Tom Capin and the Headhunters of Borneo, A WWII True Story of Heroism and Adversity

The Reverend Tom Capin with the Eyes of the Mountain Tattoo
November 16, 1944 was a typical day for twenty-one-year-old Tom Capin.  A ring gunner and assistant radio operator on a B-24 Liberator, Capin was part of Tom Coberly’s aircrew.  Most of the crew trained as a unit and they flew seven bombing missions together as part of the Bomber Barons.  Capin was a Hoosier, from Fort Wayne, Indiana, six foot five, and sported a thick mane of red hair.

Morotai, a small island in the Dutch East Indies, was the home base for the crew.  The original mission for the day was to bomb a small airfield in the Philippines.  However, the orders changed based on an intelligence sighting of a heavy cruiser in Brunei Bay in Borneo.  Due to mechanical difficulties, the crew did not board their regular B-24; instead, they received a new, fresh off the assembly line B-24, that they named the Lucky Strike.

Present Day Borneo 


The crew of the Lucky Strike


The crew consisted of Tom Coberly the pilot, copilot Jerry Rosenthal, bombardier Phil Corrin, Navigator Fred Brennan, nose gunner Eddy Haviland, tail gunner Franny Harrington, flight engineer Jim Knoch, right ring gunner John Nelson, radioman Dan Illerich, and Capin.  Aerial photographer Elmer Phillips asked to ride along for one last time before he returned stateside.

As the plane approached Brunei Bay, they were surprised to find more than the sole cruiser reported by naval intelligence.  What they encountered were three battleships, three heavy cruisers, four light cruisers, five destroyers, and numerous auxiliary ships. Coberly followed the squadron commander on a low straight course towards the enemy. Fourteen miles out, the squadron of bombers and their P-38 escorts encountered antiaircraft flak and attacking Japanese fighters.

Lucky Strike Destroyed and Crew Bails Out Into Jungle


Suddenly a large naval shell hit the front of the bomber.  Coberly’s leg was shattered and bled profusely.  The navigator’s face was blown off and the copilot’s left ear was gone, evidence of a massive head wound.  The copilot broke formation and tried to head back to the home base.  However, the plane suffered heavy damage, a fuel tank was leaking, one engine was smoking, and the hydraulic system destroyed.

The plane was over the thick jungle mountains of Northern Borneo when the copilot gave the order to hit the silk.  Tom Capin was the last to leave the rear of the aircraft, leaving through the camera hatch, while the rest of the crew jumped through the bomb bays.  The copilot, along with the dead navigator, rode the plane into the ground where it burned on impact.

Hoosier City Boy Meets Dayak Headhunters



Capin landed in a Mahogany tree and descended the tree via clinging vines.  Armed with a handgun and a bag of ammunition, Capin set out to find his crew-mates.  Although trained at the Army Air Corps survival school, Capin found the training less than helpful and he struggled to find food.  Drinking the water resulted in diarrhea.  Exhausted after wandering through the jungle for eight days, Capin settled down and fired off a round from his pistol.  He knew that if the Japanese found him it meant death, as for the natives he did not know a thing about them; he was praying that the shot would attract one of his crew-members.

Capin sat and thought about his wife, Betty, who was living with his parents back in Fort Wayne.  He imagined her pain when she received a telegram informing her that he was missing in action.  Capin was deep in thought and picking off leeches from his skin when he heard, “Ho American.”  Two natives appeared armed with blowguns and machetes.

Capin Rescued By Dayaks


The Dayaks dropped their weapons in a show of friendship and Capin dropped his pistol.  Soon the men were shaking hands and the Dayaks offered Capin some sticky rice.  Then they made a crude cigar out of tobacco and a banana leaf.  Capin recoiled when he saw the rising sun on the cover on their matchbox.  He tried to inquire about the matches but he could not understand any of their, “native gibberish.”

Kibung


The natives took Capin to their village and into a thatched-roofed house full of people.  The people were fascinated with Capin, as most of them had never seen a white man before.  One of the women roasted corn for Capin and he was gorging himself when one of the natives who rescued him put a stop to the feast.  The native’s name was Kibung and he realized that Capin was not ready for solid food because of the diareaha he suffered

Kibung was of the coastal Iban people and he was a fugitive from the Japanese.  He had killed some of the Japanese occupiers of his village and fled inland to the Lun Dayeh band of Dayaks.  He married a Lun Dayeh woman and they lived in the Pa’ Ogong longhouse.  Together they produced a baby boy who was six months old when Capin arrived at the longhouse.

