I have a coworker who always wears his Korean War Veteran hat to work. I always wanted to ask him some questions, but never knew how to strike up a conversation. It was a year or more before I actually did - but Eventually, I overheard him talking to another veteran about their services (different wars), and so I asked Dale a question, and I learned that day that he loved to talk. I found out he had fought in the Battle of Kapyong in an artillery battery (which is why he's pretty hard of hearing nowadays.)

Today, I chose to ask him some more questions. For some reason, the question came to my mind about what artillery he'd have shot in the war, so I found him in the break room and all I had to do was ask "What model artillery did you shoot in Korea?"

"I don't remember a model, but we started out with 105's when I got there. later had the 155's, and eventually, after I left, they even went to a 240."

I asked specifically about the Battle of Kapyong and he started his story.
"I think it was in Kapyong we were overrun - about 4000 chinamen against... there was three batteries of about 125 a piece, so about 400 of us. But they were - I didn't know this until lately! I thought we were overrun, but what really happened was that we had this regimen of infantry that we'd surrounded, and they were trying to get back to their lines; we were up the canyon that they'd decided they'd use to get back to their lines. so they were get back to their lines and I just found that out - after 60 years!
"What happened was, we were (in a canyon) down here by the road, and Captain Cox with A Battery was up here with Headquarters Battery. We got hit about 2 in the morning and they got hit at about 5. They went through them, and so Captain Cox took about 40 of us, a tank, two 50 calibers, and a small arms, and went after em. They caught em' going up the mountain. We were down here, shelling in front of them so they couldn't escape. They (Cox's group) shot and killed all the officers, so their guys didn't know what to do - That's why we got so many to surrender, I think. And I remember the one Chinaman I was loading into the truck, he knew English, and he said "I do not understand - we shoot you and you do not fall down!" and that's a quote!"
Me: And not a single American died in Kapyong, right?
Dale: "Correct - we had three guys wounded, I think, but nothing serious. When we got mortared, we got a bunch of guys injured, but nothing serious."

We talked for a bit longer, and he told a few other stories. But My favorite, one that he'd told me before but I happily let him retell, was about his Captain, a man Dale obviously respected and misses.

Dale said, "It was my job to inspect the barrels, so I opened up the breach one day and shined my flashlight in there, and there was a crack about yea big (holding up his hands about a foot apart) just a hairline crack. so I called the captain - he said, Call ordnance and get a new barrel. Well, when I called ordnance, they didn't send a new barrel, the sent a Major. The Major came up and asked what it was, so I showed him, reached in with a flashlight and he said 'No! there's nothing wrong with this' he said, 'This gun is safe to fire!'
"The Captain, who was a very frank man, looked at the major and said "Sir, I could stick your ass in that crack!!" The Major kind of shuddered a bit, and looked at me and said "Son, get this thing to fire - get the gun crew out here!"
"So I got the gun crew out there, and the captain said "load it up, and charge seven" - which was the max, so we did. The Captain then handed the lanyard to the Major and said "Then you fire the son of a bitch!" We all went back and the Major just stood there a for a bit, dropped the cord, and got in his jeep and left. We had to knock the shell out from the front - from the nose. We got a new barrel the next day. He was a good captain."

I will always love Dale's stories, and figured I'd share them with y'all. He's one of the happiest guys I've ever met - remembers people like nothing else, and always says Hi to everyone. Most of the time, he doesn't seem to talk too much - but when you get him talking, he's sure full of these stories.

Sounds a lot like my father in law, who was an artilleryman during Vietnam.

He didn't mention it for the first little while, until he learned I was a military history buff, and now he loves sharing stories whenever we're together.

My dad's cousin Mike was the best shot with a rifle that I've ever known. Was lucky enough to go on a couple of hunting trips with him a long time ago. His rifle was chambered for 300 Ackley Improved which to me at the time looked like he was chambering a missile in his rifle. He was a Korean War veteran as well.

One of the stories told about him was how his service in the Army ended. They were camped on one side of the river, Chinese troops on the other. They were under orders not to engage across the river. The Chinese would cross at night, find Americans asleep in their foxholes and butcher them. There was a Chinese colonel with a bullhorn that every morning would spew propaganda across the river and tell the US troops where they could find the pieces of their fellow servicemen.

Mike had enough of it one morning and finally snapped. With his M-1 Garand he executed a headshot on the colonel at over 800 yards. For his actions, Mike was court martialed, given an honorable discharge and fined 10 cents for the bullet.

Thank you for sharing these stories. They are priceless!! The man who would have been my father-in-law was a marine in the Pacific late in WWII. Unfortunately he passed away about 5 years before I met his daughter, my wife. I would have loved to have talked to him.....

