Dick the Lionheart

"How about it. chaps--shall we try flying in?" With this impeccably cool remark, addressed to two Swedish U.N. pilots in the Congo. Major Richard Lawson made his debut as a British hero. As a backdrop for heroism, the U.N. of U Thant is not an entirely satisfactory substitute for the empire of Victoria, but the British press, starved for tales of British valor in distant places, splashed Lawson of Leopoldville all over the front pages. Henceforth, trumpeted the Daily Express, he would be "known to the world as Dick the Lionheart."

Standing 5 ft. 5 in. in his jungle boots. Lawson, 37, is a fair-haired, gentle-voiced graduate of Sandhurst. Recently he was temporarily transferred from the First Royal Tank Regiment serving in West Germany to the Nigerian army (trained by British officers). In December he volunteered for a three-month tour of duty with U.N. forces in the Congo. No sooner did Lawson arrive than his legend began to sprout.

Lonely & Scared. It started when a U.N. patrol was captured by troops of Albert Kalonji, self-styled "King" of diamond-rich South Kasai province, who had tried to pull a small-scale Tshombe and break away from the central Congolese government. Lawson set out for Kalonji's provincial capital of Bakwanga in an unarmed truck. Something about Lawson's schoolboy French and unmilitary looks charmed the provincial rabble, who released the U.N. patrol.

Last month, when news reached Leopoldville that 19 Roman Catholic missionaries had been massacred at Kongolo in northern Katanga by mutinying Congolese troops. Lawson volunteered to fly to the terror-stricken town to rescue one missionary who reportedly had survived. Lawson's two Swedish pilots landed their Beaver plane at Kongolo's torn-up airfield, and Lawson threw himself out the door to avoid fire from snipers. "I was very lonely and very scared," he said. "I picked up my stick and strolled on."

Immediately, 800 rebellious Congolese appeared from the bush, aimed their rifles at the intruder. "Since I was outnumbered." he recalled, "there was only one thing to do--advance." But when one of the mob jabbed an arrow in his back ("Quite low on my back, actually"), Lawson wheeled around, punched the assailant in the nose. For some reason, this started the other Congolese roaring with laughter, and before long Lawson and Father Jules Darmant of Belgium, sole survivor of the mass murder, were flying back to Leopoldville.

Correct Calm. Two days later, Lawson was back in Kongolo looking for more priests to rescue. He was captured and beaten with fists and rifle butts by angry troops. Finally, Katangese officers took charge, and to satisfy a howling mob that demanded a public execution, the officers beat him up again until the crowd was content and went home. The officers then apologized to Lawson. who-proceeded to round up three more priests before flying back to U.N. headquarters in Luluabourg.

There the rescuer discovered that four other priests and three nuns in the area were menaced by soldiers, evacuated them in two more plane trips.

Reading all about it back home in St.

Albans, Hertfordshire, Lawson's widowed mother received the news of his adventures with all the correct British calm: "He was just doing his job." she said.

Reminiscing for reporters, she recalled how, even on leave, he was never parted from his swagger stick: "Such an ordinary stick, too, but it meant a lot to him." One of Lawson's previous commanders, a former Governor General of the Sudan, Sir Knox Helm, slightly relaxed the stiff upper lip. He said: "Lawson was a very bright little feller."

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