A Galway Engineer in Assam
By , D.S.O., M.I.C.E.The East Calling
Some thirty years ago. I sat one evening in London considering whether I should accept an offer of an appointment as assistant engineer on the construction of a railway from India to Burma. On the one side adventure in a new and almost unexplored land, good prospects, valuable professional experience; on the other separation from all one loved, the risks of malaria and other unknown ills, the loneliness of a strange land. While I pondered these and many other considerations I remembered the old adage "Sleep on it." Next morning a cold dense fog overhung London; anything seemed better than this murky prospect. That afternoon I signed a three years contract and some weeks later I joined the head quarters of the Assam Bengal Railway at Chittagong, a former Portuguese settlement in the North Corner of the Bay of Bengal.
East Bengal to Assam
On arrival I found the construction of the railway was still only a project and that I was booked for work in Assam. For twice the distance from Galway to Dublin I travelled over a vast plain of parched earth, dull, monotonous, with every village seeming to be the same in its cluster of bamboos and palms. At last the train started to climb the first of the great ranges of hills that divide Upper from Lower Assam. The country became wilder and more picturesque, precipitous hills on one side, a deep river valley on the other, in the distance mountain ranges, wooded right up to a 6,000 foot peak. Alighting at a small station 1,800 feet above sea level, there was a further climb of 500 feet to my destination at Haflong Hill, a small settlement of bungalows and offices commenced about 1895 as the headquarters of the construction of the railway over the hills.
Snakes
For the newcomer to India all the old stagers have varied and fantastic tales to tell of the dangers from snakes and wild beasts. The man who put on his shoes without first shaking them - the man who did not look under the pillow - the man who was seized by the arm and dragged by a tiger into the jungle. I was thus well informed, when one evening on returning to the bungalow, I found a snake on the verandah, tail coiled, head erect, striking out at two 'mynah' birds that tried to peck at it. Among the innumerable stories no one had explained how to kill a snake. I threw the odd walking stick from a safe distance but without scoring a hit, the servants came to the rescue with long bamboos shouting "Be careful that is very bad snake." I learnt afterwards that all snakes were invariably "Very bad." The bamboos were too long and unwieldy for an effective blow, so there seemed nothing left to do but shoot. The shot carried it some twenty feet on the lawn and along its riddled length could be discerned the bones of the mynah nestlings. Evidently it had robbed the mynah's nest, hence their audacity in attacking. The mynahs are as perky as our robins, and a familiar sight around houses. They are about the size of thrushes and akin in species to the magpie. The 'Hill Mynah' is larger than the common variety, and is a better mimic and more talkative than a parrot.
After this first encounter I found the simpler and more effective way was to walk up boldly to a snake and strike it with a light cane. Another method, which was actually used by an English doctor, was to catch a snake by the tail and, with a quick flick of the wrist, dislocate its neck. Presumably considerable practice in shaking a thermometer is required. In after years I saw many snakes; on the golf course slinking up to a ball; the harmless long black grass snake swiftly slithering away; the dangerous banded krait suddenly appearing from a heap of ballast; the vicious little green bamboo snake, which looks like a tender leaf. Once I watched a cat having a sparring match with a cobra. Although most people had tales to tell of narrow escapes very few were actually bitten.
Assam - Land of Hills and Hollows
From the Bay of Bengal for 600 miles to the Himalays great ranges of hills, the Arakan Yomas, the Lushai Hills, the Barail Range, the Naga and Patkai Hills, run roughly North and South. About midway the Khasi and Garo Hills run as spurs about 100 miles wide westwards to the broad Brahmaputra River. There was no way of going from Assam to Burma, except by jungle paths or from Upper to Lower Assam, at that time, except by the single line of railway, known as the 'Hill Section' which was opened by Lord Curzon in 1904. It was my duty to maintain this vital link. The survey and construction of the railway through this wild unmapped and malarious country was reckoned as a great pioneering feat. There was a story that it cost a man's life for every sleeper laid. In 1916 it had been severely damaged by an earthquake, and engineering materials having been difficult to obtain during the 1914-1918 war, there was still in 1921 some big bridge-building and much repair work to be done.
Elephants
On both sides of the 'Hill Section' were hundreds of square miles of dense forest, the haunt of elephants, tigers, leopards, bison, bear, deer and smaller animals of many species. The proverbial hide of the elephant is not immune from irritation by insects. These great beasts therefore appreciate the light breezes which blew through the forest clearings opened up by the railway and frequently paraded there at night. Every mile and gradient post had to be armed with sharp steel spikes, to prevent them from being torn up. Every now and again train met elephant, and, if the victims body lay across the rails it was a difficult and troublesome job to shift the huge bulk.
