The Forgotten War, July 2023

THE FORGOTTEN WAR

KOREA 1950-1953

70 YEARS LATER, WE SHARE THE STORIES OF THOSE WHO SERVED

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THURSDAY, JULY 27, 2023

NATHAN ALFORD (208) 848-2208 / alford@lmtribune.com Marketing director

DOUG BAUER (208) 848-2269 / dbauer@lmtribune.com

Managing editor

CRAIG CLOHESSY (208) 848-2251 / cclohessy@lmtribune.com

City editor

MATT BANEY (208) 848-2262 / mbaney@lmtribune.com

Photo editor

AUGUST FRANK (208) 848-2210 / afrank@lmtribune.com

KOREA 1950-1953

THE FORGOTTEN WAR

We take this opportunity to remember our neighbors who served in Korea

The Korean War, often called the “Forgotten War,” may have received that title because of its place in history.

Located in time between a popular war, World War II, and a politically controversial war, Vietnam, the Korean War failed to cement itself in the memory of our nation’s history.

That said, the stories of those who served, along with the memories of families and friends shared over the years, deserve recognition on this, the 70th anniversary of the signing of an armistice agreement between North and South Korea, and the countries that supported the two sides.

The conflict began on June 25, 1950, when tens of thousands of troops from the North Korean army crossed the 38th parallel, the boundary between communist-supported North Korea and Western-supported South Korea.

In Korea, it was largely seen as a civil war between North and South Korea, but for the United States and its allies, the Korean War was viewed

as a fight against communism and the first major battle of the Cold War.

Before the armistice was signed 70 years ago today, some estimates place the death toll at 5 million soldiers and civilians. The U.S. documented casualties of its service members in the range of 36,000. These numbers, both important to remember and alarming in their magnitude, can’t provide the same real-world understanding of what happened as do the stories from those who were there.

This special section, which we’ve titled “The Forgotten War,” includes first-hand accounts from locals who served during the war. Because so much time has passed, and many who served have since died, we also sought out and interviewed families and friends of war veterans to share second-hand stories to help ensure that the Korean War, at least for readers of this publication, will no longer be forgotten.

Clohessy is managing editor of the Lewiston Tribune and the Moscow-Pullman Daily News. He can be reached at cclohessy@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2251.

ON THE COVER

All’s quiet for the moment on this nearly-forgotten front in Korea, May 26, 1957. Kenneth J. Howard, 21, of Sacramento, Calif., watches the communist-held hills emerge from the early morning fog as the May sun rises over the truce area. Howard’s twoman observation post is just south of the demilitarized zone, an uneasy noman’s land between South Korea’s allied defenders and their heavily-armed foes to the north.

Craig Clohessy

Latah County man survived sniper fire

Edward Laven served in Korean War despite deafness in one ear

By ANTHONY KUIPERS DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Latah County resident Edward

Laven claims he was “too young and dumb” to feel afraid while serving in the Korean War.

Laven, of course, is selling himself short. He may have been courageous, but he was not dumb.

Laven was a college student attending Ohio University in Athens when the war started in 1950. After being drafted, he was assigned by the the U.S. Army to the position of land surveyor because he had training in that skill while in college.

He said all the members of the Army’s survey crew were picked because of their high IQs.

“We were a pretty smart bunch,” he said.

His duties included surveying where the artillery should be positioned in relation to the enemy. This meant he had to be on the front line, where he was exposed to sniper fire.

The problem for Laven is that he did not always know he was being shot at.

Laven was dropped on his head when he was a baby and that left him deaf in his left ear. This could have kept him out of the war, but Laven said the Army didn’t believe him when he told them about his handicap.

So, there he was, on the front line, unable to hear some of the bullets whizzing by his left side.

His lieutenant saw this happening and did not want Laven to be alone.

“He thought if his man was up

there being exposed, he should be exposed,” Laven said. “So, he stood up next to me. I was looking at him and he was sweating and shaking.”

Laven had other skills besides surveying. He was a talented hunter and while serving in Korea, he would hunt pheasants for himself and his fellow troops.

“I’d bring the pheasants into the mess and they’d cook them up for us,” he said.

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August Frank/for The Forgotten War

Edward Laven, from his home in Moscow, talks about his time in the Korean War.

August Frank/for The Forgotten War Laven was dropped on his head when he was a baby and that left him deaf in his left ear. Laven said the Army didn’t believe him when he told them about his handicap.

Right guy, right place, right time

David Bleak served as a medic during the Korean War and would later receive the Medal of Honor for heroism in action. Courtesy

By MARTY TRILLHAASE FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

ARCO, Idaho — If the story of Idaho’s David Bleak weren’t true, you’d never believe it.

It’s a tale that begins in Korea, where a bloody war had become stalemated — after swinging back and forth from the Pusan Perimeter to the Incheon landing, from the Yalu River to the Chosin Reservoir — as it was about to enter its third year.

“By 1952, the front was pretty much solid. It was like a World War I positional warfare. There were not big changes,” said University of Idaho history professor emeritus Richard Spence.

With peace talks underway, it became a test of wills.

“From the end of ’51 to the middle of ’53, it’s either fighting while talking or talking while fighting,” Spence said. “It was a matter of keeping pressure on

the other side until you got what you wanted at the peace table.”

Into that cauldron entered Bleak, who at 18 years old — five months after the war broke out — had quit high school, left his native Idaho Falls and enlisted, planning to become a tank mechanic. The sense of obligation to one’s nation ran deep among his siblings — all eight Bleak brothers served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam. All survived.

At Fort Riley, Kan., Bleak’s superiors took a look at his 6 foot, 2 inch, 250-pound frame.

Here was a man strong enough to lift the rear of a disabled car while others braced it up to make repairs.

Here was a rancher who was the equal of any ornery Holstein.

While others doodled to pass the time, Bleak would bend a “church key” — a stainless steel can opener — between his index finger and his thumb.

MEDAL OF HONOR RECIPIENTS

Korean War Medal of Honor recipients from Washington and Idaho:

>> WASHINGTON

Walter C. Monegan Jr.

Rank: private first class

Branch: Marines

Credited to: Seattle

Born: Dec. 25, 1930

Died: Sept. 20, 1950

Buried: Arlington (Va.) National

Cemetery

Action date: Sept. 17, 1950

Location: Near Sosa-Ri, Korea

Continued from Page 3

He also bagged a wild boar, but its skin was so tough he could not get his bayonet into it. He instead gave it to several Koreans who were happy to have it, he said.

Laven said he served in Korea for a year before being sent back home.

Citation: “For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a rocket gunner attached to Company F, and in action against enemy aggressor forces. Dug in on a hill overlooking the main Seoul highway when six enemy tanks threatened to break through the battalion position during a predawn attack on 17 Sep-

On his boat ride back to the U.S., the ship carrying the troops stopped in Hawaii, made its way through the Panama Canal and traveled up the East Coast before dropping Laven off in New Jersey.

Laven said while the boat stopped in Hawaii, hula girls came to the dock and drew the interest of ev-

And later in life when Bleak had grown weary of losing change in a vending machine at work, he single-handedly picked it up and threw it out of the trailer. The vending machine company took notice and replaced it with one that didn’t squander any more of Bleak’s quarters.

He was also a bit of a daredevil.

During winters in eastern Idaho, the Bleak boys would cut two holes in the frozen Snake River, dive into one and swim to the other — until their mother made them stop.

“It ran in the family,” Bleak’s wife, Lois, recalled. “He was as strong as an ox. I never saw anyone who was stronger.”

He was simply too large to work in a tank.

On the other hand, someone that powerful could be a godsend to an injured soldier who needed to be

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tember, PFC Monegan promptly moved forward with his bazooka, under heavy hostile automatic-weapons fire and engaged the lead tank at a range of less than 50 yards. After scoring a direct hit and killing the sole surviving tankman with his carbine as he came through the escape hatch, he boldly fired two more rounds of ammunition at the oncoming tanks, disorganizing the attack and enabling our tank crews to continue blasting with their 90-mm guns. With his own and an adjacent company’s position threatened by annihilation when an overwhelming enemy tank-infantry

eryone on board, almost causing a disaster.

“Of course, every GI on the boat went to that side, and I thought we were going to tip over on the dock, but we didn’t,” he said.

After returning to the U.S., Laven wanted to study forestry, so he attended school at the University of

force bypassed the area and proceeded toward the battalion command post during the early morning of Sept. 20, he seized his rocket launcher and, in total darkness, charged down the slope of the hill where the tanks had broken through. Quick to act when an illuminating shell lit the area, he scored a direct hit on one of the tanks as hostile rifle and automatic-weapons fire raked the area at close-range. Again exposing himself, he fired another round to destroy a second tank and, as the rear tank turned to retreat, stood upright to

Continued on Page 5

Idaho. He made a career as a forester in the Northwest, and started a family, became a grandfather, and is now spending his retirement years in a log home tucked in the Palouse hills about 9 miles east of Moscow.

Kuipers can be reached at akuipers@dnews.com.

David Bleak was uncomfortable with the recognition he received for being awarded the Medal of Honor

Bleak family

Walter C. Monegan

MEDAL OF HONOR RECIPIENTS

Continued from Page 4

fire and was fatally struck down by hostile machine-gun fire when another illuminating shell silhouetted him against the sky. PFC Monegan’s daring initiative, gallant fighting spirit, and courageous devotion to duty were contributing factors in the success of his company in repelling the enemy, and his self-sacrificing efforts throughout sustain and enhance the highest traditions of the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.”

Awarded posthumously, Feb. 8, 1952, by Under Secretary of the Navy Francis P. Whitehair to his widow at the Pentagon.

Archie van Winkle

Rank: staff sergeant (highest rank: colonel)

Branch: Marines

Credited to: Snohomish County, Wash.

