WW2 Rail Withdrawal:Khlong Ngae Bridge

[admin]

Ric Francis contributes entries from the WWII diary of a soldier who led the train team into Thailand to destroy bridges before the Japanese army arrived.

THE RAIL WITHDRAWAL

Shackled by the order that British forces were in no circumstances to cross the frontier until the Japanese had struck the first blow, the British lost the initiative when the Japanese advance forces landed on Singgora beaches in the early hours of Dec. 8, 1941.

It was not until 5.30 p.m.. that same day that the first troops of the 11th Indian Division under Major-General Murray Lyon crossed the Kedah-Siam border at Bukit Kayu Hitam. At dusk about 6.30 p.m., the column reached Sadao, 10 miles inside Siamese territory, and halted to-await developments.

In the meantime an armoured train driven by the the late Sergeant Eddie Augustin of the Railway Operating Maintenance Company (ROMC) of the Federated Malay States Volunteer Force (FMSVF) advanced 10 miles into Siam and blew up the Haadyai - Padang Besar bridge and then withdrew to Padang Besar.

The following diary kept by Sgt. Augustin gives a first-hand account of the fighting along the railway in Kedah sector`of the Battle of Malaya in the opening days of the war in 1941:?

Friday, Dec. 5: Our unit (composed of Chinese, Eurasian, Indian and Malay Personnel of the F.M.S. Railways under Captain H.P. Yates, himself a railwayman) was ordered to move from the Kedah Volunteer Force Drill Hall in Alor Star to the Sultan Abdul Hamid College Hostel nearby.

Saturday, Dec. 6: 1700 hours: The O.C., Capt. Yates, instructed me to go to the loco shed and get the armoured engine ready.

After getting up steam, my first fireman, Sapper Donald U'Ren (now Adviser to Asian Transport Workers in various parts of Asia in connection with Trade Union Administration, Finance and Negotiations) the second fireman, Sapper Megat Zakariah, and I drew ammunition and rations for two days.

2200 hours: Ordered to- proceed to Bukit Ketri and await signal to go to Bukit Ketri, pick up troops there, and go on to Padang Besar. Two troop-trains would follow at interval of 400 yards.

2400 hours: Reached Aran.

Sunday, Dec. 7 - 0200 hours: The two following trains arrived. The boys were in high spirits. Being senior NCO, I kept them out of mischief.

Monday, Dec. 8 0800 hours: Heard a loud explosion nearby and saw many aeroplanes. Anticipated action. Not sure how far we would have to go, and having some misgivings as to whether there was sufficient coal, I phoned to Kodiang for more. At 1000 hours a breakdown train brought it.

1600 hours: Received orders to proceed to Bukit Ketri where we picked up some Punjabi soldiers under Capt. Burns. The detachment included sappers and miners.

1900 hours:. moved forward cautiously into Thai territory. Reaching the big Haadyai-Padang Besar bridge, the sappers prepared to blow it up.

Ordered to take, the train a mile back. While waiting for the blow up heard enemy convoys rumbling on the road half a mile away.

The destruction of the bridge completed, we rushed back to Kodiang.

Tuesday, Dec. 9 - 0530 hours: Arrived at Kodiang. Rested there for a couple of hours and then returned to Bukit Ketri where we were on the alert all day and night.

Wednesday, Dec. 10 - 0600 hours: Moved back a little as enemy artillery were finding their range. 1800 hours: Ordered to retreat.

At Kodiang found two barrels of engine-oil and cylinder-oil. Filled our boxes to the brim and then poured all the remaining oil into the ground to deny it to the enemy.

Until ordered to withdraw at 23 hours, patrolled the line between Kodiang and Arau.

Thursday, Dec. 11 - 1800 hours: ordered to retreat to Tunjang. In pouring rain sappers and miners blew up bridges. We afterwards took the men to Anak Bukit. That night we patrolled the canal between Anak Bukit and Tunjang.

Friday, Dec. 12 - 1300 hours: Some of the East Surreys emerged from the jungle on our right. Was pleasantly surprised to see among them a friend of mine carrying a tommy-gun. To celebrate our re-union we shared a bottle of lime juice.

While talking we noticed a suspicious movement in an adjoining padi-field. Trailed it for a mile until an Indian soldier came to tell us the enemy were trying to surround us. Sent off the information to headquarters, warned all troops in the vicinity, and awaited orders, within minutes came the order to withdraw. A train with coaches arrived on the scene. Loaded troops and took them back to Anak Bukit. Five minutes later the Japanese attacked

Saturday, Dec. 13 - 0800 hours: Took in water at Alor Star after patrolling the Alor Star - Anak Bukit section the whole night.

