The unforgiving mistake of an ace fighter pilot
Published on: Sunday, July 30, 2017
By Kan Yaw Chong
"TO err is human, to forgive divine," says a famed English idiom. The problem is some errors of judgement, miscalculations or assumptions are totally unforgiving.
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Lieutenant Valentine Stookes – an ace British WW1 fighter pilot-turned-medical doctor, paid dearly for making one of those unforgiving mistakes.Awarded the St George Cross – a medal for acts of the greatest heroism or the most conspicuous courage of extreme danger – Lieutenant in the Royal Air Corps later turned Dr Stookes "hated war" after seeing the carnage of air combat in war-prone Europe from which most of his comrades never returned. He looked for a place he considered war-free – Borneo, to start a new life.In the end, war came after him in this far flung corner of the earth, from Japan, and he ended being executed in Keningau, along with The National Chinese Consul General and four other Europeans, after surviving every bloody dog fights in air combats against the Germans in WW1.
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Son Alexander Richard Stookes, 77, spoke to Daily Express about this great irony during his recent down-memory-lane visit to Sabah."That's what my mum (Dora Sherman – daughter of American father Richard Sherman and Japanese mother Fuji Matsuda) said. He went to Borneo, he wanted peace and then this thing came and of all things they never thought that the Japanese would invade (Borneo)," Alexander said.
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"My father even went to Japan for holiday with my sister (Jean). He thought: 'well, I could go to Japan because my wife spoke fluent Japanese and then, of course, when the Japanese attacked Sandakan knowing that they knew my mother (Dora) spoke fluent Japanese and even visited Japan, it turned out to be a liability – they suspected that my father was a spy. They knew all about his background, they even knew that he was in the Royal Air Corps, so they eventually went after him," noted Alex.Haunted by the carnage of dog fights What was so haunting about air combat against the Germans that caused Dr Stookes to run away from Europe for peace in Borneo? Alexander gave his version of the story:"My father was a fighter pilot in the Royal Air Corps, flying most probably one of those bi-planes (possibly Sopwith Camel bi-plane) that fought the Germans," he said."They fought the Germans, he fought the Germans in dog fights. They were fighting, shooting each other. There were engagements beyond the English Channel. He went to France, they went as far as France to hit the planes to stop the Germans from coming across, like a forward defence," he noted."He was sort of called to service, that is, they were all conscripts. My mum (Dora) was saying he used to fly so low apparently so that the Germans could not pick him. So he went from just a junior low ranking pilot but they kept promoting him rapidly. "From a low ranking pilot, he became a Lieutenant very quickly because all the others never came home. So that's what made him hate the war – the First World War." Indeed, World War One was the first major conflict which involved a large scale use of fighter aircrafts fitted with machine guns, basically fighting for control of the sky between allies France and Britain on one side and the Germans on the other side.'Bloody April' Air superiority shifted back and forth between the two sides.Initially Britain and France were dominant after France gained through the formation of the French Fighting Squadron and expansion of the British Royal Fighting Corps. But then the Germans responded by reforming their squadrons and introduced modern fighters. Consequently, during the April 1917 aerial battles, nicknamed "Bloody April", the British suffered four times more casualties than the Germans, before the French and the Brits restored control after hard pressed reorganisation. It was probably this comprehensive British loss and killing fields of Bloody April that turned off Stookes against war in search of a land of peace.Bound for 'war-free' BorneoWWI over, the Liverpool-born Stookes became a doctor and set out for what he assumed would be a 'war-free' world – Borneo. In 1923, he arrived at Miri, Sarawak, to work as a corporate doctor for Shell Petroleum. He later moved to Sandakan, then capital and commercial hub of British North Borneo under the Chartered Company, where he bought a private medical practice. In 1935, he purchased a 150-acre farm in Bilit, Kinabatangan River, where his family lived upstream – the present day world famous river cruise wildlife eco-tourism destination. Johnsons sparked idea of a flying doctor service That same year, famed American adventurers and documentary film makers, Martin Elmer Johnson and his wife Osa Helen Johnson, arrived in Sandakan in their small Sikorsky amphibious sea plane dubbed "Spirit of Africa and Borneo"."I remember my mother (Dora) said the plane was introduced to him by an American guy who apparently came to catch an Orangutan in Bilit so he met my father, and said: 'why are you using a speed boat, you buy a plane, it's easier but there is no landing so a sea plane like what we've got would be just nice'," said Alexander. But from one written report, it was the Johnsons' Italian pilot, Jan Laneri, who persuaded Dr Stookes that an amphibious plane would make him more productive. Given his background as a veteran fighter pilot, Dr Stookes took a keen interest in the Johnsons' expedition, especially the idea of owning a sea plane as a flying doctor to extend his medical work to remote parts of North Borneo.So Dr Stookes ordered the plane – an Aeronica C-3 and became a pioneer aviator in Borneo.Nerve-wrecking river landings Given this new-found aerial mobility, Dr Stookes wrote gleefully in one article: "I demonstrated that I could reach a camp of bark cutters in the swamps in