Born: March 17, 1925

Died: May 20, 1986

Buried: Cremated, ashes scattered at sea

Action date: Nov. 2, 1950

Location: Near Sudong, Korea

Citation:

“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a platoon sergeant in Company B, in action against enemy aggressor forces. Immediately rallying the men in his area after a fanatical and numerically superior enemy force penetrated the center of the line under cover of darkness and pinned down the platoon with a devastating barrage of deadly automatic-weapons and grenade fire, Staff Sgt. Van Winkle boldly spearheaded a determined attack through withering fire against hostile frontal positions and, though he and all the others who charged with him were wounded, succeeded in enabling his platoon to gain the fire superiority and the opportunity to reorganize. Realizing that the left-flank squad was isolated from the rest of the unit, he rushed through 40 yards of fierce enemy fire to reunite his troops despite an elbow wound which rendered one of his arms totally useless. Severely wounded a second time when a direct hit in the chest from a hostile hand grenade caused serious and painful wounds, he staunchly refused evacuation and continued to shout orders and words of encouragement to his depleted and battered platoon. Finally carried from his position unconscious from

Continued on Page 6

Continued from Page 4

evacuated.

Declared the officials at Fort Riley: “You’ve just become a medic.”

It turned out to be a good call.

“He was just a person of service,” said Bleak’s granddaughter, Rose Beverly, of Richmond, Ky. “He was the kind of person, if you needed help, you called the right guy.”

By June 14, 1952 — Flag Day — Bleak had seen one fellow medic bleed to death because there was no one to attend to him. So when the call went out for a reconnaissance patrol to sneak behind enemy lines and capture a Chinese soldier for interrogation, Bleak joined 20 volunteers.

As they advanced upon Hill 499 in a northeastern area of Korea near Minari-gol, the Americans came under attack. Bleak attended to the wounded, only to find a trio of Chinese soldiers mowing down his comrades with automatic arms fire from the safety of a trench.

As a medic, Bleak carried no weapons other than a trench knife for cutting clothing away from wounds. But he lunged into that trench, breaking one Chinese soldier’s neck, killing the second by crushing his windpipe and dispatching the third with his trench knife. (His children say he was never without some kind of a knife again.)

As he returned to his fellow soldiers, a grenade bounced off a helmet and headed toward an American. Bleak shielded the man with his own body. Because it was a concussion rather than a fragmentation grenade, both men survived.

As the fighting continued, Bleak took a bullet in his left calf — leaving him with lifelong nerve pain. The medic lifted an incapacitated soldier over his shoulder and proceeded down Hill 499 — when two Chinese infantrymen approached him with fixed bayonets.

Bleak lowered the American he was carrying and charged the Chinese, grabbed each man’s head in one of his massive hands and smacked them together, killing both.

Here is one of life’s imponderables: Where did such a mix of physical courage, selflessness and empathy emerge?

“His blood was up,” said Bleak’s 61-year-old son Bruce Bleak, of Moore, Idaho. “It’s extraordinary, mind-boggling. He didn’t think he had done anything above and beyond. He was absolutely wrong about that.”

Although Bleak carried the wounded soldier to safety at the bottom of the hill and was seriously injured as well, he somehow failed to understand that all 20 of his fellow Americans — including as many as five wounded men — had returned alive.

“After he laid that man down, he turned around to go back,” recalled Lois Bleak. “It took five men to hold him down. ‘You have your own wound to take care of,’ they said.”

Final footnote: The squad managed to snatch a Chinese soldier.

“I remember that,” Bruce Bleak said. “They did succeed. I know that.”

From there, it was off to a Tokyo military hospital, where Bleak spent

a couple months. By the time of his release, the battlefield commendation — initially his superiors recommended him for a Bronze Star — had begun making its way up the chain of command as the details of his exploits were verified. Within a year, by presidential proclamation, he was awarded the Medal of Honor.

The citation read: “Sgt. Bleak’s dauntless courage and intrepid actions reflect utmost credit upon himself and are in keeping with the honored traditions of the military service.”

Bleak wrapped up his military service at about the same time the war ended with an uneasy armistice July 27, 1953.

“He’d done his part,” Bruce Bleak said. “There’s not much call for medics in peacetime.”

Three months later, Bleak joined six other Medal of Honor recipients at the White House. Not only did he tower above everyone, but the shy Idahoan looked as if he would have preferred being anywhere else.

But a smile came across his face as President Dwight Eisenhower whispered in his ear: “You’ve got a damned big neck.”

The president, a five-star general who never encountered a bullet fired in anger, seemed to marvel at these men: “As we assemble on such an occa-

sion, I think there are a number of thoughts that must cross our minds. One of the first and natural ones is that if you ever have to get in a fight, you would like to have these seven on your side.

“Certainly we view with almost incredulity the tales that we hear told in these citations. It seems impossible that human beings could stand up to the kind of punishment they received and deliver the kind of service they have.

“But I think the most predominating thought would be: Could we be so fortunate that this would be the last time such a group ever gathered together at the White House to receive the Medal of Honor, a battlefield decoration?

“Now of course, it is obvious that the future belongs to youth. In very special measure it belongs to these young men, because they have done so much. They must do more. Any man who wins the nation’s highest decoration is marked for leadership. And he must exert it.

“And now, instead of leading in battle, they must lead toward peace. They must make certain that no other young men follow them up to these steps to receive the Medal of Honor. That is the service that the United States would like finally to give to all seven

Continued on Page 6

Courtesy Bleak family

David Bleak’s uniform and Medal of Honor is pictured at the Idaho Military History Museum.

Archie van Winkle

Continued from Page 5

of you as their decoration.

“So, along with our gratitude, with our salute to great soldiers, our affection to you and to your families, goes also our hope that you will be instrumental in bringing about a situation where there will be no more Medals of Honor.”

Bleak would never be comfortable with the acclaim that accompanied the Medal of Honor and the citation. The way Bleak saw it, he was among a multitude of heroes — he just happened to be the one that was “caught” in the act.

“Everyone else was doing it,” said Lois. “He just happened to be seen. He didn’t consider what he was doing was above and beyond. He always played down what he did. Then he’s surprised when it’s noticed.”

It is a tribute to Bleak, the Washington Post observed he “kept mum about his combat record and turned down jobs offered to him by those wanting to do a favor for a war hero.”

He departed eastern Idaho for Dubois, Wyo., about 88 miles east of Jackson where he worked as a rancher and a grocery store meat cutter and truck driver.

“He wanted to go where nobody knew him,” said Bleak’s daughter, Barbara Martin, 68, of Arco.

It was in Dubois where Bleak met Lois, who lived in Idaho Falls but was visiting her parents. The couple married in 1960, returned to eastern Idaho and raised four children. After working at a potato processing plant in Shelley, Bleak joined what is now Idaho National Laboratory and moved the family to Moore, outside Arco, in the mid-1960s, where they operated a 45-head dairy farm. Bleak could not outrun his legend. As a Medal of Honor recipient, he accepted a standing invitation to attend the inaugurations of Presidents John F. Kennedy in 1961 and Richard Nixon in 1969.

He traveled to conventions of fellow Medal of Honor recipients. Bleak had the rare distinction of having a building named in his honor, the Sgt. David B. Bleak Troop Medical Clinic at Fort Sill, Okla., in 1995. It was the first time in a century that any government building had been named for a living American, an act that required approval from the secretary of the Army.

But at home, the Bleaks kept as much of this as possible under wraps.

Occasionally, a colleague corralled the shy Bleak to address a group of

MEDAL OF HONOR RECIPIENTS

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shock and from loss of blood, Staff Sgt. Van Winkle served to inspire all who observed him to heroic efforts in successfully repulsing the enemy attack. His superb leadership, valiant fighting spirit, and unfaltering devotion to duty in the face of heavy odds reflect the highest credit upon himself and the U.S. Naval Service.”

Award presented by President Harry Truman, Feb. 6, 1951, at the White House.

Benjamin F. Wilson

Rank: master sergeant (rank at the time of action; later promoted to 1st lieutenant)

Branch: Army

Credited to: Vashon, Wash.

Born: June 2, 1922

Died: March 1, 1988

Buried : National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (Punchbowl), Honolulu, Hawaii

Action date: June 5, 1951

Location: Near Hwach’on-myon, Korea

Citation:

“First Lt. Wilson distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and indomitable courage above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. Company I was committed to attack and secure commanding terrain stubbornly defended by a numerically superior hostile force emplaced in well-fortified positions. When the spearheading element was pinned down by withering hostile fire, he dashed forward and, firing his rifle and throwing grenades, neutralized

Boy Scouts in the early 1970s. He described American citizenship as a two-way street — rights came with responsibilities, something he called “a contract with America.” And Bleak had no patience with “a few loudvoiced extremists who are working toward its overthrow.”

That may well have been the longest public speech Bleak ever delivered. Most of the time, he kept it to a line or two.

“He hated the attention. He was very humble,” said Bruce Bleak.

By no means was David Bleak unique in his modesty. An entire generation of veterans kept their war stories locked up and went about their lives in the decades after World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

Maybe it was survivor’s guilt. Of the 146 Americans who received the Medal of Honor in Korea, 103 were honored posthumously. Nor was Bleak immune to post-traumatic stress. His family said it manifested in a “thousand-yard stare.”

“He said he lived it once,” Barbara Martin said. “It never goes away. A Medal of Honor recipient either pays all at once or throughout the course of his life.”

When Bleak died at the age of 74

at Denver, Colo.

in March 2006, his family donated the Medal of Honor and Bleak’s other commendations to the Idaho Military History Museum at Boise, where they are on display.

“He said that it belonged to the people of Idaho,” Bruce Bleak said.

Even among the people who lived among them, the story remained murky.

Angela Keller, a 63-year-old retired certified medical assistant, was living nearby on the family farm when the Bleaks moved to Moore.

As a child, she had an inkling that Bleak was a veteran when he said a few words at a Memorial Day breakfast.

In high school, Keller got the sense that Bleak had received a Purple Heart or some other commendation.

Only after he had died and Keller had moved away from Moore to Idaho Falls had the internet and social media more fully spread the incredible tale of David Bleak.

