Elephant Bill - Lt. Col. J.H. Williams

Elephant Bill is a memoir about the author's experiences being in charge of a bunch of elephants for the Bombay Burma Trading Company. He applied for a job there after World War 1, and stayed through the Second World War.

The book starts with his initial introduction to the region, and some of the challenges he faced, since he received no training or advice before being given some elephants and sent to one of the camps. He has to learn on the fly, but he's an eager student. So when one of the older elephants dies for no reason he can discern, he cuts her open and crawls around inside trying to figure it out. Which, considering this was a tropical jungle, was an extremely pleasant experience I'm sure.

The first two-thirds of the book are a recounting of various experiences, and also a lot of general information about the elephants. The nature of their work, how they're trained (and the differences between training a tame elephant and a wholly wild one), the relationship between the elephant and its rider (called an oozie, for reasons that aren't explained). There's a lot about elephants and how clever, playful, and petulant they can be. He is definitely very impressed with their intelligence and ability to understand humans. Also, apparently they hate dogs, which he couldn't really explain either, since a dog isn't any kind of a threat to even a baby elephant. Count that as a strike against elephants, then.

The last third of the book concerns how the elephants were used to aid the British Army during World War 2. First in helping to get refugees out, but then there was some debate among high command about whether they were more useful bringing supplies in, or in helping to build bridges across the many watersheds all the roads would have to cross. Given these were elephants used for moving massive downed trees to the river, they ultimately opt for the latter choice. He does describe a little of how the Japanese used them, based on what he learned from some oozies who were pressed into service for Japan. It seems they preferred to use them for transporting mortars and ammunition, but maybe they weren't planning to move lots of troops through that section of jungle, so roads weren't an issue. Probably easier ways to get at India.

I enjoyed the book. He writes with an easy, relaxed style, and presents the information in a straightforward manner. The heavy use of anecdotes and personal experience give the book an informal feel that keeps it from getting too dry.

'The monsoon broke early, catching the 49th Brigade still in the valley at Witok. Within two days all motor transport was bogged. There was a small break in the rain and then the vehicles were able to start crawling back. But they could never have done it except for my elephants. All along the road there were urgent requests for help, and the elephants were pulling the army lorries out of the mud like champagne corks out of bottles. Two or three lorries were wrecked when drivers started up their engines to help the elephants by spinning the back wheels. Those who did that found themselves and the lorry being taken for a fifty-yard stampede into the jungle, ending up with the lorry hitting a tree, or overturning, or the elephant's chains snapping and releasing him from the jungle devil he was towing.'