Ordered to withdraw. When we were about to set off a terrific explosion rocked the neighbourhood - the sappers had blown up the. Alor Star railway-bridge.

The demolition, however, was only partially successful. The rails still rested on the girders. Orders came to run the engine over the bridge and sink it in the river.

I was about to do this when Capt. Burns came and asked me to show him how to manipulate the levers. I volunteered to do the job myself but he ordered me off the engine because my legs were water ?bitten and in bad shape.

My firemen and I therefore unloaded our belongings and saw the engine go thundering off. To our amazement it jumped over the broken rails, righted itself, and went on. We doubled after it. As we did so firing broke out in our rear.

To head off the engine I tried to get a lift from a passing truck but there was no room for me on it. However, 1' miles farther on an Royal Artillery battery took me a mile, until they received orders to turn back. In great pain I trudged 12 miles before a truck picked me up. Having had no sleep for five days, I dropped off to sleep, to wake up with a start when we reached Sungei Patani.

Went to the railway-station to report myself to the O.C. and was told that Sapper U'ren was bringing back the engine attached to the Red Cross train. I was instructed to take it over. Did so and drove it to Bukit Mertajam where a relief-crew took over.

Thus ended the railway withdrawal from Kedah.

[GWR]

Great to be actually able to get an account of this action. However, it's still not entirely clear where the bridge was. Another account placed it at Khlong Ngea, which is almost certainly a misspelling of Klong Ngae. Just south of Klong Ngae there are two fairly large bridges. The more southerly is the more likely, given that it spans Khlong Utapao rather than a tributary of that fairly major Klong.
1900 hours:. moved forward cautiously into Thai territory. Reaching the big Haadyai-Padang Besar bridge, the sappers prepared to blow it up.

Ordered to take, the train a mile back. While waiting for the blow up heard enemy convoys rumbling on the road half a mile away.


I've yet to go and really check out the site of this bridge, but if I were to sabotage this line, this is where I would do it. Because North of this point the line runs close to urban areas and the main road where the sabotage action would be easily discovered by advancing Japanese and their sympathisers.

But they would be close enough to the main road to hear the Japanese advancing as described. And we do know that the British force which advanced up the main road encountered a Japanese column (with headlights ablaze) advancing south on the same evening at a point just north of Sadao (probably in the region of the current Safeskin Factory). Indeed, this new account says pretty much the same. The British road force then carried out some delaying action (Japanese soldiers were already fanning out thru' the rubber trees to outflank them) before retreating back to the Bukit Kayu Hitam road border and blowing up a couple of road culverts as they went.
It was not until 5.30 p.m.. that same day that the first troops of the 11th Indian Division under Major-General Murray Lyon crossed the Kedah-Siam border at Bukit Kayu Hitam. At dusk about 6.30 p.m., the column reached Sadao, 10 miles inside Siamese territory, and halted to-await developments.
The Japanese advance would almost certainly not have been heard if a rail bridge closer to Padang Besar had been chosen for sabotage. That section of the line would then have been heavily treelined; and it runs off at a tangent heading SW from the main road south of Klong Ngae.

I'd love to know how they managed to cross the rail border. Was it a furtive op or an op carried out with the volunteered sympathetic (or paid-off) co-operation of local railway & border officials? Or had such officials melted away when they heard news of a Japanese invasion? There seems to be an actual gate at the modern rail crossing, although I can't say when (if ever) it is closed; or whether such a gate existed at that time. Not to mention the perhaps necessary rearrangement of the 'points' to exit the Padang yard. That said, most of the points were probably on the Malaysian side and the armoured train crew may have ensured it arrived in Padang on a 'default' straight-thru' route that required no 'switches'.

I do hope to get a few photos of this bridge sometime soon. Anyone care to tag along? Might even be a few locals left who remember the incident.