“I felt honored that I even knew this guy,” Keller said. “He was just cooler than I ever thought. It didn’t make him better because he was already just a good guy. Then you find out that he was a great man who did great things. And I got to know him.”

the position denying the advance, and killed four enemy soldiers manning submachine guns. After the assault platoon moved up, occupied the position, and a base of fire was established, he led a bayonet attack which reduced the objective and killed approximately 27 hostile soldiers. While friendly forces were consolidating the newly won gain, the enemy launched a counterattack and 1st Lt. Wilson, realizing the imminent threat of being overrun, made a determined lone-man charge, killing seven and wounding two of the enemy, and routing the remainder in disorder. After the position was organized, he led an assault carrying to approximately 15 yards of the final objective, when enemy fire halted the advance. He ordered the platoon to withdraw and, although painfully wounded in this action, remained to provide covering fire. During an ensuing counterattack, the commanding officer and 1st Platoon leader became casualties. Unhesitatingly, 1st Lt. Wilson charged the enemy ranks and fought valiantly, killing three enemy soldiers with his rifle before it was wrested from his hands, and annihilating four others with his entrenching tool. His courageous delaying action enabled his comrades to reorganize and effect an orderly withdrawal. While directing evacuation of the wounded, he suffered a second wound, but elected to remain on the position until assured that all of the men had reached safety. 1st Lt. Wilson’s sustained valor and intrepid actions reflect utmost credit upon himself and uphold the honored traditions of the military service.”

Awarded Sept. 7, 1954, by President Dwight Eisenhower at the Army hospital

>> IDAHO

David Bruce Bleak

Rank: sergeant

Branch: Army

Credited to: Shelley, Idaho/Vashon, Wash.

Born: Feb. 27, 1932

Died: March 26, 2006

Buried: Lost River Cemetery, cremated, no burial

Action date: June 14, 1952

Location: Minari-gol, Korea

companion and, quickly shifting his position, shielded the man from the impact of the blast. Later, while ministering to the wounded, he was struck by a hostile bullet but, despite the wound, he undertook to evacuate a wounded comrade. As he moved down the hill with his heavy burden, he was attacked by two enemy soldiers with fixed bayonets. Closing with the aggressors, he grabbed them and smacked their heads together, then carried his helpless comrade down the hill to safety. Sgt. Bleak’s dauntless courage and intrepid actions reflect utmost credit upon himself and are in keeping with the honored traditions of the military service.”

Citation:

“Sgt. Bleak, a member of the medical company, distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and indomitable courage above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. As a medical aidman, he volunteered to accompany a reconnaissance patrol committed to engage the enemy and capture a prisoner for interrogation. Forging up the rugged slope of the key terrain, the group was subjected to intense automatic-weapons and small-arms fire and suffered several casualties. After administering to the wounded, he continued to advance with the patrol. Nearing the military crest of the hill, while attempting to cross the fire-swept area to attend the wounded, he came under hostile fire from a small group of the enemy concealed in a trench. Entering the trench he closed with the enemy, killed two with bare hands and a third with his trench knife. Moving from the emplacement, he saw a concussion grenade fall in front of a

Awarded: Oct. 27, 1953, by President Dwight Eisenhower at the White House.

James E. Johnson

Rank: sergeant

Branch: Marines

Credited to: Washington, D.C.; born Pocatello, Idaho

Born: Jan. 1, 1926

Died: Nov. 2, 1953

Buried: Wall of the missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (Punchbowl), Honolulu, Hawaii, and a marker (“In memory”) at Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery

Action date: Dec. 2, 1950

Location: Yudam-ni, Korea

Citation:

“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a squad leader in a provisional rifle

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David Bleak

Benjamin Wilson

James Johnson

MEDAL OF HONOR RECIPIENTS

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platoon composed of artillerymen and attached to Company J, in action against enemy aggressor forces. Vastly outnumbered by a well-entrenched and cleverly concealed enemy force wearing the uniforms of friendly troops and attacking his platoon’s open and unconcealed positions, Sgt. Johnson unhesitatingly took charge of his platoon in the absence of the leader and, exhibiting great personal valor in the face of a heavy barrage of hostile fire, coolly proceeded to move about among his men, shouting words of encouragement and inspiration and skillfully directing their fire. Ordered to displace his platoon during the firefight, he immediately placed himself in an extremely hazardous position from which he could provide covering fire for his men. Fully aware that his voluntary action meant either certain death or capture to himself, he courageously continued to provide effective cover for his men and was last observed in a wounded condition single-handedly engaging enemy troops in close hand-grenade and hand-to-hand fighting. By his valiant and inspiring leadership, Sgt. Johnson was directly responsible for the successful completion of the platoon’s displacement and the saving of many lives. His dauntless fighting spirit and unfaltering devotion to duty in the face of terrific odds reflect the highest credit upon himself and the U.S. Naval Service.”

Awarded March 29, 1954, by Secretary of the Navy Robert B. Anderson to his widow.

Herbert A. Littleton

Rank: private first class

Branch: Marines

Credited to: Nampa, Idaho

Born: July 1, 1930

Died: April 22, 1951

Buried: Kohler Lawn Cemetery, Nampa

Action date: April 22, 1951

Location: Chungchon, Korea

his body. By his prompt action and heroic spirit of self-sacrifice, he saved the other members of his team from serious injury or death and enabled them to carry on the vital mission which culminated in the repulse of the hostile attack. His indomitable valor in the face of almost certain death reflects the highest credit upon PFC Littleton and the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.”

Awarded Aug. 19, 1952, by Col. Ernest W. Fry to his parents.

Reginald Rodney Myers

Rank: major (highest rank: colonel).

Branch: Marines

Credited to Boise, Ada County, Idaho

Born: Nov. 26, 1919

Died: Oct. 23, 2005

Buried: Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery

Action Date: Nov. 29, 1950 Location: Near Hagaru-ri, Korea

Dan D. Schoonover

Rank: corporal

Branch: Army

Credited to: Boise

Born: Oct. 8, 1933

Died: July 10, 1953

Buried: National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (Punchbowl) Wall of the Missing at Honolulu, Hawaii, and Morris Hill Cemetery, Boise

Action date: July 8, 1953

Location: Pork Chop Hill, near Sokkogae

Citation:

Citation:

“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a radio operator with an artillery forward observation team of Company C, in action against enemy aggressor forces. Standing watch when a well-concealed and numerically superior enemy force launched a violent night attack from nearby positions against his company, PFC Littleton quickly alerted the forward observation team and immediately moved into an advantageous position to assist in calling down artillery fire on the hostile force. When an enemy hand grenade was thrown into his vantage point shortly after the arrival of the remainder of the team, he unhesitatingly hurled himself on the deadly missile, absorbing its full, shattering impact in

Citation:

“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty as executive officer of the 3d Battalion, in action against enemy aggressor forces. Assuming command of a composite unit of Army and Marine service and headquarters elements totaling approximately 250 men, during a critical stage in the vital defense of the strategically important military base at Hagaru-ri, Maj. Myers immediately initiated a determined and aggressive counterattack against a well-entrenched and cleverly concealed enemy force numbering an estimated 4,000. Severely handicapped by a lack of trained personnel and experienced leaders in his valiant efforts to regain maximum ground prior to daylight, he persisted in constantly exposing himself to intense, accurate and sustained hostile fire in order to direct and supervise the employment of his men and to encourage and spur them on in pressing the attack.

Inexorably moving forward up the steep, snow-covered slope with his depleted group in the face of apparently insurmountable odds, he concurrently directed artillery and mortar fire with superb skill and although losing 170 of his men during 14 hours of raging combat in subzero temperature, continued to reorganize his unit and spearhead the attack which resulted in 600 enemy killed and 500 wounded. By his exceptional and valorous leadership throughout, Maj. Myers contributed directly to the success of his unit in restoring the perimeter.

His resolute spirit of self-sacrifice and unfaltering devotion to duty enhance and sustain the highest traditions of the U.S. Naval Service.”

Awarded Oct. 29, 1951, by President Harry Truman at the White House.

“Cpl. Schoonover distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and outstanding courage above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. He was in charge of an engineer demolition squad attached to an infantry company which was committed to dislodge the enemy from a vital hill. Realizing that the heavy fighting and intense enemy fire made it impossible to carry out his mission, he voluntarily employed his unit as a rifle squad and, forging up the steep barren slope, participated in the assault on hostile positions. When an artillery round exploded on the roof of an enemy bunker, he courageously ran forward and leaped into the position, killing one hostile infantryman and taking another pris-

oner. Later in the action, when friendly forces were pinned down by vicious fire from another enemy bunker, he dashed through the hail of fire, hurled grenades in the nearest aperture, then ran to the doorway and emptied his pistol, killing the remainder of the enemy. His brave action neutralized the position and enabled friendly troops to continue their advance to the crest of the hill. When the enemy counterattacked he constantly exposed himself to the heavy bombardment to direct the fire of his men and to call in an effective artillery barrage on hostile forces. Although the company was relieved early the following morning, he voluntarily remained in the area, manned a machine gun for several hours, and subsequently joined another assault on enemy emplacements. When last seen he was operating an automatic rifle with devastating effect until mortally wounded by artillery fire. Cpl. Schoonover’s heroic leadership during two days of heavy fighting, superb personal bravery, and willing self-sacrifice inspired his comrades and saved many lives, reflecting lasting glory upon himself and upholding the honored traditions of the military service.”

Awarded Dec. 2, 1954, by Secretary of the Army Robert T. Stevens to his mother.

Dan Schoonover

Reginald Myers

Herbert Littleton

Sometimes it is that simple

By TREVAN PIXLEY FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Not everything has to be so superficial, especially when it comes to serving the country.

Glen Morgan, an 89-year-old Lewiston resident, served in the U.S. Navy from 1952-56.

Following his high school graduation, Morgan spent one year at Westminster College in Salt Lake City before deciding to enlist in the military.

Morgan was convinced to join the service following his older brother’s decision to do so earlier that same year. This wasn’t the first of the Morgan clan to enlist in the military, not by a long shot.

Glen grew up in a small farmhouse outside of Malad, Idaho, and was the youngest of 12 siblings. Seven of the Morgan bunch had spent time in the military, so it was only right for Glen to do the same.

