Naval Party 2482

The picture left is of Ted in 1945. In August 1945 when the Japanese capitulated British forces in the Far East were preparing for the invasion of Malaya which had been planned for November. Moves were soon afoot for the reoccupation of British territories currently occupied by the Japanese. These included Malaya and Singapore, parts of Borneo, the Andaman Islands and the Nicobar Islands, Hong Kong and that part of Burma which had not already been recaptured. However, huge territories of colonial empire belonging to Holland, France and Portugal also remained to be taken over from the Japanese. These included the Netherlands East Indies, French Indo China and the Portuguese colonies of Macau and East Timor. None of these European countries had forces available in the Far East to occupy their possessions and so this chore fell to the British forces on the spot. What follows is a copy of the order issued by SEAC (British South East Asia Command) which covered the reoccupation of the Netherlands East Indies.

Headquarters S. E. Asia Command
2 September 1945

From Supreme Commander S. E. Asia.
To. G.O.C. Imperial Forces.

Re. Directive ASD 4743S.

You are instructed to proceed with all speed to the island of Java in the East Indies to accept the surrender of Japanese Imperial Forces on that island, and to release Allied prisoners of war and civilian internees. In keeping with the provisions of the Yalta Conference you will re-establish civilian rule and return the colony to the Dutch administration, when it is in a position to maintain services.

The main landing will be by the British Indian Army, 5th Division, who have shown themselves to be most reliable since the Battle of El Alamein. Intelligence reports indicate that the landing should be at Surabaya, a location that affords a deep anchorage and repair facilities. As you are no doubt aware the local natives have declared a Republic, but we are bound to maintain the status quo that existed before the Japanese invasion. I wish you God speed and a successful campaign.

Mountbatten
Vice Admiral
Supreme Commander S.E. Asia.

The 5th Indian Army Division was, as its name implies, comprised of Indian Army units, but the 2nd West Yorkshire Regiment was also attached, as were the 3/4th Ghurkha Rifles, the 3/9th Ghurkha Rifles and the 1st Burma Regiment. Royal Navy ships involved were the frigates HMS Loch Gorm, and HMS Loch Glendhu, the cruiser HMS Sussex destroyers HMS Carron, Caesar and Cavalier, the tank landing ships HMLST 3001, 304, 413 and 237, the landing craft (troops) HMLCT 1161, 1195, 1060 and 1055, Infantry Landing Ship (LSI) Glenroy, Waveny, and Princess Beatrix. Also SS Bappeta, Pulasti, Malika, and Floristan

I was attached to Naval Party 2482, which was also sent into Surabaya. The Party consisted mainly of Royal Marines who had been drawn from those ships of the East Indies Fleet that carried these highly trained fighting men and some Royal Navy Telegraphists to operate a radio station that was set up in a van in the harbour area. As a Telegraphist I was sent over from recently reoccupied Singapore aboard the frigate HMS Loch Eck to Batavia (now Jakarta) from whence I sailed for Surabaya aboard the small troopship Talma. This ship also carried Ghurkha troops as reinforcements for the British and Indian troops still engaged in and around the city of Surabaya. (I am using the British spelling of the city’s name but will include here the Dutch spelling for those who search the Internet using that spelling) SOERABAJA.

Today, little is known about the period of British occupation of the Netherlands East Indies and probably even less is known about the British occupation of French Indo China where, following the hand over to the French when they arrived from Europe, the war of independence by the Viet Minh commenced. The French defeat was followed in turn by the Vietnam War between the USA and some allies, and this also resulted in a defeat for the outsiders. However I must confine myself to the activities in Surabaya. When the Talma arrived she threaded her way, steering between the dozens of masts and funnels that simply littered the harbour. These wrecks were the result of many attacks on the harbour area by, in turn, the Japanese, the Americans the British and Dutch. I joined Naval Party 2482 and commenced watch keeping in the radio van. We were billeted in a Dutch colonial home of some grandeur near a canal and I was struck by the orderly and neat appearance of the city, which even after all the bombing and years of Jap occupation was still a credit to Dutch colonialism. During the day one could hear the sounds of fighting in the city’s suburbs, the occasional explosion and gunfire. At night these sounds seem to increase in volume and I recall that there was a night bird there that sounded for all the world like a machine gun. The first time I heard it I jumped out of bed quite certain that the gun was very close to the house. This gave some of the other lads quite a laugh as they’d all heard the bird before.