My Dad was in Korea in 1951. He still won’t talk about it. The one and only time he opened up about it was when a friend of mine mentioned he was stationed at an airbase in Korea many years after the war.

My Dad had gone into the army with a friend of his in town. They ended up going through boot camp and then Korea together. They’d seen quite a bit of fighting/action and were sent back off the line for some R&R. Not far off the line, just far enough that the brass thought was safe. Dad said they piled out of the truck, grabbed some hot food, sat down to eat it and immediately heard a bullet go zinging between them. Some R&R!

I get the impression as well that he’s still bitter about the reception Korean vets got when they got home. Back when people rightly made up for the wrongs of treatment of Vietnam vets, he would always say what about us, meaining Korean War vets.

My Dad is 90 now, and still won’t talk about it. I don’t press him on it.

My dad never talked to me about well, anything.

I only know two of his war stories and I learned them second hand.

The first was that he was in the Bataan Death March. Ended up a POW. Got some sort of skin disease from insects that burrowed into his skin that he got rid of by soaking in very hot water.

The second story was from Korea. He was running forward and he said he could never forget the sight of the head of the man ahead of him exploding from a shot. He did three tours in Korea. On his third tour for which he volunteered, they sent him for a psych eval. He passed. Talk about priorities, he didn't mind doing a third tour because his pay wouldn't be taxed.

But I've never seen him exhibit any signs we know of as shell shock or ptsd.

I had a patient a few weeks ago who was nearly deaf. I'd overheard him telling the nurse that he'd lost it when somebody threw a grenade at him. When I went in to pre-op him, I asked him who threw the grenade. He looked me right in eye and after a pause, said, "A gook...he missed." Apparently a buddy of his picked it up and tried to throw it back but wasn't quick enough. Killed him and ruined my patient's hearing permanently.

He also mentioned that they were all nearly killed in an ambush at one point. He said, "Another 30 seconds and them gooks would have killed every one of us." One of his guys spotted one of their guys just in the nick of time to thwart the ambush.

You could see in his eyes that the man lived through hell over there. I didn't comment on the slurs. I figured he'd earned his hatred, and who was I, some punk kid who hadn't even been born at that time, to tell him otherwise?

My dad was 4F due to his hearing, but my uncle went to Korea. He's never spoken of it to me or, according to my cousins, to them. He's nearly 90 now and likely will take it all to the grave with him. While perhaps that's where it all belongs, some part of me believes that it would better to hear and/or record these stories somehow if only for posterity.

I have the feeling that, short of perhaps the Pacific, this was the fiercest and most brutal fighting that we have ever done in the most brutal of conditions.

My father-in-law was a Korean War veteran. I wish I could say that he told me stories about his service in Korea, but I can’t.

I can recommend a very good book about the Korean War, and the siege at Chosin Reservoir in particular:
“On Desperate Ground,” Hampton Sides.

I was too young to serve during Korea, but served with a number of vets from that fiasco. One of them was my best friend while we were stationed together. He had taken a round thru his left shoulder while he and the rest of his tank crew were were heading back to US lines. Their tank having run out of gasoline.

He probably talked more about the experiences there because we were all on active duty.

Not to change the topic but my step dad while serving in WW2 took three German MG rounds through the middle. He only talked to me about it when we were alone, and not often.

I distinctly remember being asked to leave a couple of business establishments while in uniform, in this country. Strangely that was in Louisville, KY where much of the business came from troops stationed at Knox.

That man is a treasure, thank you for typing up his stories here!

Watch the PBS (I think) special about the battle of the Chosin Reservoir. Also look for a book called The Coldest Winter.

I was privileged to spend part of Christmas with a retired 92 Y.O. Navy Captain (also retired as an airline pilot) who had flown in both Korea and Nam. He survived being shot down in both, as well as a stateside T-33 crash. A very interesting guy and I hope to get the opportunity to hear more of his stories.

Weii -- as long as we're relating "war stories".

I was a young ROTC 2nd. Louie doing the Artillery Officers Basic Course in the winter of 1967/68 at FT. Sill. They took our group (OBC '68) from place to place (firing demonstrations, etc.) on large buses. The bus drivers were all retired Army NCO's; most of whom had served in the WW2 and/or Korea.

During breaks we were able to ask the drivers about their service. After a towed 195 mm howitzer direct fire demonstration (the crew can see the target during direct fire). And 'the target' is often shooting back! Think of a battery under assault by infantry.

AIR, the usual max rate of fire for the 105's was six rounds/min. However if 2 or 3 crew members of the crew "make up" rounds and pass to the gunner & assistant gunner they can be fired much, much faster than normal. Maybe 20 rds./min. if they're desperate!

