The Brave Shall Inherit the Earth: A personal account of battles against the Japanese and then dacoits in Burma between 1944 & 1947

By Lt Col D O O'Leary OBE MC

The Brave Shall Inherit the Earth is the motto of the Rajputana Rifles, the oldest rifle regiment in the pre-World-War-Two Indian Army. It is a fitting epitaph to this remarkable young officer who commanded the mortar platoon in 3/6th Rajputana Rifles during the 14th Army’s invasion of Burma in 1944._x000D_
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Denis O’Leary came from a family of soldiers; his father was also RajRif. Just out of officer training, a practicing Catholic, handsome, athletic, twenty years old, Denis joined 3/6th Rajputana Rifles on the eve of Field Marshal Slim’s invasion of Burma in 1944._x000D_
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This book is the story of his Regiment in that Homeric engagement. It is also about the close friendships formed in war between a British officer and his Rajput and Punjabi ‘Mussalman’ soldiers._x000D_
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The Regiment ‘had been fortunate in our introduction to war. It had been a gradual process.’ Luckily Denis learnt quickly and by the time he came to his Kurukshetra – a decisive battle to hold Pear Hill against suicidal Japanese attacks during the Irrawaddy crossings – his mettle had been tested and forged. _x000D_
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During this battle, in which he won his first Military Cross, he was badly wounded by shrapnel and evacuated back to India for the rest of the war, only re-joining his beloved battalion in pre-Independence Burma, which this account also covers._x000D_
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Denis O’Leary was a life-long soldier, he is a modest historian, he writes simply but eloquently. There are few books so hauntingly beautiful about something so savage as war.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brown Dog Books
• Release date: Jul 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781839521751

Book preview

OBE

List of Illustrations

1. Bangalore South India. Officers Training School. 4 Platoon No 4 Company.

2. A Rajput of the 3rd Battalion Rajputana Rifles.

3. Hand drawn map of 3rd Battalion Rajputana Rifle’s advance through Burma.

4. Sketch of the action involving C Company’s leading section on the North bank of the Nu river.

5. Japanese position codeword Easter. 3 Rajputana Rifle action en route to Pinlebu December 1944.

6. Sketch of the incident in which I and an LMG gunner had a narrow escape.

7. Officers and VCOs of the 3rd Battalion at Kyaukmyaung.

8. The bridgehead area of 62 and 64 Brigade 13 January to 4 March 1945.

9. 19 Indian Division Bridgehead at Kyaukmyaung 25 Jan – 3 Feb 1995.

10. A soldier of 3/6th Rajputana Rifles.

11. Sketch map of A and C Company’s position on Pear Hill 25 January to 2 February 1945.

12. 11th Sikh Regiment MMG Detachment.

13. A drawing depicting one of the many attacks sustained by A and C Company 3 Rajputana Rifles on Pear Hill.

14. 3rd Bn Rajputana Rifles casualties being hurried from the Pear Hill Feature to the Battalion’s position in the main Bridgehead on the Irrawaddy River.

15. Resupply and casualty evacuation from the Bridgehead.

16. Richard Johnson was the neurosurgeon who operated on my head wound in the Neurosurgical unit in Comilla in February 1945.

17. Map of the action against dacoits in March 1947.

18. Sketch map of the action involving B Company 3rd Battalion Rajputana Rifles on 15 March 1947.

19. At Bangalore, India, in 1946 while attending a Regular Commissions selection board in Burma.

Introduction

Whilst the content of this book is straightforward, I thought that I would provide some context to the account. Lieutenant Colonel Denis O’Leary OBE MC* was born on the 24th July 1924 in Srinagar, Kashmir, whilst his father was serving in the Rajputana Rifles. He was the eldest of five children born to his father Colonel Maurice P O’Leary OBE MC and his mother Olive.

His military service started at the age of 18 and the reader of this book will see that in the three years of service that the book covers, he had many close encounters. His first Military Cross was won in 1945. His second came two decades later, in 1964, when his company of Gurkhas, with whom he was then serving, fought a bitter battle with a group of Indonesians on the small island of Lobe in East Malaysia. He also won a military MBE fighting against lawless gangs of dacoits in the chaotic period in Burma after the end of the war, and was advanced to OBE in 1968 for his command of 1/7th Gurkha Rifles in Hong Kong during a difficult period of Beijing-inspired violence in, and border incursions against, what was then the Crown Colony.

He completed a full career in the British Army, and after a period as the Range Liaison Officer on Stanford Training Area he finally retired in 1989. He passed away peacefully on 14 March 2014 aged 89.

T D O’Leary

June 2020

Foreword

This folder contains my recollections of events during my service between 1944 and 1947. At that time, I was serving in the 3rd Battalion 6th Rajputana Rifles.

I had been encouraged to write this account by my family and started it in 1999.

I was enlisted in July 1942 into the Royal Scots Regiment as a schoolboy cadet, with some other 200 or so boys destined for officer training in India, prior to being granted Emergency Commissions in the Indian Army.

We sailed from Glasgow on a civilian steamship, converted to troop carrier, in August 1942, and arrived in Bombay, via Cape Town, in October 1942.

After six months’ training at the Officers Training School at Bangalore (S. India) we were commissioned into our respective Indian Army Regiments on 18 April 1943.

