Music in the Pacific

Some troops had assignments. Others were sent to a refurbished old Anglo-Indian (English Army) camp on a small lake some miles north of Bombay to await assignment orders. I received orders to take said troops to the camp. It was not to prove good duty. I think it was a foul-up. I was Air Corps. We went up by bus and cheap. There were about 200 troops. I, a second lieutenant, was in command.
The facilities were old, dilapidated, some falling down. We were able to fix some of them to use as a headquarters, supply, and a mess hall. We erected regular Army-type squad tents to house our troops.
The lake was small and dirty from non-use. Its shoreline was overgrown with tall grass which we would have to clear out and trim. Big problem. This was cobra country, and they live in this tall grass. But the job had to be done. On the morning duty call, the troops would do almost anything to get out of the grass clearing detail.
It did not take me long to find out I had been assigned a lot of misfits, goof-offs, and troublemakers. However, the grass-clearing detail proved to be one of my answers. If someone even looked the wrong way, I assigned him to the grass cutting detail. They killed several cobras, but no one ever was bitten. We got the job done. The lake started clearing up. We started building a decent U.S. Army compound.
In time my orders came through for me to report to the Bengal Army Air Corps base several miles north of Calcutta, which was housed in an old Indian plantation warehouse. Here I would await my final orders. All field grade officers were housed together in one huge room in the warehouse. Sleeping on cots, sharing latrines and all facilities which were outside, a big room they called the mess hall. The WACs (ladies) were housed in another section of the same huge warehouse. No place to play ball. No place to hang out. No telephones. Boring as hell.
Up until then, the CBI theater was not a Washington priority. The Japanese controlled most of the airspace and most of Burma and China. There were only two passes through the mountains from Burma into Western China. One north from Chabua Assam, at 13,000 feet high and covered with snow and the other from the Burma town of Myikini (we called it Michinaw) north of Rangoon.
Chabua Assam was a small, very independent area where the borders of Tibet, Northwestern China and Burma meet. It had been founded many years back in the days when England controlled India’s rice and tea which were its staple agricultural products. Assam soil proved to be ideal for growing and processing tea leaves. The planters had retained the old English pride and lifestyle. The people living in Assam hated just about everybody except us Americans. They helped us build an air base at Chabua.
The American Flying Tigers still held out against the Japanese in Kunming. The Army Air Corps held an air base in Chentu, China, and a base/hospital in Michinaw where our two engine transporters could supply our Western China bases. The famous Merrill’s Marauders and their mules operated and were supplied out of Michinaw on their undercover foray into the jungles of Southern Burma.
Finally my time arrived. I was scheduled for my meeting with the general in his Calcutta headquarters. He was much too busy to bother with me, but remembered and set things in motion. There had been no concentrated plan/effort between the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines concerning music and entertainment. A few USO shows had played India, but each service did its own thing. So the general decided to do his thing.
At a staff meeting, 2nd Lt. Hal Neely was directed to plan, direct and supervise the Army Air Corps music and entertainment program. My first priority would be to do something for the troops in Assam, China and Burma. I was dispatched to Chabua Assam, to discuss it with a Col. Peterson and his staff. Col. Peterson was from the little town of Oakland, seven miles south of Lyons, and had been the governor of Nebraska. He knew my dad. He also knew of me when I had my kid dance band in Lyons. He greeted me warmly and asked about my dad.
The first priority on the agenda was the problem of the huge tonnage of mule feed (special mix of corn, oats, molasses) our C-47s were flying in to Michinaw for Merrill’s Marauders. Something needed to be done. The colonel had me stand up and introduce myself to the gathering.
“This is Lt. Hal Neely. I knew his dad. He’s a farm kid.” (Me, a farm kid?)
He suggested they send me down to Michinaw to look into this mule feed problem. I was placed on temporary duty and caught the next morning C-47 mule feed flight to Michinaw. I had no preconceived ideas, plan … no notion of how or what to do (as my dad had always told me, “son, when in doubt, punt”).
I checked in at the Michinaw Airport. They had had a jeep waiting for me, a billet assigned me in the officers tent, but no other instructions. I decided to watch the unloading of mule feed burlap sacks, 50 pounds each, from the plane into big Army trucks driven by black quartermaster GIs. There were four trucks. I tagged along behind and followed. The roads south into Burma took a fork, the left fork led to the mule loading area. I parked my jeep under a palm tree at the fork of the road. The first truck went left; the second truck went right, third truck left, fourth truck right. It did not take me long to guess what was happening, but I would have to be damn right.
I knew about the habits of most of the blacks I had known back in Nebraska and in my early days in the corps. When it was hotter than Hades in the mid-day summer heat they sacked out until it cooled off. I waited an hour or so, then drove into their tented barracks area. Only a very few black souls were in the sack. One a big fat mess sergeant was in the mess hall, so I sort of wandered around. No one questioned me. I did discover a worn trail leading off into the jungle from the area. There was a sweet smell in the air. I went back to the base, checked in and asked for an MP to accompany me the next day. No one questioned me.
The next day I again met the C-47 from Chabua. Mule feed sacks again. By now I had something summed up, one for them, one for us. But why? In hot Burma it was the standard routine to take a break at noon until 2 p.m. I left the MP in my jeep. I began to roam around. I went in to talk to the mess sergeant. I introduced myself and told him I was on a general inspection tour of the base facilities. He was edgy, noncommittal. I took the MP and walked down the jungle trail. In about 100 yards there was a clearing with three tents. One tent had a big boiling kettle steaming away giving off a sweet, tantalizing odor. As a kid I had seen this before in Nebraska. They were making moonshine. The mules feed made an excellent mash. GIs were lined up with their tin mess cups. In the other two tents were Burmese-Indian girls “doing business.” For $.30 you could get a shot of moonshine and a girl. Pretty good deal. My problem. What would be the best/smart thing for me to do? I had one hellava moral problem.
The MP and I only observed. We did not talk to anyone. I went back to my billet and discussed the problem with a captain at base headquarters. He agreed with my assessment. Do something, but keep it unofficial. The black quartermaster truck drivers had a rough assignment and were not yet fully accepted in the war zone by the white troops. It was agreed we should cut the mule feed tonnage by one third which would be acceptable; two trucks for Merrill, one truck for the quartermaster truck drivers who had no other recreation. I reported by phone to Col. Peterson. He approved the plan.
I was ordered to stay in Michinaw for a spell and make a plan for our music and entertainment in our China/Burma program. The hope/plan was to open a Burma Road from Chubua into Chintu, Western China, by the way of Michnaw. I checked into special services as an assistant, and I flew into Chintu and Kunming. Not much to do in Michinaw. We played ball a lot. The base had a good hospital staff with WACs and nurses. Again as usual, I looked around and formed a small band. Not bad. Every Saturday night we played a shindig at the officers club. There was always booze in the officer’s club.