just 35 minutes to give them the necessary medical attention and return to Sandakan by mid-day whereas the past meant an absence of a night and two days."Similarly, he was able to visit a rubber plantation on the Segama River which was so isolated those days that no doctor had been there for six to seven years.He recorded the precarious landing:"It lies in a valley, with high trees along the river banks and rocks and snags in the river itself, which has no straight stretch long enough to get off and get clear of the trees before going around a bend. "I can assure you that with my few recent flying hours behind me, I went round that place four or five times, my heart in my mouth, studying every detail, before I made up my mind to go down. However, I got in and better still, out again, without mishap." Words spread and inquiries began to come from similarly isolated camps and plantations whether he could land on their river or bay and gradually buoys and wind socks sprang up across the land, he noted.Rising interest in flying doctor serviceTo cater to this rising interest in his flying doctor service, he built a hangar and ramp in a sheltered corner of Sandakan Harbour.A year later, Dr Stookes found himself clocking nearly 14 hours of flying a month, making regular rounds every Thursday, with occasional visits on Tuesdays.He said one of his longest flight was a week-end trip to Brunei, the 300 miles (500km) being covered in just under four hours, with a stop in Jesselton to refuel. By Monday he found himself back in his office in Sandakan by noon.He said his Sundays were normally spent in his 150-acre farm named "Lituk Liman" in Bilit, Kinabatangan River, "where I can forget about work and revel in the society of cows, pigs and poultry!""The journeys (by plane) back from the farm on Sunday evenings, laden with the week's supply of fruit and vegetables, are still a source of amusement to everyone but they save me the four-hour trip by boat which used to occupy time better spent in other ways," Dr Stookes relished on the new-found efficiency.Lots of Japanese soldiers in Bilit, Kinabatangan: Alex The great escape from war in chase of peace and a productive life in a far away land proved to be his undoing, as we shall see. Even his remote river-bound Lituk Liman farm in Bilit was not spared. Born in 1939 in Lamag, son Alexander Stookes was just a 3-6 years old between 1942 to 1945 when Japan invaded and occupied North Borneo.Growing up at the farm, it was Alexander's turn to see the killing, looting, right at the family door step in Bilit, Kinabatangan. Because there was a Japanese-owned hemp plantation opposite the Stookes' family farm Lituk Liman, Japanese soldiers flooded the area and, hence, brought conflict right to their door steps, he remembered. "I saw a lot of Japanese in small canoes and people running. I was only a kid and when I went to our little jetty, there was one guy who was apparently shot by Americans patrolling in their PT boats and was left bleeding in a canoe. I remember my mum (Dora Sherman) telling me: 'Bring him a bowl of soup'!" 'They shot the cows in our farm' "I remember the Japanese caught a big croc. They put it on their jetty over the other side opposite our farm. Our jetty was very small by comparison but because of their hemp plantation down there, the Japanese used the plantation for recuperation. We reared cows, pigs, chicken and planted rice in our farm. "One night a little boat came over to our farm and straight away I heard 'boom, boom, boom'. They shot the cows!" However, as a little child, Alexander remembered the moments of innocence, even as war raged."There was a 'kempetai' (Japanese secret police) who used to bring me from our farm to his place and I would play around with his samurai sword, sent me back, and jokingly he would tell my mum: 'I would like to adopt your son!'"My mother said the Japanese never bothered with the children, always the grown-ups, like the Funks – Johnny Funk's brother for instance had chopsticks put on his ears then put it in and killed him because they caught him listening to the radio wanting to get information."The beginning of trouble for Dr Stookes After the invasion, the Japanese shipped in some 1793 Australian and hundreds of British prisoners of war from Chiangi prison to Sandakan to build a military air strip and kept them at the Mile 8 camp.The Japanese found themselves in need of the services of Dr Stookes to check on prisoners of war.But that was the beginning of trouble and his eventual execution in Keningau, when he used the opportunity to help the PoWs by smuggling food and medical supplies and by passing notes to and from the PoWs to the local underground movement formed to help the PoWs stay alive or to escape, Alexander said."My father became a prime target," Alex said. Escape to Libaran island Also, because Alex's mother, Dora, joined Dr Stookes in these clandestine activities, along with the famed Funk brothers, such as Johnny Funk and his wife Lilian, she wasn't spared either."My mother was captured, interrogated and tortured but finding no leads, the Japanese released her. Upon her release, she made her way down the Kinabatangan (with her children – Jean, Lucy, Sally, Alex himself and George) to the house of Garcia – a member of the Filipino guerrillas, Dewhurst Bay, and eventually picked up by American PT boats to Libaran island – a contact point between the local underground and the Americans in the Pacific. "Sadly, no information about my father reached us in Libaran island," Alexander said. "It was only after the war that we learned of his fate – he and the Consul General of China and four other Europeans were executed in Keningau on July 6, 1945 and reportedly left to rot in the open as an example to warn others," he added.But how Dr Stookes ended up in Keningau is not clear.One thing is certain though.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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