Small memories with hero Ya Tho Tu

(Baonghean) - On May 19, 1959, at the Military Region 4 Command in Vinh City, we were attending the celebration of Uncle Ho's birthday when we received news that the Pathet Lao 2nd Battalion, commanded by Ya Tho Tu, had withdrawn from the Plain of Jars. Immediately, a number of units of the Military Region and Nghe An Provincial Command quickly marched close to the Vietnam-Laos border to welcome Battalion 2. After 12 days and nights of fighting the enemy, finding a way to cross deep streams and high passes, enduring hardships and hunger, on June 1, 1959, the entire Battalion 2 and their families gathered at Hoa Binh village, Muong Xen (Ky Son).

Mrs. Tho Tu had to go through the arduous jungle, and during her pregnancy, she fell ill and had to stay behind. Mr. Tho Tu was busy commanding the unit, so he had to leave her and her children with the Lao guerrillas for protection and take them later. The guerrillas were all captured by the enemy, and she alone brought her children back to the other side of the Nam Mo River near Muong Xen. She was exhausted and hungry, not knowing what to do, when a boat of Vietnamese volunteer soldiers arrived in time to pick her up and take her to Vinh to give birth.

I first met Ya Tho Tu at the Vinh City Diplomatic House, during the Vietnamese banquet to celebrate the victory of Battalion 2 and the Lao revolutionary armed forces that day. That day, the banquet was set, on the Lao side were comrades Khammai Siphandon, Kaysone Phomvihane and many officers leading Lao army units and the command of Battalion 2. On our side were generals from the Ministry of National Defense and the Command of Military Region 4.



Son Hung (left), Thao Tu (middle) with family.

I looked at Tho Tu attentively and remembered hundreds of stories and anecdotes about him. I thought he had slanted eyes and majestic eyebrows. Unexpectedly, Tho Tu was tall but had a bony face with a high nose bridge and bright, gentle eyes.
After that, the 120th Group of Military Region 4 handed over the entire barracks in Xuan Thanh to the 2nd Pathet Lao Battalion to stay here for a while to study, train, equip, reorganize, and prepare to return to fight to liberate Laos. Knowing that I was a former Vietnamese volunteer soldier fighting against the French in Central and Lower Laos and had a special relationship with President Souphanouvong's family, Tho Tu received me intimately like a brother, he said: "I consider Prince Souphanouvong as my father. So we are brothers." The Mong people say: "We are brothers" so they do not hide anything from each other. Outside, it was drizzling and cold. By the fire right in the middle of the ground in the thatched house, we ate cassava together and listened to Tho Tu tell stories. He was very sad and felt sorry for his wife because the march to escape the siege was so arduous, she had a miscarriage, and when she returned to Vinh to give birth, the child died. Then he told stories about the Mong people fighting the enemy. Stories about the Vietnamese brothers helping him fight. He said that when he established Coong Pat Chay (Lao guerrillas) to fight the French, a short time later, a mandarin named Phia Hom also established a Lao Lum unit to rise up and fight the French. Knowing that, the Vietnamese volunteer army sent Mr. Ngo The Son to Laos to contact the two people, calling on the Lao and Vietnamese tribes to unite to fight the French. Phia Hom, Tho Tu, and The Son, through living close to each other, understood each other and considered each other as blood relatives. The three of them went up to a temple on the mountain, took an oath of blood together. They swore that the Lao Lum, Lao Xung, and Vietnamese would unite to fight the French to the end; live together, die together, face danger, hardship, hunger, and thirst but still not abandon each other; if anyone survived, they had the duty to guide the wife and children of the deceased to their destination.

Then Vietnam called Son back to take another job. Son returned to Vietnam and missed Tho Tu so much that he sent his sworn brother, Viet Son Hung, to stay by Tho Tu's side to help him. Tho Tu loved the Vietnamese volunteer soldier, Thao Hung (Viet Son Hung), as much as he loved Ngo The Son and married his beautiful youngest sister, Ymo, to Hung. Thao Hung lived and fought in Lao units like the Lao people...

Since the day we parted in Xuan Thanh, not long after that I heard the Pathet Lao Radio announce that the Lao People's Revolutionary Party and the Lao Resistance Government had honored Tho Tu and Battalion 2 as Heroes of the Lao Armed Forces. In February 1961, I heard that the hero of Lao legends, Ya Tho Tu, had sacrificed his life.

In Hanoi, Mr. Ngo The Son and his wife kept their oath to Tho Tu, taking care of his wife and children like their own family members. The Vietnamese-Lao love of Thao Hung and Ymo gave birth to 10 children, both boys and girls who grew up, studied well, participated in the revolution as employees of the Government and the National Assembly and became engineers, doctors, PhDs and officers in the Lao army.

The children of Tho Tu we welcomed at Nam Mo River when Battalion 2 withdrew in 1959, sponsored by their adoptive father Ngo The Son and educated in Vietnamese schools, are now colonel-level officers in the Lao army, such as Kham Beng, Anong, and niece Pani, who is now the Chairwoman of the Lao National Assembly.

Several years ago, Mr. Ngo The Son passed away in Ho Chi Minh City and before that, Thao Hung also passed away in Xieng Khouang. Now in Noong Het, Tho Tu's hometown, the grave of Tho Tu - the hero of the Lao armed forces and the grave of Thao Hung, a Vietnamese volunteer soldier, are buried side by side.

Mrs. Tho Tu, the famous Mong guerrilla in Xieng Khuang in the past, has become a kind-hearted old woman. All day long she goes looking for plants, leaves, tubers, and roots to make traditional Mong medicines, to help people with incurable diseases. When I visited, she held my hand tightly and said: “If you Vietnamese children are sick, just tell me. I will find plants and leaves to cure you.” If anyone asked her if she remembered him, she would smile sadly and say: “Tho Tu? That man is really… really”… Then she quietly raised a handkerchief to wipe her tears.

Tran Cong Tan