Anyway, the driver was asked "how fast have you fired the 105's in combat?" He replied " We shot them 'till the grease flamed in the slides!' I can't recall if he was talking about the Pusan Perimeter or the Chosin Reservoir (or both).



And then there was the 'Morning Gun' at the ft. Sill OCS barracks. -- it told it's own story (writ in steel)!

VT fuses have a safety wire to prevent their being accidentally armed (if dropped or mishandled). The safety wire is removed before firing since centrifugal force throws it from the round. The wire is 'pressure welded' to the lands by the projectile.

If you looked down the bore of the morning gun, there were a number of safety wires welded in the bore.

During WW2 (or Korea?) this howitzer had been in a desperate fight. One man can load an fire a 105 (even if slightly wounded). Who knows how many men had become casualties in that gun crew? Those rounds (made us s fast as humanly possible) were being slammed in that chamber and the lanyard jerked simultaneously with the breach block closing!

My Sixth and Seventh grade science teacher, who died in the 1980's, was a Korean war veteran. IIRC, he fought at the Chosin Reservoir. I guess that means he was in the 1st Marine Division. He told stories of staying up all night and running the machine guns until the barrels glowed red. I remember him saying the enemy were coming at them with rakes and farming implements. He said they would shoot them, and they would get up and keep coming.

quote:

Originally posted by deepocean:
IIRC, he fought at the Chosin Reservoir. I guess that means he was in the 1st Marine Division.

There were Army units fighting at Chosin too... Elements of the 7th Infantry Division (Task Force Faith) and 3rd Infantry Division (Task Force Dog).

Ah Korean war stories...

My Dad is a 90 year old Korean war Army Vet. He never has talked about combat much. He said he blew up building with a big shoulder fired gun. I forget what it was.

He was on the front lines freezing his ass off.

He cycled back to camp when the Army band officer looked him up. He said I see you played the Trombone from your records. He handed my Dad a Trombone and told him to play him a scale and he did. That was it for combat and he finished in the band.

A week later his replacement was found with his head cut off and stuck on a spike.

If not for the Trombone, I probably wouldn't have been born...

My Dad went on to become a Deputy Sheriff in his civilian life and retired about 35 years ago.

I'm always interested in stories about the Korean War and later. I was in a 105 Battalion from 1965-67. High on my to read list is "On Desperate Ground - The Marines at the Reservoir, the Korean War's Greatest Battle" by Hampton Sides. He's a very good writer, some of you may have read Ghost Soldiers".

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by deepocean:
IIRC, he fought at the Chosin Reservoir. I guess that means he was in the 1st Marine Division.

There were Army units fighting at Chosin too... Elements of the 7th Infantry Division (Task Force Faith) and 3rd Infantry Division (Task Force Dog).

I thought he was a Marine, but I do not have his obituary in front of me. The only record I can find online (if it was him) seems to indicate he was in the Army.

quote:

Originally posted by PR64:
My Dad is a 90 year old Korean war Army Vet. He never has talked about combat much. He said he blew up building with a big shoulder fired gun. I forget what it was.

Perhaps a M20 "Super Bazooka".

Here's a photo of a M20 (bottom) along with the smaller M9 "Bazooka", its WW2-era predecessor which fired a smaller rocket (2.36" vs the M20's 3.5").




Or maybe a M18 57mm Recoilless Rifle

quote:

Originally posted by UTsig:
I'm always interested in stories about the Korean War and later. I was in a 105 Battalion from 1965-67. High on my to read list is "On Desperate Ground - The Marines at the Reservoir, the Korean War's Greatest Battle" by Hampton Sides. He's a very good writer, some of you may have read Ghost Soldiers".

I read that book. Quite an eye opener. Soldiers were capturing Chinese troops in -30° temps wearing canvas sneakers. The cold was so brutal. When the Americans retreated or evacuated into the valley, the change in temperature shocked them.

My step father was a corpsman in Leyte, during WW II. Attached to artillery. They fired from the beaches into the interior, he told me, if you didn't tuck your pants into your boots when firing the howitzers, you got really bad burns on your legs from the concussion blowing the sand.

And hold your mouth open when you covered your ears too, when the cannons were fired.

I just reread "With The Old Breed, by Eugene Sledge last week after about 10 years.
Different war, but probably the finest description of the horror of war and also of the conditions people fought under just a few decades ago.
Korea wasn't much later so medical care and other technology hadn't improved much. They had to deal with a the cold instead of the heat. Different but not easier.
Hard to imagine the present generation dealing with hardship like that.