One morning a wire announced that an elephant had been killed during the night and was lying by the side of the track. Some hours later, I saw the elephant lying at the foot of the bank, then to my amazement a naked man emerged from its hind quarters. No sooner was he out than another wriggled in and disappeared. He came out with a great junk of meat. The men belonged to the 'Kukie' tribe, who lived very miserably in small clearings in the jungle.
Capturing Elephants
Every few years there was a big round up of elephants known as a 'Keddah'. A very strong stockade was built in a clearing in the jungle, from this projected two long substantial fences. By an encircling movement extending over several miles, the elephants were herded very slowly but very steadily towards the stockade and, when in, the trap door was dropped. Then ensued terrific excitement, the great beasts stamping, jostling and trumpeting. The big tuskers had to be shot. When the excitement had somewhat subsided, two powerful tame elephants were driven in, the riders 'mahouts' had the highly skilled and dangerous taks of securing one of the elephants. Firmly held, like a dangerous prisoner between two stalwart Gardai, the wild animal was escorted out and tethered by fore and hind legs between trees, there it starved until it had learnt that the mahout bringing food was a friend. Lessons soon started and in a remarkably short space of time it was docile and obedient. Thirty years ago elephants commanded a ready market, no young lady could have a stylish marriage unless escorted by a long train, but fifteen years later Henry Ford had ousted Jumbo.
Nights in the Jungle
There were bungalows, at about 20 mile intervals, where the inspecting engineers could stay for the night. There was little twilight, but the sudden darkness was stabbed by myriads of pirouetting fireflies; mosquitoes hummed; elephants trumpeted; occasionally a tiger roared or a deer barked; more rarely there was a fiendish shriek that made every nerve tingle, as some animal was chased to death. Just after dawn, while breakfast was being prepared it was generally possible to shoot one or two jungle fowl, but it was always advisable to carry ball cartridge, lest bigger game were still afoot. In the tall trees the gibbons howled "Hulla, hulla, hulla" whence the Assamese name 'Hoolock'. Gibbons make amusing but rather treacherous pets. When trolleying along one might see a colony of Rhesus monkeys cross the line in front, the little toddlers held by the hand and helped to surmount the rails; or one might meet a party of tribesmen, cheery and triumphant, with a wild boar slung from a spear. Gaily coloured birds flitted in the trees, the blue jay, the kingfisher, the golden oriole or the brilliant but tiny honey suckers. While one was absorbed in technical detail or in the enjoyment of nature, a leech might quietly exercise its powers of attachment and evening would reveal a sock soaked in blood.
The Tigers
Tigers were often heard but rarely seen. Among the unwritten laws of the jungle is one, that you must not shoot a tigress in cub or you will be dead before the next moon rises; a second; that you must not shoot a cub or vengeance will be swift and terrible. On one occasion the second law was broken by two weekend sportsmen from Calcutta. A few days later, when they, no doubt, were boasting of their prowess in Firpos, a woman was killed within a few yards of her house. Then started a reign of terror. Two men were killed in the course of the next few days. Some of the Anglo-Indian engine drivers who were expert shikaris, were sent to patrol and guard the area. One rode everywhere with the elephants, that dragged in timber for the railway, but the tigress sprung and dragged down the mahout from an elephant alongside of him. The elephants were terrified and in the confusion the engine driver could not shoot. The doctor with the supple wrist already mentioned built himself a cage and sat up many nights inside but the tigress was too wary. A plantoon of the Indian Army was rushed to the area, only to have one sepoy seized and killed. The experts were baffled, for by this time eleven people had been killed, then a Kuki, clad only in a loin cloth and carrying an ancient muzzle-loading musket, mentioned casually that a tigress had got in his way as he was coming to market and that he had shot it. He got a pleasant surprise when he found he was entitled to a handsome reward.
The Earth Trembles
One morning while waiting for a train, I felt as if some one had suddenly seized the chair and rocked it to and fro. The roof timbers creaked. The waiting passengers keened "Ram, Ram, Ram." Living in one of the most unstable provinces of India, I experienced many such earthquake shocks. Older people still spoke with awe of the great earthquake of 1897, when more than 1500 people were killed, within an area as large as the whole of Ireland, all brick and stone buildings were practically destroyed. There was also a heavy shock in 1916, but nothing on a really shattering scale in Assam until the 15th August 1950. From a recent letter I learn that about 1000 people were killed; the bed of the Brahmaputra River, in one place where it is a mile wide, was raised seven feet; a range of hills 10,000 feet high was sheared from crest to plains level and is now one vast landslide.