The Morgan septet is a pretty decorated bunch as far as experience and accomplishments go, collecting a Purple Heart, jumping out of airplanes, and having endless stories to tell at family functions.

That’s really all it’s ever been about for Glen — making sure to do as his family did while going on his own unique journey.

After completing boot camp in 1952, Morgan attended radio school. While in school, he learned ways to relay messages to his shipmates, mainly using techniques such as Morse code. Morgan is still familiar with how to use it to this day, despite his age.

Morgan became proficient enough in these skills to rank as high as petty officer first class during his four-year stint in the Navy.

After Morgan wrapped up his contract with the U.S. Navy, he decided it was time to return home, stating that he “did his time.”

Once back, he attended the Uni-

versity of Idaho, where he’d get his degree in education, a decision that was once again influenced by family.

The Lewiston School District offered the UI graduate a spot on its staff, a place he would retire from as superintendent.

While in the education field, Morgan met his wife, Delores, a retired elementary school teacher.

Throughout the couple’s many years of marriage, Delores has been the one to keep Glen’s memory of the service alive.

One night, in an effort to “save some space,” Delores caught Glen trying to dispose of his military uniform.

This move infuriated Delores, who, like many others with loved ones in the service, couldn’t fathom why he wouldn’t want a memento from his Navy days.

So, in an attempt to save closet space, and instead occupy wall space, Delores decided to make a quilt and frame it.

This quilt displays several photos and patches of Morgan’s accomplishments throughout his years of service.

This includes photos of Morgan on his first day of radio school in 1952, all the locations he’s been, as well as the ships he’s spent time on.

This physical representation of Morgan’s life in the military has helped him recall a time that is now a bit hazy for the man, who had a stroke not too long ago.

For example, when Morgan took a look at the quilt, the first thing he talked about was his time in Adak, Alaska, in 1958.

While in Alaska, they sent Morgan to the farthest island,

Uniform pieces sit in a frame at Glen Morgan’s home. After the service, Morgan went into education, completing his career as superintendent of the Lewiston School District.

August Frank for The Forgotten War

August Frank/for The Forgotten War

where he was one of just 14 people working on the ship.

As for his station, he was one of three. And there were several advantages to working with such a small group.

“We had an open kitchen,” Morgan said. “We could go up there and eat anytime we wanted.”

It was truly the little things that made the military enjoyable for Morgan. And when it comes down to it, while he doesn’t glamorize his experience, or give himself much credit, if he could go back and do it all over, he would.

“I’d do it again,” Morgan said. “It was just the thing to do in our family.”

Pixley can be reached at tpixley@lmtribune.com.

Glen Morgan served his country because it’s what his family did

Glen Morgan points out various patches on a quilt at his home in Lewiston commemorating his time served during the Korean War.

Living, remembering a piece of history

By KAYLEE BREWSTER FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Dick Riggs was always interested in history.

Then he got to live some of it while serving in Korea after the war had ended. After that he taught history as an educator and when he retired in 1992 in Lewiston, he started preserving some of that history, including his time in Korea. Now at 90 years old, that history — local, national and world — is still being taught by Riggs.

In that time, Riggs said the “draft was very much alive” so he was commissioned into the Army and also was in the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps at the University of Idaho. He was in the Army for two years and in the reserves for six years for a total eight-year commitment.

“You’re just assigned wherever the Army sends you,” he said.

Although Riggs didn’t serve during the Korean War, some of his classmates in 1951 did. The National Guard in Lewiston sent 100 men to Korea and graduates received their diplomas three weeks early before they deployed.

“Every male was in the military unless they had deferments,” Riggs said.

Later, Riggs was commissioned as a lieutenant and served in Korea for 16 months from 1956-57. The war had ended in 1953 in a truce and Riggs was sent with the United Nations Command Military Armistice Commission, which was making sure the rules of the armistice were being enforced. One of the rules of the armistice was monitoring military equipment so the UNCMAC would see if equipment, like tanks, met the guidelines of the requirements. The agreement also included the establishment of the demilitarized zone, also known as the DMZ, between the borders of North and South Korea.

In one of his books, “Remember When,” Riggs writes about his experience in Korea. He writes about his first impression of arriving in Korea in January 1956 and recalling the “desolate” place. He remembers seeing old men walking along the road with a load of supplies strapped to their backs. In his time in Korea, he was stationed at Munsan-ni, Seoul, Panmunjom and Yong Dong Po.

In Munsan-ni, he was the base supply officer and special services officer who was responsible for ordering and distributing things like uniforms, bedding, barracks, furniture, tents and vehicles for around 300 troops, he wrote in his book.

Riggs also wrote about serving as an escort officer in Seoul and escorted South Korea’s President Syngman Rhee; Army Chief of Staff General Maxwell Taylor; and Gen. L.L. Lemnitzer, the far east station commander in Tokyo.

Even though he was there a few years after the war, Seoul had a lot of rubble and destruction.

“Seoul was a beat up city,” Riggs said. “You could tell there had been a war.”

However, a lot has changed since then and Seoul has had decades to be built up and even hosted the Olympics in 2018. Riggs enjoyed seeing the city on TV while watching the Olympics, even though if he went back he wouldn’t recognize it.

“Now it’s a big, beautiful, modern city,” he said.

In his book, Riggs also recalls his time in Yong Dong Po, which was 10-15 miles from Seoul. He was stationed at a railway security company because Koreans were jumping on the trains and stealing supplies.

Riggs writes about one event that reminded him of a movie scene. A sergeant from Spirit Lake, Idaho, shot three or four thieves to stop them from robbing the train. The man, Sgt. Wilson, later was decorated for the action.

Panmunjom was right at the border between North and South Korea, near the DMZ.

“You could stand and look into North Korea and there a few feet away would be the North Korea military,” Riggs said.

“Every once in a while there’d be a little ruckus there,” Riggs said about

serving so close to the border.

During his service in Korea, because he was on commission with the UI, Riggs met and saw several others from the university and Idaho while he was there. When he was on leave he would fly to Japan. In Tokyo, he wrote about riding “tiny taxis, which the drivers drove very fast like a fire truck going to a fire.” He shopped in a place called Ginza, where he purchased a pair of binoculars for $10 that he still owns. The pay was $250 a month, but it was plenty to live on because he didn’t have to cover room and board.

Riggs was released from active duty on Sept. 2, 1957, and spent six more years in the inactive reserves and would have been recalled if there was a national emergency.

In his books, Riggs calls the ex-

perience in the Army a wonderful opportunity and was thankful he was able to serve, even if he didn’t realize it at the time.

“The terms ‘duty and country’ might sound a little corny to some, but to me and most people, I’m sure it has meaning,” he wrote.

The experience of meeting interesting people and being in interesting places helped him mature and broadened his outlook.

“I am glad I wasn’t home starting my teaching career because I feel my Army experiences helped me when I did start my civilian profession,” Riggs wrote. “Most men my age served in the military, but I know a few who for some reason didn’t. I

Continued on Page 10

Local educator, historian served in Korea and later wrote about his time there

August Frank/for The Forgotten War Lewiston’s Dick Riggs sits for a photo at his home next to photos and a Korean defense service medal he received.

Packages proved a gift to sender, receiver

Senes Orton’s son, Duane, recalls stories of the joy mailings brought for all

By ERIC BARKER FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Senes Orton didn’t meet his son until the youngster was 6 months old.

The U.S. Army soldier was home on leave from the Korean War for Christmas, the first time he laid eyes on his baby boy, Duane Orton.

Duane doesn’t remember it of course. Nor does he recall his family sending care packages to his dad, or gathering together to read the letters his father sent home.

But he can envision those scenes, a vital part of families supporting their loved ones stationed overseas, based on ones he would later witness involving his uncle Larry who served in Vietnam.

“We’d all go over to my grandparents house when Larry’s letter would arrive and sit around and my mom or somebody would read the letter out loud. We’d look at his photographs.”

Care packages were a big deal for both the recipient and the sender. It was a way to stay connected.

“You can imagine how happy you’d be to get something, you know, letters from home, maybe some photographs,” said Duane. “Probably a pretty big deal, because I don’t think my mom had been married for a long one when he went over.”

His uncle Larry would ask for things like socks and the family would gather them and other niceties, put them in a box and then use popcorn as packing material. Duane wondered why they used an edible void filler.

It turns out the practice, which became a family tradition, started with his father. Duane isn’t sure why his family used popcorn as packing “peanuts” that first time, but it ended up being a big hit in a roundabout way. Senes loved the things sent to him, but he saw the popcorn for what it was — a space filler.

“He was going to throw it out. But evidently, they had these little kids that would work in their shop, or clean their bunks, or whatever. And so he said that they loved that

Continued from Page 9

always feel sorry for them because I know what they missed. I am still very interested in the Army and always enjoy talking with young soldiers I see in places like airports.”

Later, Riggs received a Korea Defense Service Medal for his service that is given to those who served

popcorn, so they made sure that they filled up every box they sent to him.”

Senes Orton stopped going to school in the eighth grade and opted for a different kind of learning.

“He hung out at a body shop. And these guys, after a while, just put him to work. And then he quit school. And he did that the rest of his life — body and paint,” said Duane, of Lewiston.

It isn’t clear if Senes was drafted or joined the Army on his own, but he shipped out to Korea in 1953. On his way there, the ship he was on needed a small repair and leaders asked if there was a welder among the ranks. Senes volunteered and made the fix.

“Because of that, they gave him a pass so that he could go to the front of the line every time they’d eat,” Duane said. “He thought that was a big deal; he thought that was pretty cool.”

In Korea, his experience in the autobody shop and his natural talent at

at least 30 consecutive days in the South Korean theater after July 28, 1954. When he returned from his service, he was an educator for 34 years in Lewiston, Seattle, Anatone, Riggins, Craigmont and Rosalia, working in administrative roles and teaching history. That love of history also led him to write 10 books about local history. As a history teacher,

working with his hands landed him an assignment to the motorpool. Duane doesn’t know if his dad saw action. Later in his life, he rarely shared stories of his time in Korea.

