LOOKING BACK

On the 2nd of Dec. the 1st BCT left their position at Sachang-ni, and proceeded to fight their way back to our position at Huksu-ri.  There were hundreds of CCF following close behind all the way back and “B” Company had their hands full fighting the rear guard.  The road was out in four places, (one the bridge where we lost our truck), and Lt. Col. Besson, our Battalion Commander, dispatched our 10th Engineer people with a small escort up the road to help make repairs to speed up the 1st BCT withdrawal.

When they finally reached our position, they were loaded onto waiting trucks and taken to the rear area.  “B” Company was still locked in a running battle and could not break contact with the advancing enemy forces.  Col. Besson moved his people to high ground around Huksu-ri and “B” Company, fighting off over 1600 CCF troops in their rear guard action, finally made it to our line.

Jake Grauman was with “F” Company of the 2nd BCT and was one of the men sent to the high ground that day.  That night, 3rd Dec., the 2nd BCT was hit with overwhelming force by the CCF.  Jake was one of the many that did not make it.  The tales told to us later by those guys up on that mountain top, were of horror, being over run by the enemy, and sustaining very heavy losses.

We knew it was bad because of our fire missions through the night.  Our minimum range was 565 yards and that night we rewrote the book for 4.2 mortars.  The troops around us were requesting us to drop rounds almost on top of them.  In order to do this we disconnected the standards that held up the barrels of our mortars, and held them up with our hands and eye balled the angle of the barrels.  We were firing much less than 565 yards and the line troops were calling for more!  It was a hell of a night with heavy losses on both sides, and no one had time to think about how bitterly cold it was.  And yes, we did hear those bugles blow, and their eerie echoes through the valley.

I believe it was later that Day, DEC 3rd, that we proceeded with our withdrawal.  The Engineers blew the bridges behind us, and we started fighting our way out of that trap on the one and only road out.  It was icy and snow covered, and would have been a treacherous trip down out of those mountains even it we hadn’t had to fight our way out.  The road was clogged with vehicles and the progress was very slow.  If a truck stalled and caused  a backup, it was shoved over the side where it would roll down the embankment, sometimes hundreds of feet.

At one place I saw a tank slowly sliding sideways toward the edge of a cliff, when our forward progress stopped for a few minutes.  The crew came scrambling out of it, as it went over the side.  I remember seeing a wounded Officer sitting on the back of a jeep trailer loaded with bodies.  His legs were hanging down, and his body was leaning out, so the blood coming off his jaw would run onto the ground instead of his clothes.  It was there I shot an enemy soldier with my M1, and saw him fall next to the road.  The one and only time I took aim, pulled the trigger, and actually saw my target fall.

One of my Korean men climbed over me, and got into the rear of our truck.  After getting in he turned around behind me to face front, and immediately caught a bullet in the middle of his back.  He pitched forward landing on top of me.  If he hadn’t been standing in back of me, I believe I would have caught that bullet.  He was taken by the medics to be attended to and we never saw him again.  I don’t know if he made it or not. 

We finally did make it down out of those mountains to the valley below.  We began to work our way back to Hungnam, on the shore, where we were finally to be evacuated.  At one place we stayed for a short time, my Koreans came to me and said, “Sahgee, you come see.” 

I went to see what they had found.  There were two Korean women crying in a hut nearby.  There was also a young child, dead, wrapped in some cloth, laying on the floor.  The child had been dead for some time, but the women had no way to bury it.

I had my guys chip out a shallow grave in the frozen ground, and then we took the little body from those wailing women and placed it in the ground.  It was a sad experience for us all.  The human suffering I witnessed during my time in Korea, is something that has haunted me ever since.  The feeling is difficult for me to put into words, but is like being eternally sad deep inside somewhere.