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At Kohima, Mills greeted me and stayed a week to tell me about Nagas before going back to his subdivision at Mukokchung. There was at Kohima, Major Vickers and his wife. He commanded the Naga Hills battalion of the Assam Rifles. They were mostly Gurkhas. I saw very little of Vickers who had been wounded in the foot and was lame and not of a sociable disposition. His successor Major Shakespear was very nice with a young wife. He had one junior British Officer to help him. The battalion was run as if it was a regular unit of the Indian Army and it was a marvellous accomplishment of the two British Officers allowed to a battalion. They were Military police and could be called out to assist the Civil power at once, whereas a battalion of the Indian Army could be employed only with the sanction of the Central Government and Army Headquarters Control. This elaborate procedure would render them useless in a sudden emergency. |
