COMBAT STORIES FROM Korea

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Showing : Korea Videos

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  Ben Malcom - Army +12 Total Videos

  8240th Army Unit, Special Forces

  Ben Malcom recalls a mission to infiltrate and destroy a 76mm gun hidden inside a North Korean mountain. During the cover of night on July 14, 1952, Malcom managed to sneak 120 guerilla fighters onto the mountain and into the bunker, and describes the combat that ensued.

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  GEN Ray Davis - Marines +11 Total Videos

  1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment

  Ray Davis had distinguished himself in the Pacific campaigns and when he returned stateside, he was assigned to Quantico and the Marine schools. When the next war started, his regiment didn't exist but it was quickly formed and dispatched to Korea. Once the Chinese entered the fray, his battalion trekked up to the Chosin Reservoir where there was nothing but trouble. Part 1 of 2.

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  Bill Minnich - Army +2 Total Videos

  C Company, 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division

  When it was time to act, Bill Minnich came through. On a night watch, as he caught sight of a Chinese patrol, the only question was, rifle or grenade? When the unit was pinned down and no one responded to the order to move out, he cussed them all out and charged forward. And when he fell wounded, it was a sure thing that he would get up and scramble through the bullets landing at his feet.

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  Fred Culbreth - Army +8 Total Videos

  36th Engineer Combat Group

  Combat engineer Fred Culbreth was on a train rolling through Seoul toward the front. He had a support role but, within days of arriving at his post, he thought he may have to engage in combat in the middle of the night.

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  Allyn Johnson - Air Force +8 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  Allyn Johnson graduated high school in 1948 and went into the Air Force, figuring it would provide a secure future. He became an aircraft mechanic and then an instructor in rotary wing maintenance.

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  Ed Price - Army +8 Total Videos

  68th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion (90MM)

  He was fortunate that his time in Korea was relatively uneventful. Ed Price remembers a couple of big air attacks, but most were on the level of hand grenades lobbed out of a small plane. Since he was in headquarters company, which had a small amount of privates, he was in for a lot of guard duty.

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  William Moncus - Marines +7 Total Videos

  1st Marine Division

  When North Korea invaded the South, a train pulled out of Brooklyn with William Moncus on board. It picked up more Marines as it traveled across the country, arriving finally in San Diego. After shipping across the Pacific, they landed at Pusan and went straight into battle. The tide was turned.

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  Ed Price - Army +8 Total Videos

  68th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion (90MM)

  Ed Price was stuck in Seattle. While other troops boarded ships for Korea, he and several others had to wait for records to catch up with them. After a couple of false starts, he was finally headed across the Pacific. When he got to his anti-aircraft unit, he was asked a fateful question. Can you type?

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  Fred Culbreth - Army +8 Total Videos

  36th Engineer Combat Group

  A bridge was washed out on his route, but Fred Culbreth didn't want to waste hours on the detour. He knew that there were rocks and a hand cable at a certain point, so he plotted a route on the map and headed for the spot. When he saw that the ford was flooded, he decided to go for it, anyway.

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  William Alli - Marines +9 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division

  The Marines reversed their retreat in the face of the Chinese spring offensive and began to advance to the north, once again. Ammo bearer William Alli had to hit the deck when the enemy fire started and his load scattered across a dry rice paddy. Leave it, came the shout. Later, very high up in the mountains near the coast, he was serving last watch when daylight revealed a surreal scene.

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  Ed Price - Army +8 Total Videos

  68th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion (90MM)

  Ed Price thought he made a pretty slick move. By becoming a clerk in the personnel section, he wouldn't have to be out in that cold Korean weather. Somehow, he still found himself manning a .50 caliber machine gun from time to time.

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  Marty Letellier - Marines +17 Total Videos

  5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division

  All they said was to get on the boat. Marine PFC Marty Letellier had no clue where he was going, as usual. It turned out to be Inchon, where Gen MacArthur planned to turn the war around. It wasn't a normal landing, but there was, thankfully, not much resistance.

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  Norman Kling - Marines +12 Total Videos

  Marine Corps Reserve

  The trip over to Korea was just a trip on a troop ship. No big deal, but while Norman Kling was docked in Japan, a huge typhoon hit the harbor and ships were coming unmoored and banging into each other.

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  Robert Martin - Army

  38th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division

  Shortly after high school, Robert Martin enlisted in the Army. He became a cook and when the Korean war broke out, he joined the 2nd Infantry Division there. While he was deployed, the order from the White House came that the troops could not fire unless they were fired upon. This was very bad, in his estimation.

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  Lloyd Glasson - Army +6 Total Videos

  5th Regimental Combat Team

  On his first day in the Army, Lloyd Glasson picked up athlete's foot in the shower. A few days later he asked to go on sick call for treatment. No one paid him any heed until he was a medical oddity. When he was finally through with training, he had a plum assignment to guided missile school, but he had to get a security clearance.