The explanation of these upheaveals as given by the hillmen is simple. Round the earth is curled a great phython, he falls asleep and as he relaxes his tail meets his head, he wakes angrily to see what had disturbed his slumbers, he bites and the shiver of pain runs round the world. He falls asleep again.
The Monsoon
From November to March the climate in Upper Assam is delightful, bright, clear days and cool evenings. During April and May the temperature rises, the atmosphere becomes more humid and oppressive. In June the heavy moisture-laden clouds roll up from the Bay of Bengal and deliver their contents over Assam. At Cherrapunji, where the ground rises a sheet 4,000 feet from the southern plains to the central East West plateau, the heaviest rainfall in the world has been recorded, 500 inches a year. Thackeray, father of the novelist, had a summer residence here, to escape from the heat of the plains of Sylhet. In the days of the East India Company there was a summer barracks for troops, but so many committed suicide by throwing themselves over the cliff, that it had to be abandoned. Having myself experienced 24 inches in one day there, I could appreciate their feeling of depression.
In the 'Hill Section' of the railway, the rainfall averaged from 80 to 120 inches, concentrated in a few months. Often six inches fell in as many hours, at times a whole hillside would slip bringing hundreds of tons of earth and boulders crashing on to the line; little streams became cascading waterfalls; the rivers came rushing down in swirling torrents of silt and debris.
Home Again
Doubtless 'there is a pleasure in the pathless woods' but exiles in India argue that the finest sight in the world is the view of Bombay from the stern of a ship. After some years abroad the fushsia hedges of Connemara are a more thrilling sight than the most exotic orchids of the jungle.
When I returned from leave in the Autumn of 1925, I was posted to the construction of a railway to serve a number of tea gardens. The project necessitated acquiring some garden land, uprooting some of the bushes, and many meetings with garden managers. I therefore learnt something of the cultivation and manufacture of tea.
How Tea Gardens Originated
To understand why tea plays such an important role in the economic life of Assam, it is necessary to take a fleeting glimpse at the historical background.
The North East frontier of Assam has been invaded again and again by people of Mongolian origin, but we have no connected historical account until 1228 A.D., when Assam was invaded by the Ahoms, who gave their name to the province. Knowledge of earlier days has been obtained from references in the 'Mahabarat' and other Hindu epics and from place names. The route was generally by the Hukong Valley, since made famous by the construction of the Burma Road. The inhabitants of Assam, having become soft and easygoing in a damp and relaxing climate, fell easy victims to the incursions of harder tribes from the Far East. They were driven into the more remote and inaccessible valleys, where today numerous tribes with their own language, folklore and customs, live isolated in the mountains.
The Ahoms in their turn were exposed to the impact to great world movements, when the Mahommedans, who had invaded India by way of the North West frontier, endeavoured to complete their conquest by the annexation of Assam. All the attempts failed, mainly owing to the difficulties of maintaining the lines of Communication. A 'war correspondent' of 1662 reported that
"Assam is a wild and dreadful country abounding in danger - the air and water of its hills are deadly poison - narrow are the gates by which an outsider can enter or issue from this country."
In 1816 the Burmese raided the country both through the Hukong Valley and through Manipur, the route followed by the Japanese in the last war. No less than thirty thousand Assamese were taken away as slaves, nearly half of the population was destroyed, famine and pestilence carried off thousands that had escaped the sword or captivity. The incursions of the Burmese into territory ceded to the East India Company after the battle of Plassey, led to the first Burmese war of 1824. By 1826 the invaders had been driven back but as the Government of India were reluctant to absorb more territory. Assam was handed over as a native state to a descendant of the Ahom Kings. He proved so bad a ruler that he was deposed in 1838.
The historical fact, that Assam has often been invaded from the Far East is significant today when Chinese armies are on the warpath and have already advanced into Tibet.
In 1823 it was found that the tea plant grew wild in Assam but nothing was done until 1832 when a Government Committee was appointed to consider the possibilities of development. Seven years later the still active Assam Company was formed, with a capital of half a million sterling. The years of invasions and internal strife had left vast areas of unpopulated jungle, which the pioneering tea companies now commenced to clear, importing indentured labour from the overpopulated areas of India.
The Manufacture of Tea
An average sized tea garden has about 800 acres under tea in addition to 1,200 to 1,500 acres of rice, thatch-grass and forest land. A big company such as the Assam or Jorehaut, owns several such gardens. The output varies considerably, depending on whether the garden produces coarse or fine leaf, but 700 to 800 pounds of good quality tea per acre is probably a fair average. A garden thus producing about 600,000 pounds of tea a year, has a manager and two or three assistants, before the war nearly all Scotsmen. The requisite labour force was generally reckoned at two to two and a half workers per acre of tea. Each garden has a dispensary and some hospital accommodation under an Indian doctor, the work of several gardens being supervised by a European doctor, usually an Irishman. The industry, as a whole, maintains a research and experimental station, where several scientists are engaged.
