Voices from the Korean War - Douglas Rice [31]
Early the next morning, we moved out. The snow was now deeper and the going was rough. I was still a scout at this time and the only opposition we received was a single individual about three-hundred yards in front of me. He fired one shot and ran away as fast as he could.
Continuing on, we came to a place where there was a sheer cliff on one side and a drop-off to a river on the other side. Across the river was a small hut, where the door would fly open and either a North Korean or Chinese would spray us with burp-gun fire. We quickly returned fire and for some reason I was knocked backwards, into a ditch, when I fired my M-1. I don’t know if we got him or not, but the shooting stopped.
Somehow I had jammed the muzzle of my rifle with snow, thus causing me to be knocked backwards when I fired it. I saw that one of our ROK soldiers had an M-1, so we traded. The M-1 I had was split open all the way back to the gas port.
Roughly two-hundred yards from here was a tunnel approximately two-hundred feet long, and at the front end it looked like there should have been a bridge over a tributary of the Yalu. There was a sharp incline, on the far side, where the ground leveled out for a few hundred yards. At the end was a village with a tower at one corner. As my squad topped the incline, and crossed the open, we began to take small arms fire from the tower. Equipped only with small arms ourselves, we charged forward running and firing. I was on the right flank and that was as far as I got.
Some time later, I woke up in a jeep trailer. Apparently I had been struck a glancing blow, above my left eye. Later, my platoon sergeant told me with all the blood he thought I was dead. I was taken back to the battalion aid station where I was treated. They kept me for two days to be sure I was okay—I had one hellish headache.
When I returned to Item Company it was late afternoon and they were getting ready for chow. Suddenly, word came to move-out immediately. All the mess hall equipment had been brought up and set up in the tunnel; we left everything and headed south. Can you believe it, we were going to have chocolate cake? I hope the bastards that got it enjoyed it as much as we would have. There was no need to worry about stragglers, because if you fell behind, “Charlie” had you. We took very few breaks.
We arrived at one place that had an overhead cable system—built by the Japanese—that was still operational. All the gear that we could do without was loaded onto the cable cars, and sent over the mountain to Pungson—where we were headed.
When we arrived at Pungson, we found a narrow gauge train with enough flat cars to carry all of us. I don’t remember how long it took us to get to Hamhung, but I was glad to be riding for a change. At Hamhung we were placed along a perimeter so the Marines could get out. After this was accomplished, we went south to the mountains that were just north of Hungnam.
The 3rd BN was deployed along a ridge line on both sides of a pass. Our platoon was selected to set up and man a roadblock at the base of the pass. My squad was placed on first watch, so we set up just before dark with four rifles, a BAR, and 3.5 rocket launcher. There was a house, with what we would call a privacy fence, approximately fifty-to-sixty yards from our position. Two other guys and myself pulled the first watch while the guys who had the second shift went in the house to get warm, and dry out their socks. I don’t remember the time we were relieved, but I’m guessing it was around 2300 hours. We had just pulled our snowpacs and socks off when we heard a jeep stop at the roadblock.
A short time later—two to three minutes—we heard all hell break loose in the direction the jeep was headed. We scrambled to get dressed. It goes without saying, it was darker than dark. As we started out the door, guys from the roadblock ran past us heading up the hill towards Love Company—we were right behind them. By this time bullets were flying through the fence and over our heads as well. It sounded as