Voices from the Korean War - Douglas Rice [50]
HOME!! Our squadron gets 12 pilots and 45 enlisted men as replacements so we had a drawing and I was #5. We’ll fly to Itami to get our final orders and mode of transportation.
February 12,
Pusan, Korea,
I flew this morning—armed recon to Chang-chow-ni—and very possibly this was my last hop—my 87th.
All the Corsairs in VMF-323 were equipped with four 20mm cannon’s and not the six .50 caliber machine guns that were mounted on them during World War II.
There is a huge difference between cannon and machine gun fire: a cannon round explodes; a round from a machine gun makes a bullet size hole. When strafing the soldiers on the beach, those in close proximity exploded; turning into red mist. This was the scene that upset me the most.
Most of the carrier-based Corsairs during my tenure carried a centerline extra fuel tank; 1 – 1000 lb. bomb and rockets on each wing; and 20mm cannon ammo carried internally. However, this configuration varied widely depending on the mission we were flying. The rockets came in two different weights, and often the centerline fuel tank was replaced with a third 1000 lb. bomb or a 1000 lb. napalm tank. To add to this equation we also had 250 lb. and 500 lb. bombs.
My typical ordnance load would be 2 – 1000 lb. bombs, 4 – HVAR rockets, a belly tank of fuel, and 2000 rounds of cannon ammo. With all this weight, the wings would bend during take-off. The Corsair comes with (an instruction) book telling ordnance men how much they could load, which was a big joke! If anything was cut for safety’s sake, it was fuel—never ordnance.
~~Sixteen~~
Eric Hanney
USS Gurke—DD-783
U.S. Navy
I was born in Pomona, California on May 25, 1931. After graduating from high school, in Pomona, California—at mid-term—I joined the U.S. Navy. As I was only seventeen, my mother had to sign for me.
Upon completion of basic training, in San Diego, California, I was assigned to the USS Gurke—a destroyer. The Gurke was armed with 5 inch .38 caliber twin-mounts, 20mm single mounts, 40mm quad and twin-mounts, torpedoes and depth charges; and she roughly held two-hundred men.
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On August 5, 1950, the Gurke left San Diego for Korea; arriving in time to participate in the Inchon landing. Along with five other destroyers, DeHaven, Mansfield, Collett, Lyman K. Swenson, and Henderson, the Gurke anchored in Inchon Harbor, on the 13th of September. We remained there for two days firing at shore batteries on Wolmi-do Island, and at the same time receiving fire; we were called the Sitting Duck Squadron.
As a Seaman First Class, I was a radar man, which meant I watched the radar for approaching ships. Our head phone was on the same frequency as the look-outs. On one occasion while we were receiving fire, the look-out said he could see where the incoming fire was coming from. Suddenly, he was hit; lucky for him he was just wounded.
One of our sister ships took a direct hit, killing five men.
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We also accompanied aircraft carriers to protect them from submarines.
~~Seventeen~~
Tom Enos
1st Marine Regiment
1st Marine Division
U.S. Marine Corps
In 1947, at the age of sixteen and a junior in high school, I enlisted in the Marine Reserves. My mother, at the urging of my older brother, signed papers stating that I was seventeen. My brother was my Reserve Company’s First Sergeant, and a Marine veteran of the Second World War.
I was attending college in 1950 and was home for the summer working at a local hardware store, when my Reserve Company was activated on the 26th of July, 1950. Having been in the reserves for three years, and having taken part in the weekly and monthly weekend training along with completing three summer camps, I had been promoted to Corporal.
We arrived at Camp Pendleton during the first part of August, and our Reserve Company was disbanded and mixed in with the Regulars to fill the units of the First Division. I was assigned to G/3/1 and in a few days I would realize how lucky I was to have ended up with a great group of Marines.
Even though our