[GWR]

The Hat-Yai to Padang Railway runs diagonally NE to SE across the center of this Google Sat. So Khlong Ngae with its station and level-crossing are at the top of the Sat. Right in the center one can just make out the meandering Khlong Utapao (which drains the border watershed between Thailand & Malaysia). The railway bridge at this point was probably that blown-up by Indian sappers as described in recent posts. The main road lies a little to the east; along which the sabotage column could hear the IJA truck convoys heading South:-
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?ll=6.777466,100.446196&spn=0.029635,0.040280&t=k&hl=en

Right in the centre of the second Sat, Safeskin 2 (Probably the World's largest Medical Glove Factory) marks the approximate site that Operation Matador's Road Column came to halt and were eventually confronted by the advancing IJA. Look for a large area of white 'roof' to the West of the mainroad. Sadao is just visible under clouds to the South. You may have to zoom in a bit to see this image as I describe it; but unfortunately you can't zoom these images to the max on the scale (in this remote locale):-
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?ll=6.665631,100.433235&spn=0.059283,0.080561&t=k&hl=en
Off-Stage Left, I can just make out Padang Besar between fairly heavy cloud cover, but the Malaysian railyard is not visible; so I haven't liked to that image.

[tram1]

I spoke to the Augustin family today, I will be getting more information on the dairy when I meet Eddie Augustins son.
So far I have found out that there was a agreement between the Siam Government and the British to cross over the Border and procceed as far as Haadyai,if and when the Japanese landed, The Siam army would hold of there advance till the British came.
I will find out more details from the family after our meeting next month.
I have been told the British never reported alot of the operation after the Bridges where blown of what the local army Railway unit did.

[GWR]

If the agreement in the previous post was ever made, I don't suppose the Thai or British Governments will ever admit it. And in fairness, could it have perhaps just been a story concocted by the British Military to keep the minds of the soldiers in this operation on their immediate task?

“Campaigns in Southeast Asia 1941-1942” (pub. 1960), part of the Official History of the Indian Armed Forces in WWII on 'The Armoured Train':
“ .... concurrently with this column on Singora Road, an armoured train manned by one platoon of 2/16 Punjab and a detachment of 3 Indian Field Company advanced into Siam from Padang Besar. The train moved north as far as the 200-foot girder bridge immediately south of Klong Ngeh. But after this bridge was successfully destroyed the train pulled back and arrived at Padang Besar at 0200 hours on 9 December ... “ (page 146)

And further on, references (page 179) to the composite “Holmes Force” including: “the armoured train guarding the Bt. Pinang Tunggal Railway Bridge”

[GWR]

This appears to be the bridge that was demolished: -

http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/download.php?Number=730568

It's about 1.72 Kms SW of Khlong Ngae Level Crossing and Station, and Google measures it at about 200 Feet, as indicated in a previous post.

I believe this was the bridge that was destroyed by Indian Army Sappers as part of the effort to slow down the advance of Japanese troops in WW2. There is another similar bridge on the line closer to the town (heading NE), but I believe the much larger size of this bridge makes more likely to have been the one that was demolished.

[GWR]

The broader topic of W.N. Dunn has now been moved to another subforum:
http://www.angkor.com/2bangkok/2bangkok/forum/showthread.php?p=20649#post20649
Also:
http://www.angkor.com/2bangkok/2bangkok/forum/showpost.php?p=20769&postcount=81

Sometimes the answers come looking for you.

Today I met an ex-railwayman by the name of Raluk Dunn (perhaps Dun) who was present in Hat-Yai during the WW2 era. (He must have been very young.) I asked him about the demolition of the bridge at Khlong Ngae and his comment was that the damage was so limited that trains were still able to pass over it.

Raluk had some other rather interesting things to tell me. His Scottish grandfather, W.N. Dunn (No one seems to know what the initials stood for), was the first British Consul in Songkhla. He married locally, and his son - Somboon Dunn - became a railway engineer at Kaeng Koi and some other places in the North-East before returning to work at Hat-Yai Junction. I was shown two pictures of Somboon: One as a boy in the compound of the British Consulate in Songkhla (He went to high school in Penang and Assumption College in Bangkok.) and a later one in a Thai Railway uniform.

Somboon always signed himself บ. ดันน์, short for Bor. Dunn, short for Boon Dunn.

Somboon later worked in Hat-Yai during WW2. Somboon was treated with suspicion by the Japanese, but his Thai railway uniform and engineer status was enough to protect him for the duration of the war.

Now, I didn't really have enough time to get the full story, but it appears that Somboon was eventually given some sort of honorary knighthood by Queen Elizabeth 2 for his assistance to POWs and expat internees.

I promised the family I would try and find some photos and extra information on W.N. Dunn and Somboon Dunn. So far I have found some internet evidence that a W.N. Dunn was at the Consulate in this approximate era, but no real detail. I am a bit hampered by the lack of a first and middle name. And because there were a lot of other subjects also to be talked about, I didn't get to ask that many questions.