THE FIRST WORLD WAR
At the outbreak of the First World War the whole of the Nepalese Army was placed at the disposal of the British Crown. Over 16,000 Nepalese troops were subsequently deployed on operations on the North West frontier and as garrison battalions in India to replace troops of the British Indian Army who had gone to fight overseas.
Some one hundred thousand Gurkhas enlisted in regiments of the Gurkha Brigade. They fought and died in France and Flanders, Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, Gallipoli, Palestine and Salonika. A battalion of the 8th Gurkhas greatly distinguished itself at Loos, fighting to the last, and in the words of the Indian Corps Commander, “found its Valhalla”. The 6th Gurkhas gained immortal fame at Gallipoli during the capture from the Turks of the feature later known as “Gurkha Bluff”. At Sari Bair they were the only troops in the whole campaign to reach and hold the crest line and look down on the Straits which was the ultimate objective. To quote from Field Marshal Sir William Slim’s introduction to the second volume of the 6th Gurkhas’ history:
“I first met the 6th Gurkha Rifles in 1915 in Gallipoli. There I was so struck by their bearing in one of the most desperate battles in history that I resolved, should the opportunity come, to try to serve with them. Four years later it came, and I spent many of the happiest, and from a military point of view the most valuable, years of my life in the Regiment”.
BETWEEN THE WARS
There was little respite after the First World war, with fighting in the Third Afghan War in 1919 followed by numerous campaigns on the North-West Frontier, particularly in Waziristan. Four Nepalese Army regiments also took part in operations on the North West Frontier during the Third Afghan War.
THE SECOND WORLD WAR
In the Second World War there were no fewer than forty Gurkha battalions in British service, as well as parachute, garrison and training units. In all this totalled some 112,000 men. Side by side with British and Commonwealth troops Gurkhas fought in Syria, the Western Desert, Italy and Greece, from North Malaya to Singapore and from the Siamese border back through Burma to Imphal and then forward again to Rangoon.
In addition to the enormous manpower made available there were many personal gestures on the part of the Minister and Court of Nepal. Large sums of money for the purchase of weapons and equipment, including money for the provision of fighter aircraft during the Battle of Britain, were presented as gifts from Nepal. Considerable sums of money were also donated to the Lord Mayor of London during the Blitz for the relief of victims in the dockland area. An equally generous response was made to a variety of appeals for aid – all this from a country which was then, and still is by western standards, desperately poor. The spirit of this friendship can best be illustrated by the reply made to the Prime Minister of Nepal to the British Minister in Kathmandu after the fall of France in 1940. When Britain stood alone. Permission was sought to recruit an additional 20 battalions for the Gurkha Brigade, and for Gurkha troops to be allowed to serve in any part of the world. This was readily granted by the Prime Minister who remarked, “Does a friend desert a friend in time of need? If you win, we win with you. If you lose, we lose with you”. The whole of the Nepalese Army was again placed at the disposal of the British Crown. Eight Nepalese regiments were sent to India for internal security duties and for operations on the North West Frontier. Later a Nepalese brigade was sent to Burma and fought with particular distinction at the Battle of Imphal.
CONCLUSION
In the two World Wars the Gurkha Brigade suffered 43,000 casualties, and to date it has won 26 Victoria Crosses – 13 by Gurkhas and 13 by British Officers. This short chronicle is of necessity brief and factual. It cannot adequately portray the spirit and the character of the Gurkha soldier, nor can it reflect the ‘esprit de corps’ and the bond of comradeship and mutual respect which bind together the British and Gurkha officers and men of the Brigade. But perhaps these words written by the late Sir Ralph Turner MC (Professor of Sanskrit at the University of London, Fellow of Christ’s College Cambridge and some time Adjutant of the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Queen Alexandra’s Own Gurkha Rifles) in 1931, give a hint of the true feelings of both sides:
“As I write these words, my thoughts return to you who were my comrades, the stubborn and indomitable peasants of Nepal. Once more I hear the laughter with which you greeted every hardship. Once more I see you in your bivouacs or about your camp fires, on forced marches or in the trenches, now shivering with wet and cold, now scorched by a pitiless and burning sun. Uncomplaining you endure hunger and thirst and wounds; and at the last your unwavering lines disappear into the smoke and wrath of battle. Bravest of the brave, most generous of the generous, never had a country more faithful friends than you”.