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  Ray Bohn - Army +11 Total Videos

  27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division

  Ray Bohn made a decision in his life. He wasn't going to take a back step to anybody. This led to his leaving the Catholic school he attended after clashing with one of the brothers. His trouble continued in the working world and that was fine with him.

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  Jack Wold - Army +4 Total Videos

  3rd Infantry Division

  WWII veteran Jack Wold reentered the Army with a commission out of ROTC in 1951. He then served in Korea as an S3 managing the evacuations of wounded. He nearly got hit himself, but fate intervened on his side. At that point in the war, the Chinese were using huge human wave attacks.

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  Ed Fulghum - Army +14 Total Videos

  28th Infantry Division

  Ed Fulghum had conned his way into the Army at sixteen and gone to war in Korea. He got a little nervous when another soldier was shipped home for the same reason. He had a talent for talking his way into things and, when his section chief was due to go home, he set about getting his job.

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  Charles Kelly - Navy +4 Total Videos

  USS Cowell (DD-547)

  After seeing action off the coast of Korea, the USS Cowell resumed its around the world cruise, which had begun in Norfolk. From Korea, the ship headed south. Charles Kelly recalls the delightful liberties he had in many ports on his trek from Singapore to Ceylon and up through the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean.

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  Ed Fulghum - Army +14 Total Videos

  28th Infantry Division

  He was too young to be scared but there were a couple of times that Ed Fulghum thought he was going to die. Mortar fire will do that to you. The one thing that did affect him in Korea was seeing other guys get maimed. That will get to you.

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  William Alli - Marines +9 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division

  The whole division was pulled off the line and in reserve when William Alli read a letter from a cousin in Turkey. Why don't you go visit the Turkish troops serving in Korea, tell them your father is from Turkey and you are all brothers fighting Communism together? Great idea, until he got there.

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  Sinclair Stickle - Army +7 Total Videos

  7th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division

  Chinese artillery was zeroed in on the road. The only way you could make it was to floor it and not stop. Sinclair Stickle was in a truck barreling down that road when the shells started. What happened next made him think he'd had it, but the closest he ever came to dying in Korea occurred in a jeep and he wasn't even in combat.

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  Marty Letellier - Marines +17 Total Videos

  5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division

  It had been a hard battle and the Marines were stripping down to get in the Miryang River for a much needed bath. That's when a lady journalist happened along. After a short rest, they were sent right back to the place on the Pusan Perimeter they'd just left. Another hill to take.

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  William Alli - Marines +9 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division

  Seven months into his tour in Korea, William Alli was put in charge of the local unit of Korean laborers. The nineteen year old Marine was now an Asian despot, according to his friends. He didn't mind the ribbing. After all, he wasn't carrying that heavy machine gun ammo any more.

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  Charles Vicari - Marines +11 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  While walking past a recruiting office, Charles Vicari made a spur of the moment decision to join the Marine Corps. When the Korean War broke out, he volunteered for duty on the west coast to replace Marines that had been sent there. He was told the duty may be a little further than the west coast.

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  David Epstein - Marines

  1st Marine Division

  When David Epstein was drafted in 1952, he chose the Marines, along with his buddies. He swore vengeance on his DI, but when he ran into him in Korea, it was another story. He spent a year there just behind the lines at the 38th parallel.

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  Jim Larkin - Marines +6 Total Videos

  1st Battalion, 5th Marines

  For seventeen year old Jim Larkin, what he found after he came ashore at Inchon was fascinating. The novelty of Asia soon wore off since there was a war to fight, but he discovered that the Koreans are a humble and polite people. It's not a bad way to be.

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  Ed Fulghum - Army +14 Total Videos

  28th Infantry Division

  He had to weigh 120 pounds but he only weighed 116. Ed Fulghum's induction physical was the next day and, as usual, he came up with a plan. It was knee deep snow where he did his basic training. When some joker didn't turn in his pistol at the range, the recruits were sent outside to stand in the snowy Indiana weather.

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  Lloyd Glasson - Army +6 Total Videos

  5th Regimental Combat Team

  Because he had some college and could type, Lloyd Glasson was assigned to headquarters company. He became the Awards and Decorations Section Chief and it was his job to write up the awards and interview soldiers who were recommended for them.

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  LTG (Ret) Charles Cleveland - Air Force +5 Total Videos

  334th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron

  Fighter Pilot Charles Cleveland compares the aircraft he flew, the F-86 Sabre, to the aircraft flown by the enemy, the MiG-15. The plane flown by the Communists had the edge in armament but they had lousy gun sights. By the end of the war, the victory in combat ratio was not in their favor.