Company Sergeant Major R.S. Blain D.C.M.

OPERATIONS IN BURMA - MARCH 1943

This Warrant Officer belonged to the Sabotage Squad of his Column, and took a leading part in the destruction of the railway to Myitkyina. On 6th March, 1943, working with great speed he destroyed a bridge south of Nankan, cutting a box girder with a span of 120 feet, and blowing the abutments of another span. He also cut the railway in many other places, laid a number of booby traps using 3" mortar shells for bursting charge, and then withdrew his men safely to rendezvous some miles distant.

On 23rd March 1943 at Pago, he and his party of ten men helped to ambush a Japanese company, inflicting a number of casualties. Later, near Nyaung Bintha on the Sheweli River, his section ambushed an enemy party of twice his strength, destroying about half of them. On all occasions and at all times he upheld the finest traditions of a British Warrant Officer.