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J2 The Orange County Register Thursday, November 15, 1990SPIES: Now they can try to put together pieces of the puzzleFROM 1fluent in seven languages and he knew the Burmese countryside likea Sherpa.For months in 1943 and 1944, Hengshoon thrashed through the Burma jungle, slipping in the muddy, hilly terrain, deluged by monsoons, blazing trails for the allies and spotting enemy troop movement.Be scraped leeches from his skin a£|ie struggled through the undergrowth. To survive, he ate plants and the worms that nest inside b^nboo shoots. He nearly waskilled seven times.•*-Qn one such event, he entered a village that recently had been oylrtaken by the Japanese and his gwjup was hit by machine-gun fire.jPe saw a captain fall dead to his right. He saw his guide, a child, fall topiis left. He hit the ground.;5JThey tell you that when you get sMJJt, you don’t feel it right away,” h^jsaid. ‘‘So I looked all around at myself. I didn’t see any wounds. Tufcn when I saw the big hole in my bdg, I realized how close I got.”» 7# i5he bullets had gone in one side ofhis bag and out the other, barely massing his back.Only when the war was over, af-teS more than three years of spying ontthe enemy, did Hengshoon see hi# family again.•Pledged to secrecy, many of the spies at the reunion had not told thw?ir stories — even to their families — until recently.pJjack Chappell, 44, of Riverside, sid his uncle was a navigator on a boJnber squadron sent in 1944 to take out a bridge in the Brenner Pass between Italy and Austria.German forces were firing on them as they attempted to take out the bridge.it There were times when I had to look at myself (and ask): ‘Wait a minute. What am I doing here? I’m learning how to kill people and subvert people and to lie and cheat.' But war is like that. You have to forget a lot of your scruples and standards of behavior. 99Clair WeeksWorld War II spy stationed on Catalina Island‘‘They were suffering horrific losses,” Chappell said. Sitting in a briefing session for their third attempt at the bridge, many of the men feared for their lives.Just as they were about to leave, a colonel arrived and announced that they didn’t have to go. The OSS had knocked out the bridge.‘‘It wasn’t until many years later that we found out my dad led the OSS team that knocked out the bridge,” Chappell said. “My uncle said he believed that my dad saved his life.”Jack Chappell’s father, Howard, was captured twice in March 1945, in the same area of Brenner Pass.The first time, he was living in a mountain shepherd’s home, blowing up bridges and sending radio messages. He risked getting shot and ran from his captors. He hid in a barn, barely missing capture when the Germans marched by and killed other men hidden in the barn.But Chappell knew his partner, who hadn’t escaped, had stashed their radio equipment in the deep snow when they were caught.“If they got the radio and the code book, they could pretend they were me and have more men sent in, more supplies sent in,” Chappell said.He was bleeding from the first capture. He wrapped his woundcarefully so the blood-wouldn’t give him away in the snow. The next day, Chappell went back for the equipment.Again, he was captured by a Nazi soldier. Chappell had no weapon but his own hands.“I broke his neck and stuffed him in a culvert,” Chappell said.Chappell, 72, of Oak Shores, has been awarded the Silver Star for his war efforts.Frequently, despite their best efforts to avoid detection, the spies were followed by counterintelligence agents. They learned how to watch their backs.“You walk slowly, look, double back, keep an eye across street,” said Marshall Houts, 71, of Dana Point. “Usually it’s two people in a relay.”Houts was sent to Brazil to ferret out clandestine radio transmission centers and prevent the Nazis from sinking Allied ships.He masqueraded as a journalist for Transradio Press, a cover that should have allowed him to ask questions without arousing suspicion. But Houts was followed soon after he arrived in Brazil. Eventually, the Nazis caught up with Houts’ informant and they both were jailed. Houts was released after an ambassador interceded.When the OSS needed a wilderness area to teach spies survivaltechniques, they took over Santa Catalina Island.Destined for India and Burma, Clair Weeks, 79, of Los Alamitos was surprised to hear he was being sent to Southern California for more training after completing classes on the East Coast.“In peacetime when I was working at Disney (Studios), I had a sailboat, and I went to the island all the time,” he said. “I never expected to have to hike all over that island. It was rough. Suddenly, it was dry and dusty. And suddenly the honeymoon and the sailingdays were over.”Living off the land for three days, he said, “I looked nostalgically at these lovely pure coves where we used to sail.”Weeks worked in “morale operations,” a psychological warfare team. He helped write the scripts for a “black radio” station in the country that today is Bangladesh. The radio station transmitted false messages to the Japanese — telling them that they were losing the war and that their families were suffering.The son of missionaries, Weeks said he didn’t dare tell his father what he was doing.“There were times when I had to look at myself (and ask): ‘Wait a minute. What am I doing here? I’m learning how to kill people and subvert people and to lie and cheat.’ “But war is like that. You have to forget a lot of your scruples and standards of behavior.”Later Weeks helped illustrate “Bambi,” for Disney and worked in the Foreign Service. His spy work remains a vivid chapter of his life — but the subversive methods have not affected his values.“I’m still a very idealistic, people-oriented person,” he said.tion to reduce an inflamed cvst.
Newspaper Details
Santa Ana Orange County Register
Santa Ana, California, US
Thu, Nov 15, 1990
Page 38
Full Page
Clipped by
Dakota W.
SD, USA 17 Apr 2023
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