Voices from the Korean War - Douglas Rice [74]
The Chinese said we had been spotted by American planes, so we stopped in a tunnel. Due to the heavy smoke from the train, we almost suffocated. Since our train had been spotted, we were forced to march the rest of the way. During our march, we were strafed several times by allied aircraft.
As we neared the end of our march, we saw many Russian trucks. We then marched into the city of Sinuiju, North Korea—I believe this was the name of the city. The locals lined the road to see us, spit on us, throw rocks at us, and even tried to hit and kick us. Our Chinese guards did their best to protect us from the locals.
When we approached the outskirts of the city, we passed by some Russian manned ack-ack batteries; the Russians gave us some bread.
On, or around, the 25th of October 1951, we arrived at Camp One after a thirteen day journey. The camp was located in the town of ChangSong, North Korea, which was about thirty miles northeast of Sinuiju. When we arrived, I remember seeing American prisoners locked in dark, stinking cells for solitary confinement. These men had been placed there due to an infraction of camp rules, or they had gone insane from the pain or infection of their wounds. Our captors had crudely removed bullets, amputated limbs, and then placed these men in solitary confinement for months—to live or die.
Upon our arrival, it was bitter cold and our Chinese guards kept us standing around for hours, so we could be assigned living quarters. We registered at the Guard Headquarters the next day, then we were placed in squads and huts in the seventh compound. Here they placed ten-to-twenty men to a room. Our room had a dirt floor and the walls plastered with mud. Compared to other living arrangements—this was much better.
The housing arrangements was that of a typical Korean home, straw roof, mud walls, paper windows (in doors only), and an earthen floor kitchen that had an old black kettle for cooking and heating water. Even though the rooms weren’t very large, there was enough room to lie down, and stretch out. In one wall was an opening that served as a window; however, instead of glass, it had a piece of light brown paper glued to the inside of the opening, and it let through very little light. When it turned colder, our breath caused condensation on the paper making it wet and when the wind blew, it would tear. All prisoners had the same kind of room—cold and drab.
Our compound consisted of approximately two-hundred American soldiers and Marines, who were starving and suffering from their wounds and other illnesses. The first week here, we were given a blanket—the first since being captured—for every two men. Located to our south was another compound that was separated from us by a barbed wire fence. It contained the same number of prisoners as us, and they were in the same condition.
Running through the center of camp was the main road that was used as the main supply route. On several occasions our planes strafed Chinese trucks as they used the road. During these strafing’s several of our men were wounded, including Roy Farley who received a shrapnel wound to his foot. There were no markers indicating this town was being used as a POW camp, so our pilots had no idea we were there. We finally were able to get the Chinese to put up a marker—six months, or so, later.
From the time of our capture, we had experienced near-starvation on several occasions. At least here we were getting two small meals a day. The food, which was mostly consisted of barley and millet, was brought to us in a bucket and served to us like pigs. One day we happened to find a dead chicken, and cooked it, not caring how rotten or diseased it was; everyone in my squad tried to get a piece of that cooked meat.
If we had to go to the latrine, which was located about ten feet behind the huts, we would be challenged by the guards in front and back of the huts; they stayed with us until we returned to our room.