“There were, you know, goofy stories like guard duty and guarding some trains and then at the shop, somebody got a hold of an old tank and they brought it in and they cut it all down and made kind of like a dune buggy out of it. And they’d drive that around. He told that story, but that’s pretty much it. He didn’t really talk about it (the war) much.”

Duane knows his dad achieved marksman certification during training. Before he stopped going to school, Duane said his father often skipped class and went hunting instead. Pursuing game remained a favorite pastime throughout his life and served as a vehicle for father and son to bond.

he at times taught students about the war and was known for telling stories of “when I was in Korea.”

The Korean War is often referred to as “the forgotten war,” a description he agrees with. “I’d say it’s sort of forgotten how many American boys died.”

He said that World War II is well-remembered but then people

Duane said he learned a lot from his dad, most importantly how to work.

“If nothing else, I have my work ethic because he was a hardworking guy. My mom and her side of the family were good people, but they were not real energetic. But he wasn’t like that at all. It was always nose down.”

Senes would often buy wrecked cars to fix up and sell.

“He’d come home, crash for just a few minutes, and go out into the garage and then work until late in the evening. And that’s pretty much how his days went.”

Senes died of a heart attack in 2009 at the age of 78.

Barker may be contacted at ebarker@ lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2273. Follow him on Twitter @ezebarker.

jump to the Vietnam War because of all the political controversy. The Korean War in the middle of those two wars gets forgotten. However, telling his own story and writing it in books helps those people and the conflict to be remembered.

Brewster may be contacted at kbrewster@ lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2297.

Courtesy Orton family

From left are Paul Orton, Senes Orton, and Duane Orton are pictured. Senes Orton, who died of a heart attack in 2009 at the age of 78, was serving in the Korean War when Duane was born.

Former Navy Seabee ‘had a pretty good time’

Jim Haines’ farming background served him well as he built infrastructure for American forces

By MATT BANEY FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Jim Haines has met fellow Korean War veterans who endured combat, capture and even torture. But that wasn’t his experience.

“I look back and I had a pretty good time,” said the 93-year-old Haines, a retired farmer who lives west of Clarkston.

Haines enlisted in the U.S. Naval Construction Battalions, better known as the Navy Seabees, during the war. He ran various pieces of heavy equipment while stationed in Guam, Korea and Japan. His primary task was to help build concrete “warmup barriers” which allowed jet airplanes, being used in warfare for the first time, to warm up their engines without melting the asphalt runways.

So Haines never saw combat. About the closest he came was seeing the campfires of Chinese soldiers in the hills at night and, at the end of the war, watching North Korean soldiers who were freed from captivity walking back toward their homes in the north.

Haines enlisted in the Navy in 1951 after washing out of school at the University of Idaho.

He ended up in the Seabees thanks in part to his rural upbringing in the Colfax area. He learned how to run a variety of equipment while working on the family farm, and those skills earned high scores on aptitude tests, keeping him in the infrastructure business rather than the fighting business.

Haines did his training at Port Hueneme near Los Angeles. The farm boy was struck by how different his upbringing was than that of his compatriots from urban areas.

“These guys — I couldn’t believe it — had never shot a gun, had never drove a truck. I couldn’t believe it. Where had these guys been? That’s all I ever did when I was a kid. We were always hunting with my dad.”

Haines’ first deployment was to Guam in the South Pacific, where he spent 22 months. He helped build warmup barriers and, one evening, memorably used a crane to pluck the wrecked car of a base captain off the edge of a canyon. He also played football for his base team and had his own pickup truck he used to drive around.

Haines was next sent to Korea during the last year of the war. He marveled at a steady stream of jet planes landing, refueling and reloading — all without shutting off their engines — then soaring away for another bombing run before returning in just 20 minutes or so.

After the war concluded, Haines was sent to Japan where the Seabees constructed more warmup barriers at two bases. He spent a year there, which included a sobering visit to

Hiroshima, which was still “devastated” about eight years after it was leveled by an atomic bomb at the end of World War II.

“On a walkway, I saw a figure of a man in the cement — it burnt the cement,” he said

After his time in Japan, Haines had the option of reenlisting in the Navy, but he couldn’t resist the pull of the family farm in Colfax. His grandfather, who had homesteaded the land, had died, and his father, M.L. Haines, was running the Diamond Shop in Lewiston,

which he started in the 1920s.

Jim Haines never got into his family’s jewelry business. Instead, he put in decades as a farmer, growing wheat, peas and barley on his plot of Palouse land, which increased to 900 acres. He also raised cattle during the latter half of his career.

He “never made any money farming,” but did well selling off some of his land. He still owns 400 acres, which is farmed by the Fulfs brothers, whom Haines has known since they were children.

He now lives alone on land he

August Frank/for The Forgotten War ABOVE: Jim Haines holds an article about the Seabees, from the Navy publication from the 1950s that included a picture of him running a bulldozer. Haines was a Seabee in the Korean War.

Courtesy Jim Haines LEFT: Haines (foreground) stands with a fellow Navy Seabee, Chuck Minerd, next to a bulldozer in Korea during the war.

bought near Chief Timothy Park, where he spends his time tinkering as a “jack-of-all-trades, master of none.”

When he thinks of his Korean War experiences, only fond memories come to mind.

“I never was anywhere where I felt like I was in trouble. If they tried (to send him into battle), I always think I could’ve lied my way out of it.”

Baney may be contacted at mbaney@ lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2262.

Letters from a soldier writer

By STEPHAN WIEBE FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Day after endless day, the “clickety clack” of his teletype machine became a familiar sound for Army Pfc. Bill Cameron.

It could be a bit monotonous at times, but it was better than hearing the bomb blasts that, for three years in the early 1950s, obliterated much of the infrastructure in Korea.

Cameron’s task as a teletype operator in the Signal Corps was to send military messages between U.S. Army companies on the South Korea side of the war-torn peninsula.

Click, clack, click, clack until every important and urgent message had been delivered for the day.

That’s when Cameron would exchange his teletype equipment for a different writing instrument — a pen and paper.

And the Lewiston man, born in Bonners Ferry, Idaho, would write a letter.

Every single day, without fail, Cameron wrote a letter to his fiancee, Carole McIntire — now Carole Ruark — back in Lewiston.

Cameron wasn’t always at his teletype machine. Sometimes he’d grab his rifle and head out to the battlefield to string communication wire, or on his days off he might visit a train station or local temple in safe parts of Seoul, the capital city.

But whether he was typing that day or not, the 21-year-old soldier always had his pen and paper ready to write a letter back home.

“Every day — I wrote him every day, and he wrote me every day,” Ruark, 88, said from her Lewiston home.

“Sometimes his letters didn’t come. Maybe I’d get two or three at a time.”

Those times that Ruark wouldn’t get a letter for a few days always filled her with dread, but it made it that much more special when she’d get three or four letters at a time.

Ruark was 16 when she and Cameron got engaged, just a few months before he left his job as a lumber mill worker in Kamiah and was shipped off to basic training in Georgia, then back across the Pacific Ocean to Korea, where he was stationed from 1951 to ’53.

It was a hard time for the young lovers, but the letters made it easier for them both.

Ruark would tell Cameron about what she was doing in school and a lot about her family, which was extremely close to Cameron. (They met each other through her uncle, who was friends with the younger Cameron).

And Cameron would write to her about his daily duties and goings on, and rarely about the atrocities of the war.

That’s not to say that the teletype operator was never in harm’s way.

One time, while laying out communication lines between bases, Cameron’s group was surrounded by enemy troops and forced to hide for several days until they could be res-

Continued on Page 13

During his time in the Army, Bill Cameron wrote a letter every day to his fiancee back home in Lewiston

Courtesy the Cameron family

Bill Cameron is pictured outside the building where he worked in Seoul, Korea, during his time in the service as a teletype operator.

Continued from Page 12

cued.

Although this was a story he shared with Ruark in a letter, he didn’t go into detail about the perils.

“My grandpa was the type where he would’ve sugar-coated it so she wouldn’t have to worry,” said Sara Cameron, granddaughter of Bill Cameron and Ruark.

On one occasion, Ruark forgot to put a stamp on her letter, but she was saved by the mail carrier.

“The postman actually knocked on the door and my mom went to the door and he said, ‘I’m pretty sure she wants this letter to go out’ … so my mom put a stamp on it,” Ruark said.

The time in the war was not easy for Cameron. Mostly, though, it was long.

The couple had only one phone call in two years, made easier by the frequent letters.

Cameron’s military mates did at one point spoil him with a surprise meetup with his brother, Don, who was in the Air Force at the time.

And Cameron did get one week of R&R — rest and recuperation — when he and some fellow soldiers

went to Japan, and Cameron sent back home a set of China and a kimono to Ruark.

Ruark in turn sent him a copy of her senior picture, which he cherished.

While the contents of their letters varied from day to day, one sentence was always present and usually showed up over and over again on the handwritten pages.

“A lot of it was ‘I love you, I love you, I love you,’ ” Ruark said. “That took up quite a bit of space; how lonesome we were.”

The end of those two years couldn’t come soon enough for Cameron and Ruark. When he did finally arrive back in Lewiston on March 13, 1953, the betrothed decided they couldn’t wait to get married.

Cameron and Ruark were married just two weeks later on March 27, with Ruark’s parents as witnesses.

The mail carrier who had delivered Ruark’s letters every day noticed when the letters stopped, so one day he came by to ask if Cameron had come home and the two had married.

He was right.

“When (Cameron) discharged and

came home and there were no more letters, the mailman stopped mom one time out on the porch and he said, ‘Did they get married? Did the guy come home or anything?’ ’cause no more letters. He was paying attention.”

The couple went on to have two sons, Greg and Kevin.

Cameron was just 56 years old when he died of a brain aneurysm in 1986.

In those two-plus decades after returning from Korea, Cameron didn’t talk much about the war.

“When he came home, as far as he was concerned, it was over,” Ruark said.

Instead, Cameron put everything into his family.