Bangalore South India. Officers Training School. 4 Platoon No 4 Company. DO’L rear rank 5th from the Right

CHAPTER 1

I must try to recall some of my memories of the men in the battalion, whose names will crop up from time to time in these pages.

The one who probably most clearly shared my experiences and who looked after me most devotedly in action, on exercises and in camp, was my dear friend and orderly, Kasub Singh. He was a Rajput from Bikaner in Rajputana. He had been detailed from ‘A’ Company (Rajputs) and had met me at Bethamangla.

When I joined the battalion, he was a Rifleman with 13 years’ service and had seen action with the battalion on the North-West Frontier Province of India against the Pathans in 1936/37. Like all Rajputs, he was very proud of his caste and his military calling, and like his fellows was a real gentleman. Although never smart, he was always neat and tidy. He was completely trustworthy like all rifle company soldiers; he rather looked down on the specialist platoons such as the Mortar Platoon and the Signals Platoon as these were not considered ‘front line’.

After we had been in action, however, he became fiercely loyal and very proud to be in the Mortar platoon. He caused us some affectionate amusement; like all Rajputs he wore a moustache. These were groomed meticulously with wax or water to curl the ends upwards in the shape of horns. The effect made the wearer look very haughty and fierce. Poor old Kasub Singh was the owner of a very stubborn variety. No matter how much or for how long he twirled the ends of his, it always drooped down and gave him a rather doleful look. He spent much time in the evening after work outside my tent in camp coaxing that unruly moustache to no avail.

Wherever we were, he always cared for me. That early morning mug of hot, sweet tea, sometimes long before dawn, sometimes in monsoon rains, always with a gentle Chyar Sahib. Then another mug of hot water for a shave. He looked after my uniform and equipment, often washing and pressing my clothes when there were no dhobis. He was my close protection in action and shared all the moments of fear and danger. He dug my trench, made a comfortable place to sleep on the ground. He helped me to understand and speak Hindustani, as when I joined the battalion, I knew very little.

A Rajput of the 3rd Battalion Rajputana Rifles

Our CO was Billy Beyts. He was a pre-war regular. When the family was in Neemuch in 1933 I remember him as one of the few young officers in the Battalion. He was Battalion hockey player and as a Lieutenant in 1930 had won an MC in Burma when the battalion was part of the force sent from India to put down the Burma rebellion, 1929-31. He had come back to the Battalion from the staff and took over from the previous Commandant, who had become most unpopular. He was a very good Commanding Officer, knew the Indian officers and the men. He did well and was awarded a DSO and was promoted Brigadier. He was very much respected by the men and he had great affection and respect for them. (Died in Spain 1999)

The Second in Command, also a pre-war regular, also in Neemuch with Billy Beyts, took over from a much older man who was very popular but unfortunately out of touch with the flexible and fast-moving warfare we were training for. He had become injured in an accident on a live firing exercise while on a course. The new man was a snob and a bully and was not popular. It was a relief when later he was injured accidentally while trying to recover parachuted supplies during an action with the Japanese and was evacuated to hospital.

He was relieved by George Isaacs, an Indian Christian who came to us from our 5th Battalion. This Battalion was one of the first battalions in the Indian Army to be selected before the war for what was called Indianisation; in other words, all King’s Commissioned Officers would be Indian instead of British. He was one of those Sandhurst trained pre-war regulars. An extremely nice man, very humorous. He commanded the two rifle companies on Pear Hill during the battalion’s heavy fighting in the bridgehead on the Irrawaddy River.

‘A’ Company (Rajputs) was commanded by Leslie Fleming. Because all Rajput names ended in Singh, Leslie was known as Flemsingh Sahib. He was a senior Emergency Commissioned Officer (ECO) and was a very good company commander. He always looked and acted much older than his age. Until one got to know him, he seemed pompous but this hid a calm and warm-hearted nature.

His affection for his men was returned by theirs for him. I saw more action with his company than with the others. Just before the end of the war, while the Battalion was fighting the Japanese withdrawing into Siam along the Mawchi road in S. Burma, he won an MC and was wounded. I was his best man at his wedding in Delhi in 1946. He became a regular after the war and joined the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, which he later commanded. We have kept in touch through the years and marched together in the Rajputana Rifles contingent with the Indian Army group during the 50th anniversary parade in London for Victory over Japan Day (VJ Day 19 August 1995).

‘B’ Company (Jats) was commanded by Roy Tallentire. He also was a senior ECO. He was very good-natured, rather quiet but had a wicked sense of humour and a bushy moustache that was always covered in beer froth! A very good company commander and highly respected.

‘C’ Company, like ‘B’ Company, was composed of Jats from Rajputana. Humphrey Arthington-Davy commanded it. He, too, was a senior ECO. He was a Cambridge graduate. He was witty, humorous and sensitive. An excellent company commander who was very respected and loved by his men, to whom he was intensely loyal and devoted. It was a great blow to all of us when he asked to be posted from the battalion after our initial contacts with the Japanese.

He was no coward but blamed himself for the casualties which his men suffered and took these too much to heart, feeling that he had let them down. We all liked and admired Humphrey and he was a real loss. He later joined the Indian political service and served as a political agent on the North-West Frontier of India and after Independence joined the Foreign Office.

His place was taken by Roy Birkett, his company officer. Roy had come to us from the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun, where he had been an instructor. In those days he always seemed very austere and reserved, but later, as I got to know him better, he was good company and always ready for a laugh. A very steady company commander, who after the war commanded