The first 'flush' occurs about April, when the women commence plucking by hand 'two leaves and a bud.' The leaves are transported to the withering sheds, where they are exposed on netting shelves for from twelve to twenty four hours. Thence they are brought to the factory, where they are machine rolled. The rolled leaf, which looks rather like tobacco, is fermented for a few hours under very carefully controlled conditions, then passed through a 'firming machine', which dries the leaf and prevents further fermentation. Finally it is sifted into fine, medium, and coarse grades, packed and dispatched to market. For all that, the worst possible place to get a cup of tea is on a garden, the reason being that the leaf is not yet blended.
Plucking usually ends in October, then follows pruning, hoeing, replanting, draining and the many other activities familiar to anyone with knowledge of work on a large farm.
Human Sacrifice
In the first few months of railway construction the centre line and boundaries were pegged out and, according as land was acquired, earthwork was commenced in the cuttings and embankments; a temporary bungalow for the engineer and offices and housing for the staff were erected; a brickfield was laid out and the manufacture of bricks started. There was time to enjoy the hospitable planters' tennis and bridge parties, to watch the garden coolies' sports and native dances. I knew many of the 'sirdars' or foremen by sight and got a friendly 'salaam,' as I drove along the garden roads.
As the coolies watched the sinking of the foundations of a large bridge, memories of ancient customs revived and the rumour spread rapidly that a male child was to be buried in the foundations.... No longer friendly smiles and greetings, but dark angry looks. The 'cold war' went on for months, nothing could be done to allay their deep-rooted suspicion; mothers went frantic if they missed a child even for a few moments; managers and assistants could not leave the gardens but had to remain always on guard against some untoward incident. Then one evening a howling and excited mob surrounded my bungalow, alleging that a child had been captured; a garden manager leaped from his bath and, clad only in a towel, saved the life of a railway messenger who had already had his arms broken; a Bengali clerk faced instant death to bring the mob to reason; they were only convinced when the bungalow was searched. At last they realised that they had behaved foolishly and afterwards all was quiet and friendly again.
During the next few years on construction projects, technical and administrative problems left little leisure for jungle life. Stalking 'mugger,' hunting leopards, sitting up for tiger, watching birds are described in many books more adequately than can be attempted here. My next and most exciting entry into Assam was by an unusual route.
Retreat from Burma
In December 1941 Rangoon was bombed by the Japanese, several hundred people were killed, many thousands fled the city. In January 1942, I was sent over with a small advance party to investigate what assistance was required by the Burma Railway administration, which was then struggling under immense difficulties to keep the railway working. The Japanese were advancing from Siam, British and Indian forces, stubbornly resisting overwhelming forces, were being driven back. As the armies retreated, hundreds of thousands of Indian civilians sought every means of escape. Trains were packed to suffocation; men stood on the couplings, on the running board or lay on the roofs of the carriages; many died on the way.
In the streets of this great thriving city nothing was to be seen but the scurrying jeeps, the criminals, the looters and the insane. No one was left except a small band of 'Last Ditchers' and garrison troops who had volunteered to remain until the end. In March they also were ordered to leave; the ground shook as port and other installations were blown up; the sky darkened with the smoke from the inferno of a great oil refinery. The last train steamed slowly out into the night leaving a wake of destruction - and behind it pathetically followed, the spaniels, the airedales, the terriers, all the big and little pets with their appealing eyes saying "Surely you can not abandon US."
Followed grim days of defeat and withdrawals, at one station alone eighteen people were found one morning dead from cholera. Mandalay station was a mass of wreckage, when fifteen tons of bombs exploded after an air raid. Station after station was bombed, patched up, and finally abandoned. In May 1942 the last of the devoted band of railwaymen, who for four months had kept trains running in the face of appalling difficulties, who had provided transport for thousands of refugees to the frontier, and could now do no more, were ordered to escape to India as best they could.
It took fifteen days to cover 220 miles to Imphal, 4,000 feet above sea level, the capital of the native state of Manipur. Thousands of refugees were also painfully toiling along what was but a jungle path, winding up steep slopes to 6,000 feet, descending into deep valleys, only to climb up again in the broiling sun. Their only food was what they were able to carry, their resting place the bare ground. Many fell exhausted, or succumbed to dysentery or malaria. The Manipuris offered us unrefined sugar, which I had often seen made in the villages from sugar cane and had thought a filthy mess. I was glad then to accept their generosity.