He was very protective of Ruark, Sara Cameron said, and he was very close with her parents. He would often go fishing and camping with his “best friend” — Ruark’s dad, Lester McIntire.

And he never missed one of his sons’ football, baseball or basketball games.

After returning from Korea, Cameron got a job at a lumber mill in Potlatch, working many different roles there over the years until his death.

“He loved lumber,” Ruark said. “He loved working with the woods.”

Cameron was a man who lived in the present and looked to the future — not back.

When he got home from the war, he and Ruark had a bonfire and they burned all the hundreds of letters they had sent — something Ruark came to regret.

In a sense, it was symbolic of the Korean War’s nickname in this country: the “Forgotten War.”

Even back then, it’s not one that was talked about much compared to the wars before and after it — World War II and the Vietnam War.

“They call it the ‘Forgotten War,’ and it really was,” Ruark said.

Wiebe can be reached at swiebe@lmtribune.com.

Courtesy the Cameron family

ABOVE: Cameron sits at a desk during his time in the service, with a picture of his fiancee, Carole, sitting on the counter next to him. RIGHT: Cameron and his teletype machine.

KOREA 1950-1953: THR FORGOTTEN WAR

From war, a life together was born

By TEREN KOWATSCH FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

War involves leaving things behind. Leaving behind your family, albeit temporarily, to go somewhere halfway around the world. Leaving a part of yourself in a foreign land. Leaving homes, brothers-in-arms and too many other things than can be accounted for.

For Nona and Roy Schuler, the Korean War resulted in them finding something; each other.

At the conclusion of the war, Roy was on his way home on a ship that carried other veterans on board. Roy lived in California where Nona’s brother, Tham, who also served, lived. Nona’s brother asked his fellow veterans who was from California, and Roy noted that he was.

Nona’s brother asked Roy to come to his house for several days and meet his family, where he and Nona met for the first time.

“At the time there were three sisters,” Nona said. “And when they found out he was coming they said, ‘Well, I wonder which one he’ll choose.’ And I guess you know who won — I did.”

Before Roy left to return to his family, he asked Nona if they could write letters to each other. They continued to exchange letters and talk on the phone until Valentine’s Day of 1954, when Roy proclaimed to Nona, “Let’s find a jewelry store.” Roy proposed that day. The engagement lasted years, and they wed Nov. 23, 1957.

The newlywed couple moved to Eureka, Calif., after the engagement where they made their home. Roy worked in local lumber and saw mills

for several years following. After a number of years, Roy decided he wanted to have another job and the couple made their trek to the Pacific Northwest, where Roy got a job at a smelter in Tacoma.

The smelting job eventually fell through, and Roy spent the rest of his time in the workforce driving a taxi cab in Fort Lewis, Wash.

“He drove that cab all over,” Nona said. “Picking people up, taking them places. But soon his health kind of declined a bit. And then one night, in ’87, he said, ‘My chest hurts real bad. I think I better go see the doctor.’ It was around midnight.”

Nona took Roy to the hospital. At 3:15 a.m., the doctor came out and informed Nona that Roy had died.

Nona went through some of the darkest days of her life following Roy’s death, but eventually put her life back together. A large part of her trying to fight through her own personal darkness was her faith and trying to be better for her and Roy’s four children: Steven James, Melvin Wayne, Lawrence Eugene and Pamela Tay. When Nona’s health started to deteriorate, she moved into the Idaho State Veterans Home in Lewiston, where she continues to reside today.

“The state of Idaho has been good to me,” Nona said. “It has been said that Idaho takes care of its own, and they do just that. I’ve seen it and I’ve experienced it and there’s no other place that I’d rather be than here.”

Nona’s relationship to Roy lasted 33 years. Through her marriage to Roy, Nona was able to see his kindness and love for his fellow man.

Roy, in Nona’s words, was a people

person. He loved helping people and putting smiles on their faces. That’s part of the reason he drove a cab. Throughout the entire time they spent together, Roy was satisfied with his life, with his family, and would do his best to (make) every day, especially holidays, special.”

“Christmastime was always special,” Nona said. “He’d say, ‘I’m satisfied with life now. I got three boys, and I’ve got my daughter.’ And that was it, the family was complete. And we’ve all managed to be together at times.”

Through those 33 years with his family, Roy never forgot his time serving. He would invite veterans from the local base to his house on Thanksgiving to share meals and festivities with him and his family.

“He would go out to the fort and bring in a soldier who was far from home,” Nona said. “And he’d share Thanksgiving dinner with us. He had a lot of good in him, but you wouldn’t want to monkey around with him. You best leave him alone. But he was good for what he did. Very good father and husband.”

Nona, who will be 90 years old in November, still retains many memories of Roy and their time together with their family. And though it’s almost impossible to capture two lifetimes in so many words, the one they shared apart and the one they shared together, Nona keeps a poem that she wrote for Roy when he died, one that ensures that the veteran, the husband, father and

the friend will never be forgotten:

“I, your father young many years ago,

“Told my Uncle Sam it was time for me to go.

“Seems there was a war in some strange land,

“Told Uncle Sam I’d go and give him a hand.

“I joined the army on the 17th of November,

“A day I shall all remember.

“Once in the army, I said ‘here I am.’

“Proud to be in uniform for my Uncle Sam.

“I trained hard and now I fight,

“For God and my country and for what I thought was right.

“I was sent to a strange land so very far away,

“And I knew that I’d come back home someday.

“I walked the hills of Korea called “no man’s land,”

“And there I would fight and take my stand.

“I fought in a forgotten war so many years ago,

“For the wind was so cold with ice and snow.

“Now I’m gone, never again to walk this proud land,

“Knowing I took my stand for God and man.

“And that I am not forgotten.”

Kowatsch can be reached at tkowatsch@lmtribune.com.

Nona Schuler remembers a good life with Korean War veteran Roy Schuler

August Frank/For The Forgotten War Nona Schuler talks about her late husband, Roy Schuler.

August Frank/For The Forgotten War Schuler reads a poem she wrote about her husband after his death.

The bitter cold was his strongest war memory

Clarkston’s Leo Cline drove armored vehicles as a corporal in Korea

By LAURA GUIDO FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Leo Cline was 21 years old and working at the Potlatch lumber mill when he was drafted into the U.S. Army National Guard.

Shortly after, he was sent to Korea where he served until the end of the war in 1953.

Today, the 92-year-old Clarkston resident mostly remembers the bitter cold from his time in what’s now known as the “Forgotten War.”

“I would crawl into bed with all my clothes on except my boots,” Cline said.

He served as a member of the Wyoming Army National Guard 300th Armored Field Artillery Battalion, known as the Cowboy Cannoneers. Cline and the other Cannoneers served in North Korea; in fact, they were the farthest north.

They had the furthest American battery north of the 38th parallel.

Cline, who grew up in Juliaetta and Genesee, served as a corporal during his time in the service. He drove an M7 Priest armored vehicle. Sometimes the local children, many of whom were orphans, would help unload the ammunition, Cline said.

He remembers sharing a small underground bunker with four or five other members of his unit — the memories of the bunker aren’t exactly fond memories.

“There was no heat and no windows,” he said. “It was just a hole dug in the ground and some bunks down there.”

Amid the tight quarters, however, he forged close friendships with the other men in his unit. His closest friend was named Kenneth, and they kept in touch until Kenneth’s death several years ago. He and the other members of the 300th battalion attended an annual reunion in Wyoming for decades after their service.

U.S. Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., read into the Congressional Record that the Cowboy Cannoneers met for their final battalion reunion on Oct. 1, 2010, which marked the 60th anniversary of their Korean War mobilization.

Cline considers himself “pretty lucky” during his time there.

He recalled one day in which he initially volunteered to go out on a ship to do some work that he wasn’t required to do. Then he changed his mind and decided to get off the ship. All of the men who had stayed aboard were captured. Luckily, the men were released shortly after.

As for his service, he didn’t think much about the United States’ role in the war.

“I was just doing my job,” he said. “... I wasn’t there because I wanted to be.”

He stayed in the service for two years, and returned to the region to again work for Potlatch, where he remained for around 42 years.

He now is retired and lives in Clarkston with his wife, Violeta.

Guido can be reached at lguido@lmtribune.com.

August Frank/For The Forgotten War

Leo Cline is pictured at his home in Clarkston. Cline spent two years in Korea as a member of the Wyoming National Guard.

Leo Cline

Courtesy Leo Cline

Photos (above and top) show Cline’s time in the Korean War.

The unknowing veteran

Ken McLaughlin reflects on time spent overseas during the ‘Forgotten War’

By EMILY PEARCE FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

When Ken McLaughlin was short on change, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. Little did he know that it would lead to a tour of Asia during the Korean War.

“I was honored and blessed to serve our country,” McLaughlin said. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but by going on active duty, I became a Korean veteran.”

For McLaughlin’s 17th birthday, he asked his mom if he could join the National Guard. Because he was a minor, he needed a guardian’s signature to enlist.

She agreed, and a little more than a week later, McLaughlin enlisted.

He was one of the last to sign up for the Korean War, enlisting Jan. 3, 1955, shortly after the armistice and before the end of the Korean G.I. bill.

After McLaughlin completed high school, he went with a unit to a tank range in the Boise desert, where he’d receive his first set of orders: peeling potatoes as the base’s cook.

McLaughlin moved to Pocatello after completing camp to study at Idaho State University. He had a change of heart while starting his second semester, and chose to leave college for the Marines.

“I was running low on funds and

Continued on Page 17

Ken McLaughlin is pictured behind several model aircraft at his home in Clarkston.

August Frank For The Forgotten War

Ken McLaughlin

Courtesy Ken McLaughlin

McLaughlin is pictured during his time serving in the Korean War.

70 years later, Kamiah man still has questions

By KATHY HEDBERG FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

KAMIAH — Like a lot of young men and women who answered the call to join the military during the Korean War, James Bruner stepped up to the plate, did his duty and came home alive.

But to this day Bruner, like so many others, remains ambivalent about why the U.S. was involved in that conflict in the first place.

