He Failed to Smile

In Rangoon last week, ailing, 53-year-old Burma Surgeon Gordon S. Seagrave, dressed in a blue double-breasted suit, sat in the prisoner's dock. He listened attentively, as Assistant Attorney General U Chan Tun Aung droned through a three-count indictment, accused Seagrave of committing high treason by aiding and comforting the rebel Captain Naw Seng in his war against the government.

Prosecutor Aung reviewed events leading to Dr. Seagrave's Aug. 15 arrest at his Baptist missionary hospital in the foothills near the China-Burma border. The assistant attorney general told how Captain Naw Seng, a leader of the Karen rebels, raided and occupied Namhkam. Aung said that Seagrave attended a dinner in honor of the rebel leader and permitted Naw Seng's forces free access to the hospital.

A prosecution witness, Colonel Khum Nawng, commander of the First Emergency Kachin Rifles, testified that Seagrave was plainly displeased when government forces reoccupied Namhkam and that the "doctor's attitude indicated that he had sympathies with Naw Seng." Khum Nawng solemnly told the court that he considered Seagrave a rebel sympathizer because the doctor never smiled at him.

Much of the testimony would have been barred by U.S. rules of evidence, but Dr. Seagrave heard it without a sign of indignation. He was going to hear a lot more: by week's end it appeared certain that his trial would last at least a month.

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