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Kohima
by Arthur Swinson
Description:
On 7 March 1944 Tokyo announced that the Japanese invasion of British India had begun. By mid-month, the Japanese 31st Division had crossed the Chindwin River in northern Burma, advancing on a wide front towards Imphal and Kohima. In bitter jungle fighting from early April, the British Fourteenth Army under Field Marshal Slim held the Japanese assault on Kohima Ridge. By late June the Japanese were in headlong retreat. Kohima ranks for strategic importance with Alamein, Midway and Stalingrad. The increasing dominance of Allied airpower in the region in the aftermath of the battle was a major factor in turning the tide of the war in East Asia against the Japanese. Drawing on documents and diaries from Japanese as well as Allied sources, Arthur Swinson, who served at Kohima, not only presents a thrilling and fascinating tale of heroism and combat action, but also analyses the political background to and long-term impact of a clash described by Mountbatten as ‘one of the greatest battles in history’.
About The Author
Arthur Horace Swinson (c.19151970) was a British Army officer, writer, playwright, and historian.
Born in St Albans, Hertfordshire, Swinson attended St Albans School. He enlisted in the Rifle Brigade in 1939 and in 1940 was commissioned into the Worcestershire Regiment. In the Far East he fought at the 1944 Battle of Kohima as a Staff Captain with the British 5th Brigade, which commanded the 7th Battalion of his Regiment. The diaries he kept during the battle are now lodged in the Imperial War Museum. He served until 1946, with postings in Malaya, Burma, Assam and India during World War II. He subsequently became a writer and producer at the BBC where he produced a number of programmes for Richard Attenborough.
In 1966 Swinson wrote and published “Kohima,” an account of the Battle of Kohima which was fought from April to June, 1944 and in which he was a participant. The preface states that Field Marshal William Slim directed Swinson to ensure that Kohima and Imphal are described as twin battles fought under Slim’s 14th Army. This Swinson does. Ultimately, however, the book focuses on the experience of the British 2nd Infantry Division. The book is a good adjunct to Slim’s “Defeat Into Victory” and Masters’ “Road Past Mandalay.” He was married with three children.
Swinson was the author of Scotch on the Rocks (1963 and 2005), which told the true story of the wartime wreck of the S. S. Politician, on which Compton Mackenzie’s novel Whisky Galore (1947) – and the Ealing Comedy of the same title – were based
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