“I have three brothers — all ex-military — and they talked me into going into the Navy,” Bruner, 90, recalled during a recent interview from his home in Kamiah. “So that’s what I did.

“At that time they were calling it a police action. I don’t know what they call it now. But nobody wants to go to war. And especially one like that, that’s an action that really didn’t belong to us. It was a problem between North Korea and South Korea and they should have handled it on their own, as far as I’m concerned.

“I don’t know why we were there, unless it’s the spread of communism at the time. There was a lot of politics involved in that one.”

Bruner had grown up in the Black Hills of South Dakota and joined the military reserves when he graduated from high school in 1950.

He worked as a civilian for a short time before receiving his draft notice. He went to boot camp in San Diego

Continued from Page 12

was approached by a Marine,” McLaughlin said. “He told me I could be able to retire in a year and I thought, ‘Well that doesn’t seem all too bad.’”

Training as an aviation electrician, McLaughlin left El Toro, a Marine Corps air station in California, for Barbers Point, Hawaii, in 1957.

The next day, when McLaughlin was flying from Barbers Point to Wake Island, an atoll halfway between Japan and Hawaii, chaos struck.

He can still remember the feeling he had when the cabin lights went out on the plane. The aircraft’s generators had gone offline and he was the only one on board who knew how to fix it. He joked on his second day of tour, he saved a plane from electrical failure.

McLaughlin and his fleet visited Iwakuni, Japan, where he ran into a friend from high school at a bar. It wasn’t a joyful reunion, McLaughlin said, because when he approached his friend, he had been crying.

“I asked him what was the matter, and he had lost his entire avionics shop because of an accident,” McLaughlin said. “Two U.S. aircrafts were in the air on a foggy day, and

and was assigned to radar school at Naval Station Treasure Island near San Francisco.

“After I graduated from radar school they assigned me to … USS Cymbal, a minesweeper,” he said, adding that all minesweepers were named after birds.

From there he was transferred to a troop ship in Japan for more training while the USS Cymbal did patrols along the coast of South Korea. When

both chose to come down to land. They unknowingly collided in midair — there were no survivors.”

McLaughlin finished his yearlong tour and moved back home to Idaho to study at the University of Idaho. He joked that he found girls and beer in Moscow.

He married his first wife, Marge McLaughlin, in 1959, and had his first child, Anne McLaughlin, in 1960.

McLaughlin said he wasn’t the best student, and dropped out of UI to serve another tour. He left for a 13-month tour in 1961, where he visited the Philippines, Japan and many coastal islands.

While in the Philippines, McLaughlin grew fond of the animals. He said he often saw boa constrictors, albatross birds, apes, monkeys and wild pigs in the tropical forest. He would sneak off with his buddies to eat pineapples and sweet rice. He added he’s never been able to taste a pineapple as good as when he was in the Philippines.

When McLaughlin finished his tour, he became an electrician for a telephone company in Seal Beach, Calif. He said the smog got to him and his family, so they moved back to northern Idaho in 1968.

Bruner’s ship returned he went aboard, only to realize a short time later that the peace treaty had been signed and hostilities ceased.

“So that left me just as a crewman for the USS Cymbal,” he said. “I was a radarman so radar has a lot to do with navigation of the ship. So wherever we went, I was part of that.

“The only time I was even near Korea was when they came back off the line (patrolling the coast) and the peace treaty was signed. Then they assigned us to offshore patrol on the tip of South Korea because they had a big prisoner camp on the shore. So we were assigned to go up and down the shore to make sure nobody came near that from the seaside to do anything, as far as prisoners go.”

Following the war, Bruner’s ship was assigned to various military exercises, hopping back and forth between Long Beach, Calif., and Hawaii.

“And I’m glad I didn’t have to go to war with that ship because we got blown out of the water three or four times by the submarine,” he said.

“So we were spending a lot of government money for nothing, as far as I was concerned.”

Eventually the crew was returned to Long Beach where the USS Cymbal was dry docked. Bruner stayed with the ship for a couple of more months cleaning up and then his time served was over and he returned home.

He spent his career working main-

ly selling parts for heavy machinery and eventually owned his own company. He and his wife, Pam, moved to Kamiah from Sacramento in 2005 and in 2010 Bruner retired.

Looking back, Bruner said he doesn’t have a lot of emotions about the conflict, other than the memory of a schoolmate “who went over there and he never came back.”

His reception from the public once he returned home from active duty was mostly unremarkable.

“It was nothing like Vietnam,” he said. “I didn’t get the Vietnam feeling from anybody. There was too much politics involved in all that junk.”

But Pam, Bruner’s wife, said her husband is a private man who tends to understate his role in the Korean War. She is a member of a quilting club that makes Quilts of Valor for retired veterans. The group, Pam said, doesn’t distinguish between how much combat a person has seen or what kind of job they filled. If they’ve answered the call to duty and served their country, she said, all veterans — like Bruner — are worthy of a quilt that says: “Thank you for your service.”

“There’s not much to tell, not any action at all,” Bruner said. “Well, I was a crewman assigned to a ship and filled a position. That’s all.”

Hedberg may be contacted at khedberg@lmtribune.com.

He lived on the Palouse, where he raised his five children and became a grandfather. McLaughlin is spending his retirement years in Lewiston,

Courtesy Ken McLaughlin McLaughlin, with an “A” above his head, is pictured with his company.

with his wife, Eileen McLaughlin. Pearce can be reached at epearce@dnews.com.

James Bruner did his duty, but he fails to understand this nation’s involvement in Korea

James Bruner

Letter describes intense moment of conflict

Lewiston’s Frank ‘Sully’ Sullivan wrote more than 50 letters about his experiences during the Korean War

By ELAINE WILLIAMS FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

An oversized helping of bullets that never stopped is how 1st Lt. Frank “Sully” Sullivan marked his 28th birthday serving in the Korean War.

Sullivan’s unfiltered account of March 12, 1951, is contained in a letter his son John Sullivan shared. It documents the intense vulnerability his dad experienced in the 105 mm Howitzer Battery, 3rd Infantry Division as he faced grave danger and grappled with the possibility he would never again see his wife and 2-year-old son.

The elder Sullivan wrote he “cried a little, and was up on line in 20 min — giving (the enemy) hell,” immediately after helping subdue an armed soldier who had gone “crazy,” and learning he had been assigned to immediately replace a fellow lieutenant, who had been killed in combat.

“I was sick and could not eat for 5 days,” wrote Sullivan, who had served in World War II where he was held as a prisoner of war after his plane was shot down.

“I stayed up all night for 4 days & nights and scared to death,” wrote Sullivan, a part of Army Reserves, 148th Engineering Battalion stationed in Lewiston.

“I saw medics carrying Lt. Ellingson off the hill and stopped and put my helmet over my heart until they passed me in the path up on line.”

The letter is one of about 50 that Frank Sullivan wrote to family members and others when he was in Korea, said John Sullivan, his youngest son, in an email.

John Sullivan has titled it “Sully’s Worst Birthday” and posted it on the website and social media channels of American Insurance, the company where Sully worked and eventually owned after his return from active duty.

The correspondence is in the possession of John Sullivan after his dad’s death in 2013. Now retired, John Sullivan is reading the letters from the Korean War and hundreds more his dad wrote and received, stumbling on some that were the most significant.

“This letter … revealed the pressures of war and the toll it takes on a soldier’s mind and emotions,” he said.

Written on American Red Cross stationery, Sully recognized what he was sharing was raw. He sent the letter not to his wife, but to his uncle, Harry W. Christy, who employed him as an agent at American Insurance and asked Christy not to share it.

BIRTHDAY MESSAGE

Here is the text of the letter Frank “Sully” Sullivan sent to his uncle from the front lines of the Korean War in 1951:

H.W.C.

Just for you to read. (He did not want his wife, Betty, to worry about him.)

Here is what happened on my Birthday.

A boy in the 6th Gun Ser — went crazy — shot up 13 rounds of carbine through a tent — did not kill anyone — I was first one there to help hold him down — took weapon away from him after another kid knocked him cold with his fist — while I was holding him down — trying to get things under control.

Then Btry C.O, Capt Jones, came running over and tapped me on the shoulder & said “Sully — quick, get in Jeep and go on (the) line. Lt Ellingson has just been killed with I-ten Co. (IX Corp) 7th Inf.” He was F.O. (forward observer) who took my place on line. He had just been back to rear to clean up and was killed ½ hr after going back on line.

John didn’t find it until after his dad died and never had a chance to ask his dad more about it.

Before Sully went into combat on his birthday, he likely prevented casualties of American soldiers from a threat within their own ranks.

“A boy in the 6th Gun Ser — went crazy — shot up 13 rounds of carbine through a tent — did not kill anyone — I was the first one there to help hold him down — took weapon away from him after another kid knocked him cold with his fist — while I was holding him down — trying to get things under control,” Sully wrote.

That danger had barely been contained when a commanding officer ordered Sully to get into a Jeep and go on the line to replace Ellingson who had died, he wrote.

“He was (a forward observer) who took my place on line,” Sully wrote. “He had just been back to rear to clean up and was killed ½ hr after going back on line.”

Forward observers, John said, would secretly crawl to an elevated front-line forward position on or behind enemy lines, observe enemy positions, calculate on a grid map enemy troop or supply locations and share them with headquarters to plan artillery attacks. They were frequently targets of snipers.

His dad served as a forward observer in Korea and as an assistant intelligence officer for the I Corps where he briefed officers on the front line. He remained in the Idaho National Guard, retiring as a lieutenant colonel in 1978.

Sully’s bravery in both wars was recognized by his superiors. He received two Purple Hearts, two Bronze Stars, two Presidential Citations and five Air Medals as well as a special POW medal in 1989.

Back in Lewiston, Sully lived a full life, developing a reputation for telling jokes, entertaining individuals with his harmonica and and sending people notes with clippings when they were mentioned in the newspaper.

He was owner and president of American Insurance until his retirement in 1996. In his spare time, he was involved in numerous civic groups such as the chamber of commerce, United Way and a number of Masonic groups.

