', Maymo was famous for growing in lavish abundance the tastiest strawberries in the land. With attractions such as these, it was no wonder to us that the Government of Burma chose Maymo as their retreat from Rangoon during the hot summer months.
At the edge of the town was a tree-lined avenue called Fryer Road, so quiet you could almost hear the grass grow on lazy Sunday afternoons. About halfway along and set back behind a row of cherry trees and a tall, well-manicured privet hedge, was a four-acre plot of land on which stood a large rambling house with wide airy verandahs and floors of glowing polished teak. I thought this place was Paradise when I was little but I discovered much later that it was called 'Lindfield', the house where I was born.
There were tiger and leopard skins on the drawing-room floor and elephant tusks in one corner near the organ which my sister Maisie played. Close by were display cabinets with gold, silver, jade and ivory ornaments and jars full of rubies, while on the wall hung a superb oil portrait of my Burmese mother next to a similar painting of my father's Scottish mother, Granny Stuart. At the eastern end of the drawing-room were bedrooms which led to my father's medical surgery and library, while to the west were his gunroom and more bedrooms. To the rear of the building was the dining-room, with its huge teak table at which my parents, their eight children, guests and occasionally my three half-sisters, consumed a prodigious quantity of delicious food prepared by Ohn Sein, our neurotic cook.
Around the house, land was set aside for rows of sweet-corn and potatoes, a well-stocked kitchen garden, extensive orchards, lawns and a number of formal gardens sheltered by oak and eucalyptus trees. Beyond the porch, where my mother's favourite orchids hung in extravagant clusters, was the parking area for the Oldsmobile convertible. From here a track led to the dog kennels, coops for chickens and geese, and a pleasant row of quarters for the servants.
I was the last of eleven children who made up the Brookes family, an affectionate boy with an overactive and intensely inquisitive mind. By the time I was old enough to be aware of who I was, most of the older siblings had married and left home, but we met occasionally when war was declared and Lindfield became the focal point for the families of the men on the front line.
My father, Major William Lindfield Brookes, had spent his entire working life in the Indian army. He had the constitution of a man of 50, looked like someone of 60--but was actually a few weeks short of his seventieth birthday in 1942. He had retired in 1927 but rejoined the army in 1941 at the outbreak of war with Japan.
Born in India, he had qualified as a surgeon and first saw action in 1897 as a 25-year-old Assistant Surgeon during the campaign in the Tirah in the North-West Frontier Province of Afghanistan. I have a vague childhood memory that he was also in Mesopotamia around the time of the First World War. Most of his medals appear to have vanished mysteriously but I have two: the India Medal 1895 with bars for the Punjab Frontier 1897-8 and the Tirah 1897-8; and the British War Medal 1914-18.
Family legend relates that soon after his posting to Burma, while he was learning the Burmese language, he fell in love with his teacher's exquisite young daughter and decided to marry her as soon as he had finished his course. She was only 16, her name was Ma Sein--Miss Diamond--and she could speak no English. He was a 38-year-old widower with three little daughters under the age of 10. The year was 1910 and they were married in Kindat, Upper Chindwin, by the Rev. Chapman, General Superintendent of the Methodist Mission.
From then on Father's career in the army was blighted, yet he and Ma Sein flourished for thirty-two years in singular warmth and harmony. She bore him four girls and four boys--and I revelled in being the youngest.
As to the slights and prejudices of the small-minded, they were of little consequence to my parents for they were confident in themselves and in their love and admiration for one another. When an invitation to an official function was addressed to 'Major Brookes' only and not 'Major and Mrs Brookes', my father's response was to burst into the Government Secretary's office like a wild bull and frighten the man out of his wits. He left through the closed French windows, leaving behind shattered glass and a shaken secretary. He was my kind of man, fearless and resolute, with no mealy-mouthed 'ifs' or 'buts' or 'maybes' in his vocabulary. His army papers include the adverse comment that he was 'ordered to proceed to Yeravada but refused to go'. How like my Old Man to have the courage to live life on his own terms.
