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On January 13th the Mount Vernon arrived at Singapore in the middle of an air raid, for which the ship was meant to be the target; but a sudden squall of heavy rain and mist providentially concealed the vessel and the air –craft unloaded somewhere else instead. In heavy rain the Battalion disembarked and proceeded to a makeshift camp on the Bukit Timah racecourse, which consisted largely of mud, expecting to spend some weeks re-organising and training after a long voyage. However, owing to the critical situation on the mainland, these illusions were rudely shattered and the unit was rather unceremoniously pushed into battle on the 16th, without having time to unpack. It was attatched to 15th Indian Brigade and dispatched to Batu Pahat in north Johore to releive a composite Leicester-Surrey Battalion(the “British Battalion”) and prevent the enemy occupying the town and it’s airfield. Within a few hours of arrival on the mainland, the first casualities were sustained from dive bombing attacks.
The last few days in Batu Pahat were spent in active patrolling; contact was soon made with parties of enemy who had landed on the west coast behind Battalion positions and were threatening communications. Before long, many enemy forces driving south from Muar had built up a considersble force round Batu Pahat on the north of the river and began to attempt to break into the town. The British Battalion was brought back from reserve to reinforce the small garrison of the town which consisted of th 2nd Battalion, a company of the Malay Regiment and a battery of the 155 Field Regiment. Even with the addition of the British Battalion it was a very small force to hold a place of the size of Batu Pahat and meet attacks from every direction.In the meanwhile, the enemy continued to land troops behind the defence line, and before long the defenders found it necessary to form a complete circle, which perforce was only thinly held in parts. The Japanese the attacked the troop positions of the Field Regiment, taking them by surprise; a company each from the British Battalion and the 2nd Battalion had to be sent to disperse the enemy and rescue the guns. This done with the loss of one gun only. Having failed in their attempts to take the town by direct frontal attack, the enemy next sent out a flanking force to work round to the south – east and cut the Ayer Hitam road, the principal line of communication with the rear. They succeeded in doing this on the 22nd, ambushing part of the 2nd Battalion’s “B” echelon and destroying a number of vehicles; the R.Q.M.S. who was in charge of this convoy was wounded, but managed to escape from the trap with two of his trucks. From this day onwards, no further food or ammunition could be delivered to the Batu Pahat and life became rather austere. The enemy now began to feel their way towards the town by the Yong Peng road, after crossing the river some miles outside the defence perimeter. The garrison was by now so hard pressed for men that this road could not be effectively patrolled so far from the main defences, since all available reserves were in daily use attaking enemy infiltration parties nearer to the town itself. But though the Japanese were thus able to effect a crossing of the river, they soon ran against “A” Company’s positions astride the north – eastern entrance to Batu Pahat. They were promptly driven back into cover each time they tried to break through. Similar attempts to cross the Muar Road Ferry in the harbour area of the town were held by "B“ & "C“ companies with the assistance of the gunners. The last remaining line of communication with the beseiged garrison was the coast road to Benut; but unprotected vehicles could not be sent up by this route since enemy landing parties some miles to the south were known to have reached the road and prepared blocks in places. On the 23rd, , orders were received by wireless for a withdrawal from Batu Pahat to a position some mile down this road, where it was intended that the garrison should halt and fight a delaying action to cover the establihsment of a further defence line through Benut. Soon after nightfall the complete force broke off action and withdrew from the town without difficulty; the Brigade formed up on the coast road with it’s vehicles and began the march south, headed by the last armoured cars remaining to it, and with its guns disposed in the column. No sooner had the move commenced than a further signal was received cancelling the withdrawal order and ordering the force to reoccupy the town, and hold it for a further 48 hours to enable certain British units on the east coast to be extricated first. It is profitless to question why and how mistakes such as this are made; from a wider point of view it may be but a small error and unimportant, but to the garrison of Batu Pahat it was an extremely serious matter. Had no withdrawal order been given in the first place, the town could have been held indefinitely without any trouble, since the defenders were well placed in carefully chosen positions on which the enemy had made little or no impression as yet; now however they had in pursuance of orders withdrawn from these positions which thus fell to the enemy without any necessity of fighting for them. The garrison had thus to recapture Batu Pahat by force before it could be held for a further period , and the enemy had now all the best positions in town.