Manipur State
Before the war Manipur was one of the most picturesque States of India, remarkable also for its dancers and strange customs. They were, at one time, animists, like most of the hill tribes, but advancing into civilisation had been absorbed into Hinduism. There is a Bengali proverb "Twelve Manipuris, thirteen ovens." Meaning they were so ultra orthodox that each man cooked and eat separately. The duck shooting was famous, with a record of five hundred birds to one gun in a day.
In 1944 Manipur was invaded by the Japanese and bitter fighting ensued before they were driven back.
It was thus twenty-one years after I had gone to India to assist in building a railway to Burma that I returned from Burma, weary and nearly starved, over one of the three possible alignments for a railway.
Assam a Battleground
Eighteen months later I returned as Engineer-in-Chief of Construction in Upper Assam. The railway, which had been designed to carry tea, could not meet the demands now placed upon it. In August 1943, at a Conference in Quebec, it was decided that the Assam lines of communication were to be developed to carry 7,500 tons a day, excluding petrol, for which a pipe line was to be laid. This meant increasing the capacity sevenfold, or transporting for twice the distance from Kerry to Antrim more traffic than is loaded daily on the whole of the CIE. The construction programme involved large marshalling yards and doubling 350 miles of line. The water supply for the additional engines and staff was, itself, a formidable undertaking.
An American Transportation Division was sent to operate the traffic. With new methods, more intense supervision, and with the assistance of a greatly increased Indian staff the extended facilities were used to the utmost capacity.
Military supplies and rations had to be carried for the British and American troops fighting in Manipur and the Hukong Valley; for the airlift over the famous 'Hump' to China; for the construction of the Burma Road; for the great number of airfields and depots of all kinds; and for the doubling of the railway.
On the double-engined trains half a mile long were aircraft engines and parts, mechanical excavators, Bailey bridges, pontoons, tanks, guns and ammunition, pumps and pipes for the oil line, rails and sleepers, pigs, and goats, all the immense paraphernalia of a modern war. With everyone straining to the utmost, to push the supplies through, in addition to troop, ambulance and civilian passenger trains, risks had to be taken and accidents were bound to occur. When wagons were derailed the Americans sent out a bulldozer, shoved them bodily off the line, and trains were soon running again.
On one occasion a train was held up at a station, to my enquiry as to the cause of the delay, the American stationmaster replied that there had been a head-on collision between two stations. "How did it happen?" "There is a fine young fellow down there, but he don't know much about trans-port-ation" was the reply.
Somehow these thousands of men, of different races, classes and creeds, serving under different authorities managed to work together with remarkably little friction.
The Pipe Line
The pipeline was laid, mainly alongside the railway, for 750 miles from Calcutta to the Burma Road. At Ledo, the Assam end, was a sign post: Mitkynia 275 miles Juomting 1078 miles.
Peace at Last
When the atom bomb was dropped at Hiroshima, the tumult and the shouting died and the captains and their companies departed. Assam gradually returned to its quiet and easy going way of life, but the scars of war were left.
My last visit, paid in 1946, was to make arrangements for dismantling the redundant track and pulling out the pipeline.
The Province Divided
In August 1947 when India gained her independence the province was divided, Lower Assam, which was mainly Mahommedan in religion and Bengali in race, became part of Pakistan, while Upper Assam and the Hills, the ancient kingdom of the Ahoms was allotted to India.
Sir E. Gait: History of Assam (out of print) F. M. Bailey: China Tibet, Assam: A Journey of Lancaster; The Story of Tea, 1947. R. D. Morrison: Tea - Its Production and Marketing, 1948; Tea: A Progressive Industry 1950 Maurice Cullis: Trials in Burma C. J. Rolo: Wingate's Raiders. W.G Burchett: Trek Back from Burma. Beverley Nichols: Verdict in India Geoffrey Tyson: Forgotten Frontier. W.G. Urchet: Wingate's Phantom Army. Bernard Ferguson: The Wild Green Earth. E. Candler: The Unveiling of Lhasa. Sir F. Younghusband: The Epic of Mount Everest. H. W. Tilman: Mount Everest. T. C. Hodson: The Noga Tribes of Maniput. Peter Fleming: Kipling - Jungle Tales, etc. Kipling: Man Eaters of Kumaon: Jungle Tales, etc. Technical: the Hill Section - Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, CLXXVII & CCXVIII. Ethel Mannen: Jungle Journey. While Memory Serves: (The Story of the last two years of British Rule in India) by Sir Francis Tuker Kingdom Ward: The confessions of a Thug. (perhaps something like Railway Workers of the World...)