One day some of the troops pulled the body of an Indian Army officer out of the canal. He had had his throat slit from ear to ear and this had an immediate effect upon our fellows - you knew what to expect if you were caught alone and unarmed. The body of the unfortunate Indian officer was buried in the garden of our billet and I could see the cross in the moonlight through the window as I lay in my bed. I suppose someone had ascertained that he was a Christian. Shortly after this I was walking along the edge of a nearby sports field with another telegraphist when we heard a shot ring out. Although I had survived much bombing and gunfire I had never before come under small arms fire, which is pretty personal, I knew immediately that we were the target, as the buzz and whine of the bullet was unmistakable. We both leaped behind a hedge and ran crouching down in the direction of our billet. I heard a couple more shots and because we were both unarmed we just kept going.

Upon arrival we told the marines what had happened and they had in fact heard the shots. Two of them, whose names I cannot recall, took off with Lanchester automatic weapons. Shortly thereafter we heard the Brr Brr of the Lanchesters and then the 'Bootnecks' returned. They told us that they had set the body alight as a warning to others and when we expressed doubt about this, one of them, who came from my home town of Hull, in Yorkshire, offered to take us to view the funeral pyre. I could see the pall of oily smoke in the distance and declined. As explained, these marines were not Royal Marine Commandos but Sea Service Marines who normally served on cruisers and warships above that size in the Royal Navy. They wore blue berets and not the green berets of Commandos. I had had little to do with marines because almost all my ships were the size of minesweepers, destroyers and landing craft. All these years after the event (I type this in 2002) I view the incident in a different manner to that of the time. The fellow who took shots at us was of course, in the eyes of Indonesians, a freedom fighter and he saw my friend and I as invaders. Had he been a better shot I would not now be typing this!
Whilst I was there the fighting in the main was well away from the harbour area and the city centre was firmly in the hands of the British and Indian troops. As mentioned earlier these included Ghurkhas who had arrived on the Talma with me. One had only to look out for the odd sniper as my friend and I discovered. The British forces stayed in Surabaya until Dutch forces arrived to take over from them and these proved to be Dutch Marines of the Korps Mariniers. These had been outfitted and kitted up in America and wore their US uniforms with Dutch badges. Because, like American GI’s they constantly chewed gum, they immediately became known to us as Amsterdam Yanks. We were not sorry to be leaving the Netherlands East Indies and we left many graves behind to join those other British graves that this territory has acquired during some few hundred years of British Eastern policy.

I arrived back in Singapore on 24th May 1946, which was my 19th birthday. I had by then spent well over a year in the Far East and didn’t yet know that I had another year to go before I saw the English coast once again. My next ship was HMS Jaseur, which was an Algerine class fleet minesweeper. We swept along the coasts and channels of the Netherlands East Indies, (soon to become Indonesia) Borneo, Malaya, Burma and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands but that is another story. For our service in Surabaya we received the Naval General Service Medal with S. E. Asia Clasp. Subsequently (actually over fifty years later) I was awarded the ‘Minesweeping Clasp’ to add to this medal. The mills ground very slowly at the Admiralty. I already held the Burma Star for service aboard the cruiser HMS Ceylon and in 1951 I was recalled from the Royal Fleet Reserve because of the Korean War and I then clocked up another eighteen months in the Far East, mainly Japan and off the Korean coast but with an involvement in another of Britain’s ‘Little Wars’ as a sideline, doing the odd bombardment of Communist bandits in Malaya. But once again that is another story. However, almost four years in the Far East may be something of a record for an HO (Hostilities Only) rating. I like to think so.

Some years later I heard a whisper that there had been a mutiny of sorts in the West Yorkshire Regiment. If that was so then I could certainly understand the reasoning. They had survived World War Two and were then told to lay their lives on the line for a territory that was not British and which most of them had never heard of. Also the British in the N.E.I. were heavily criticized internationally for rearming Japanese troops and using them to help subdue the revolutionaries. Of course these critics did not see the many murdered British and Indian troops nor indeed the scores of murdered, surrendered Japanese soldiers. South East Asia had been designated a British theatre of operations and with Allied troops very thin on the ground and 25,000 fully trained Japanese troops on the spot, it would have been stupid not to use them. The British did the same thing in Saigon, against the forces of Ho Chi Minh’s new Republic of Viet Nam. Oh, and there were two German U-Boats in Surabaya that had been there since the German surrender in May 1945. I bet the Germans were very pleased to see fellow Europeans arrive. In fact they told us so. I sometimes see it as ironic that I chose to settle in Australia when I finally left the Royal Navy. The Australian government in 1945 supported the Indonesians in their fight for independence. So much so that supplies from Sydney were never sent to us in Surabaya and this resulted in our fellows smoking Japanese cigarettes, which were pretty foul and in fact I wore Japanese Army boots. We taught the Jap POWs how to brew tea Navy style and after seeing the ravages they had wrought amongst our POWs in Changi, Singapore, I was very surprised to see how docile they were. It seemed that once the Emperor had said, “Enough!” they all accepted the inevitable.