Throughout 24th, ,the Japanese made a sustained effort to retake the Batu Pahat and pressed heavily on the defenders from all sides; the brunt of these attacks were borne by 2nd Battalion and casuallities began to mount up. Street fighting developed in several quarters of the town and confused close – quarter actions prevented the use of artillery to support the hard pressed infantry; but the Battalion mortars were in constant demand. In the course of the day “A” company captured an enemy infantry gun. On the night of the 25th the Batu Pahat force, having fulfilled the demand made upon them, it finally withdrew down the coast road to the village of sengarang where it found that the last way out of the trap had been already blocked and the force was surrounded. An enemy landing force had erected blocks across the road and prepared strong positions to prevent a break out. From dawn on the 26th until 1630 hours in the afternoon continual attacks were launched against these blocks in the hope of being able to clear the road to allow the ambulances and other vehicles of the Brigade to pass through; but in vain. Once again, the brunt of this action was borne by the 2nd Battalion, and every man was thrown into the fight, including cooks, drivers, signallers and batmen; the opening of the road was a matter of desperate necessity, for the Brigade was still carrying with it the accumulated casuallities of the last four days’ fighting in the town, for whom there was no chance of evacuation to hospital.
The enemy positions were well chosen, the only way of attack lay over marshy ground, thickly wooded, with every clearing covered by both light and heavy automatic weapons. By reason of the limited visibility in this type of country the use of artillery to support the attacks was quite useless and even mortars were employed with difficulty. Up to their knees in mud and water, and hampered by the thick vegetation the companies struggled to reach their objectives, suffering heavy casualties from concealed weapons of the enemy; destroying one post after another only to find that the Japanese position was planned in great depth, with every position covered by another. While the battle was in progress, the guns in the village itself were constantly attacked by Japanese aircraft and threatened by infiltration parties who closed in on the houses, armed with machine guns and mortars. Behind the Post Office, the Field Ambulance staff worked under great difficulties, being continually under fire. When finally it was found to be impossible to open the road for the passage of vehicles (there were found no fewer than six blocks and ambushes between Senggarang and Ringit) the Brigade Commander gave orders to destroy all guns and transport and to attempt to break out through the jungle and link up with the nearest British forces, who were believed to be at Ringit or Benut. A bitter decision had to be made – such of the wounded as were too ill to be moved were left in the village under the care of two doctors of the 168 Field Ambulance. When the 2nd Battalion Padre heard of this he elected to stay with them and share their fate. When the break – out order was given at Senggarang, the Battalion was widely deployed amongst the swamps on both sides of the roads with every man in action. As a natural result, it was impossible to collect the scattered sub – units into a complete Battalion in the time given in the order; however, in companies, platoons, sections and groups of every size and sort, under their respective officers and N.C.O’s, the great majority of the Battalion managed somehow to break out of the enemy ring and make their way back to Singapore, 70 mile distant. The stories of the adventures of the parties who found themselves alone in the jungle, desperately weary and hungry, hampered with many walking wounded in need of assistance, and constantly harried by enemy ambushes on the few practicable tracks and river crossings, would alone be sufficient to fill a book. One can only say that by the qualities of great endurance, faith and unconquerable cheerfulness these men won through; mud – covered, exhausted, their clothing in rags they came back, their weapons in their hands, the strong helping the weak. Some marched through swamp and jungle till they contacted British units in Benut or south of that town, others found sampans and paddled down the coast, while a large group of 9 officers and 400 men were taken off by naval craft from a fishing village on the coast. All those who escaped were sent to Singapore |
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The reoccupation of the town was effected by night attack, delivered by the 2nd Battalion with the assistance of two companies of the 5th Norfolks, which with their Battalion H.Q. had been sent up to reinforce the Brigade just before the coast road became impassable. The attack was successful; though the enemy held on grimly to hill 127, an important feature, and were only dislodged from this after a series of company assaults in the course of which “B” company commander Captain Cutlack was mortally wounded, and a number of officers and other ranks killed and wounded. 