Capin resided a single-family hut that sat next to Kibung’s residence.  The sister of the longhouse chief cooked for Capin.  Schooled by missionaries, she spoke Malay, enabling Capin to use the Dutch/Malay/English word list that he carried. Every evening after dinner Kibung and Capin would study the Dayak language.  Kibung’s first message to Capin was to remove his boots and walk barefoot like the natives.  Japanese patrols would immediately recognize the boot print of a soldier vice the native bare feet.  Capin excelled and quickly picked up the Dayak language.  Soon he excelled in other areas such as learning to squat on his haunches for hours on end, with his posterior resting a comfortable two inches above the floor, and eating with two or three fingers of the right hand and using a leaf for a plate.

Capin Goes Native


A Dayak Headhunter
The villagers made Capin an extra long loincloth out of bark cloth.  He learned to wash himself using a soap made of tree bark.  Kibung’s son went with Capin often to the stream to bathe and the natives started calling him Tom in Capin’s honor.

Kibung taught Capin how to travel through the jungle as the Lun Dayeh.  Kibung pointed out that fruit trees in the jungle had markings on them, indicating the owner.  Certain markings meant the fruit was available to all.  Capin learned the uses of jungle plants, how to sit quietly in the jungle without being disturbed by the leeches, mosquitoes, ants, and flies, and wait for prey to walk by.

Within a month after parachuting in to the jungle, Capin was proficient in the Dayak language, knew the customs and ways of the headhunters, and owned a sempit to hunt game.  The sempit was a seven-foot long blowpipe used to hunt game.  Along with the sempit, Kibung gave Capin a bamboo case the attached to his loincloth.  The case contained a set of poison darts.  The poison was extremely lethal and one dart could kill an animal or man.  Dayak customs forbade the use of a dart on a man; they preferred to kill a foe with a spear or machete.

Capin became an honorary member of the Lun Dayeh with a tattoo ceremony.  He received a tattoo using charcoal and a suture needle.  Placed on his forearm, the “Eyes of the Mountain” tattoo reminded Capin of the Lun Dayeh for the rest of his life.  Betty Capin reported that at the time of Capin’s death over fifty years later the tattoo was just as clear as the day he received it.


Becoming American Again



Two and a half months after bailing out of the Lucky Strike, Capin reunited with members of his crew.  The crew-members recalled that Capin seemed more Dayak than American, and that at times he spoke Lun Dayeh and faltered with English.  A tension developed between Capin and his fellow crew-members.  Capin looked upon his crew-members as ignorant of the Dayak way of life and they thought him arrogant.

Major Tom Harrison


Major Tom Harrison and six members of SEMUT 1 came to Borneo in April of 1945 to organize resistance against the Japanese.  Harrison was a British Major who had lived with and studied the Kelabit peoples of Borneo.  Harrison was well versed in the ways of the headhunters.  He heard of the downed airmen living with the natives and planned a rescue.  Harrison contacted the flyers via letter and then set about to visit them.
Harrison and Capin became well acquainted as they both suffered from foot ailments and spent a few days recuperating together.  Harrison was impressed with Capin’s grasp of the Dayak culture and Capin was impressed with Harrison’s arrogance.  Harrison persuaded Capin to teach the natives how to use the British .303 Enfield rifles.  A few days later Harrison assigned Capin to work with Doc McCallum, a medic, and he became McCallum’s second in command of all medical services in Northern Borneo.  Capin gave up his native attire and dressed in Australian shorts.

Capin Leaves Borneo
Harrison put the Dayaks to work at making a landing strip in the jungle; before long, a British Auster flew in to start taking the Americans home.   The landing strip was barely long enough for the two-man plane to take off.  The natives celebrated the building of the strip by lining the strip with poles adorned with Japanese heads.  Capin described the decaying odor of the heads as he boarded the Auster.  After seven months living with and indeed becoming a Dayak, Capin finally headed home.
Tom Capin loved the Dayaks that saved him and always wanted to go back to Borneo.  However, because of the diseases he suffered in Borneo, his doctor advised against returning to the country. At the bequest of Major Harrison, Capin received the British Empire Medal (BEM) for his service as a medic and helping Doc McCallum.  A few years after his return to the states, Capin attended seminary and became a Methodist minister.  He never forgot his time with the Dayak people.


References:

Heimann, Judith M., The Airmen and the Headhunters, Harcourt, Inc., 2007
Heimann, Judith M. The Most Offending Soul Alive, Tom Harrison and His Remarkable Life, University of Hawaii Press, 1997
E-mail correspondence with Betty Capin.

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