His name for my mother was Puss. Far from being a timid handmaid, she was his equal in boldness and determination, standing up to him when others would have tactfully given way. She ran the household at Lindfield, both family and servants, like a queen dealing with matters of state. And on Sundays, or when important guests were present, she would indeed dress like a queen, radiant in gold and jewels and smelling of fresh sandalwood. Her shimmering Thai silk longyi was edged with threads of gold; gold buttons held her blouse of purest white, and jewelled rings, bracelets, hair-grips and necklaces completed her adornments. My favourite task was to thread a garland of white jasmine flowers for her to wind round the tall bun on her head in the traditional Burmese fashion.
I could not have had a more fascinating couple for parents. The age-gap of fifty-eight years between my father and myself seemed to enhance rather than obstruct our relationship, much to the amusement and envy of family and friends. He taught me to play chess when I was 10 and glowed with pleasure when I demolished adult guests who dared to challenge me. I was the only one allowed to sit in his surgery and experiment with chemicals--except for poisons, which he kept out of my reach on the top shelf in case curiosity overcame prudence. However I must confess that on two occasions I did offer my brother George some chocolates dipped in substances from bottles clearly marked with a skull and crossbones. Yet apart from a touch of diarrhoea, which he shrugged off, George remained surprisingly frisky.
Father and I shared the joy of books and the pleasure of singing: his wistful rendering of 'Macushla' echoed in my 'Rose of Tralee'. He encouraged me to cook and I remember the alarm on the faces of my brothers and sisters when he insisted that everyone had to eat my offerings, even the sparrow curry. The wild jungle enchanted us both, and I trusted him when he taught me how to hold a live poisonous snake in my bare hand, even though the exposed fangs and the writhing body wrapped around my small forearm made me shiver with fear.
Despite his martial exterior, Father was a very religious man, a lay preacher in the Baptist Church with an Abraham-like presence, who was capable of calling down fire and brimstone on the congregation. Meanwhile my sister Maisie soothed their ruffled nerves by playing the organ, my brother Richard taught in the Sunday School, my brother-in-law Dennis was a Deacon, and at Christmas George and I were two of the three kings of a place called Orien-Tar.
Even so, I was fortunate to have the moderating influence of my mother to soften the hard edges of the male Brookes. She was the embodiment of the tactile Asian mother, her arms for ever open to comfort and restore a grieving child. Through her I learnt to heed the oneness of all life in the exuberant forms around me. From her I learnt to be mindful of the spirits, or nats, who were the invisible forces of good and evil. These spirits occasionally appeared at night as globes of light, drifting silently through the branches of the banyan tree at the bottom of the garden. Richard, always practical and scornful of such bizarre ideas, dismissed the lights as fireflies. Even so, I still held my palms together as Mum had taught me, to signify to the lights 'I see the God in you'--just to be on the safe side.
In our corner of Maymyo, bordering Fryer Road, Nestwood Hill and Circular Road, were properties similar to our own and in them lived our friends with British names like Langtry, Plunket, Fenton, Jellico, O'Hara, Lovett, Vincent, Edwards and Russell. My older sisters and brothers grew up with them, went to the same schools and attended the same social and sporting events. Despite the passing of over half a century, I am in contact with many of them still.
And so I played, heedless of the passing years, unaware that the sun was finally setting on the once great British Empire. My days were brim-full of wonders. My universe at Lindfield was filled with relatives, friends and servants, sometimes as many as eighteen people, scattered around the living quarters and gardens. All of them were older than I was, yet I was never short of company or affection. And from them, Asian and European alike, I absorbed the insight and fortitude that would be the foundation of my survival when the black days of adversity came.
Table of Contents
Illustrations List.Map.
Prologue.
Soldiers of the King.
Bombers over Paradise.
Chasing the Serpent.
Sawbwa Fang of Mangshih.
Fly Me to India.
Prelude to Disaster.
The Rat Trap.
Racing the Monsoon.
The Butterflies of Kumon.
In the Valley of Death.
Through the Chinese Ambush.
The Scarecrows Arrive.
Shingbwiyang.
The Longhouse of Tears.
The Man Is Born.
I Have a Dream.
Journey's End.
Epilogue.
Acknowledgements.