“My dad was a bigger than life character (who) lived in interesting times that I find fascinating,” John said.

Williams may be contacted at ewilliam@ lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.

I cried a little, and was up on line in 20 min – giving them hell. I was sick and could not eat for 5 days. I stayed up all night for 4 days & nights and scared to death. I saw medics carrying Lt. Ellingson off the hill and stopped and put my helmet over my heart until they passed me in the path up on line.

So, we are short a man now. I was relieved from line by another man who has not been on line yet this war. I am now getting back to normal and don’t expect to go back on line for at least 10 days. ...

I just wanted you to know for matter of record what happened on my Birthday – no one here even knows about it.

While I was on hill and Lt. Ellingson body was brought back a T/Sgt went completely crazy and we evacuated him while I was still on line. Ellingson had two children.

Thanks Harry for listening to my feelings. It really set me back for awhile. Inf lost 3 men – same time.

- Sully

Courtesy photo

First Lt. Frank W. Sullivan, right, of Lewiston, is congratulated by Col. Edgar S. McKee, I Corps operations officer. Sullivan arrived in Korea in December 1951, and was cited for meritorious service as assistance operations officer in the plans and operations (G-3) section of I Corps.

Clarkston veteran reflects on time as a POW

Ray Servatius spent more than 300 days as a prisoner of war

This article originally appeared in the Lewiston Tribune in 2003. It has been updated for this edition.

By KERRI SANDAINE FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Seventy years ago, Ray Servatius stepped back onto American soil after surviving 309 days as a prisoner of war during the Korean War.

Upon his arrival in San Francisco, the 23-year-old called his folks at home in Clarkston and told them he was headed to Seattle.

Then the plans changed and Servatius was flown to Spokane instead. He caught a bus to Lewiston, arriving at midnight.

Meanwhile, his whole family was anxiously awaiting his return in Seattle. He had to take a taxi to his house, break into the garage and spend his

first night home curled up in the backseat of a car.

“I snuck in ahead of them and missed the parade they had planned,” says Servatius, now 92.

Servatius, the guest of honor at a 50th reunion in 2003, was the only prisoner of war present from the 148th during the Korean War.

“I don’t consider being captured by the enemy as being a hero,” Servatius says.

Servatius was called into service with the National Guard in 1951 and sent to Korea in 1952. He was with the 7th Army in a field artillery battalion on the front lines when the Air Force asked for volunteers to fly as aerial observers.

Servatius signed up and was assigned to the 6147th Tactical Air Command as an observer with a group nicknamed the Mosquitoes.

He rode in a two-cockpit T-6 plane at top speeds of 110 to 120 mph, marking targets for the F-86 jets with smoke bombs.

“I tell the Air Force guys they couldn’t handle it and had to call in the Army,” he says.

“I guess you might call me unlucky, as I was the one picked out of the entire 7th Army. I flew 60 missions, and not once do I recall being scared or wishing that I had not volunteered.

“I do not even remember being scared when I bailed out and was being taken prisoner. What did Forrest Gump say? ‘Stupid is as stupid does.’”

On Oct. 24, 1952, the day of his capture, Servatius and Capt. Wilbur Darby encountered a heavy dose of anti-aircraft fire as they circled their targets to assess the damage below.

“We were losing altitude to gain speed to get back to our side of the

front lines faster when it sounded like a .22 bullet going through a tin can, and I realized we had been hit.”

The plane burst into flames, and Servatius pulled the ripcord on his parachute.

“I landed on the Chinese side of no man’s land in a dry rice paddy ditch, and my parachute hung on a bush, blowing in the breeze. I was wearing a bright blue winter-style flight suit over my Army fatigues, so I immediately removed them and realized my left leg was broken and my right leg was in very bad shape.”

His younger brother, Fred, was on an outpost in the area and saw the plane go down and somebody bail out, but he didn’t know it was Ray until four days later.

Artillery fire was bursting all around Servatius when he hit the ground. He heard a helicopter coming and assumed it would pick him up.

August Frank/For The Forgotten War Ray Servatius is pictured at his home in Clarkston. Servatius spent 309 days as a prisoner of war.

Continued from Page 19

“In just a few minutes, the helicopter lifted off the ground and flew away, leaving me out there.”

Servatius had a .45 pistol on him, but when he cocked it, he realized the clip was missing. “If I’d have been shooting, they’d have killed me, I’m sure.”

An American infantry sergeant came out to get him and told him to keep his head down because Chinese soldiers were all around them.

“Almost immediately a bunch of Chinese soldiers jumped up, and after a brief firefight, the sergeant was hit and I was taken prisoner.

“I had a bullet hole in my shirt sleeve and another in the side of my shirt. Neither one hit me, but I did have a bullet crease across the top of my left hand. The sergeant was killed. I saw blood on his forehead and never saw him again.”

The plane’s pilot was found dead in his unopened parachute and Servatius was reported missing.

IN A HOLE

After his capture, Servatius was forced to crawl up a steep hill, dragging his broken leg. “My legs were completely black almost up to my hips from being bruised so bad. When it became dark, they loaded me on a stretcher and four Chinese soldiers carried me all night.”

When the sun came up, they stopped at a house and interrogated him all day long. “I was hurting, tired, thirsty and every time I dozed off, they would punch me with their pistols to keep me awake.”

He was taken to a hole dug in a hillside that had a log roof. “They put me in there with 10 Americans, some of them wounded, and about eight South Korean soldiers.”

The place was so small they had to lie side by side in the dimly lit space.

Twice a day, a bucket of rice and water was delivered. A can was placed up front for the soldiers to relieve themselves in.

“The first night I was in this hole they brought in some doughy-type stuff for our evening meal. We couldn’t or did not eat it and they took it out. The next morning they brought it back and six soldiers with machine guns stood there and you can imagine how fast that stuff was eaten under those conditions.

“After that we got rice. We did not get any water to wash with or any toilet paper, so you can see it was not exactly the cleanest facility.”

After two months in the hole, the POWs were infested with body lice. Water dripped through the roof and they were glad when it turned cold enough to freeze the ground.

“Being Catholic, before I left home my mother gave me a rosary to carry with me and the Chinese did not take it away from me.

“Another POW that was there had gone to college at Notre Dame and had played on their football team. We about wore that rosary out praying, and the way things turned out, I

guess it paid off.”

By this time, Servatius’ leg had healed enough so he could stand on it. After dark one night, he and the other POWs were ordered into the back of a truck. They were crammed in and tied together so they couldn’t move.

That night, a wounded POW named Wilson died on the truck.

After stopping at a farmhouse, the POWs were again loaded in the truck. “They put Wilson’s body across the back of the truck and made four of us sit on him for the night’s ride. I had to sit on his head all night long.”

JOURNEY’S END

At this point, the prisoners were taken to Korean houses with no furniture, but they were thankful to be out of the weather and dry.

“There was a creek running nearby so they let us wash and did give us some lice powder to get rid of the lice.

“This is where they divided us up and the officers went one way and enlisted men another. So I said goodbye to the fellow from Notre Dame, as he was an officer. This is where we spent Christmas Day.”

The POWs were moved three more

times on their way north, sometimes by truck and sometimes on foot. The temperatures sank to 35 below in the high, mountainous areas, he recalls.

“We finally ended up on the Yalu River and we could look across the river into China. There were about 200 of us there, including Greeks, Turks, French, British and others. Things did improve here with us staying in Korean houses, but again sleeping on the floor.

“Many guys got bed sores on their hips and back from the hard floor and being so skinny with not much flesh on their bones.”

The POWs dug trenches around the compound and hauled firewood from the nearby woods for the Chinese. “They brought in a lot of Communist pamphlets for us to read and they again started interrogating us.

“The Chinese officers that interrogated us were very well educated with most of them graduating from colleges in the U.S. They could speak better English than we could.”

They mostly concentrated on the younger and less-educated POWs, trying to get them to be defectors, Servatius says.

“As far as I know, no one from our camp was among the 21 that chose to stay there after the war was over.”

In February, some of the guys were sent home after an exchange of seriously injured POWs. One of the American soldiers who was leaving took down all of the names and addresses of the men staying behind, so he could contact their families.

“Private Walker, an American Indian, called my folks when he got home and told them I was OK, and that was the first that they knew of my whereabouts, other than the

Continued on Page 24

1950-1953: THE FORGOTTEN WAR

August Frank/For The Forgotten War

Ray Servatius and his wife, Carol, share a laugh at their home in Clarkston.

Couresy Ray Servatius

The T-6 plane that Ray Servatius flew in is pictured.

Lewiston man was a dedicated double vet

By KALI NELSON FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

James Jennings was one of thousands of U.S. Army veterans from World War II who also served during the Korean War. During the course of both wars he would be wounded three times, survive his injuries and return home to become an educator.

Jennings was a longtime teacher in the Lewiston School District, working there from 1955 until his retirement in the 1980s. Jennings died in October 2002.

He would leave the service with four Purple Hearts received over the span of a 15-year career. He was born March 24, 1920, in Elk River and would graduate from Clarkston High School in 1939.

His daughter Debby Roberts, of Portland, said he used the G.I. bill to attend the University of Idaho and get a master’s in education in 1954. He taught for a year in Colfax before working in Lewiston for the remainder of his career.

“He wanted to give back and do something positive,” Roberts said.

In Lewiston, Jennings taught sophomore English and grammar, was the yearbook adviser and taught driver’s education in the summer. He taught at Sacajawea Junior High (now Middle Mchool) and Lewiston High School.

Having served in two wars, Roberts said her father was upset by the response to the Vietnam War and always had respect for veterans.

He was a member of the Episcopal Church of the Nativity in Lewiston as well as the Nez Perce No. 10 Masonic Lodge, Calam Shriners and Lewiston Education Association. Roberts said he was an avid reader of anything, from Agatha Christie to Westerns to the classics.

Roberts said she doesn’t remember many of her father’s stories but does understand the sentiment behind them.

He spoke about both wars often, she said, and they were a big part of his life.

“He had seen people and societ-

ies destroyed and he wanted to be part of the creation,” Roberts said.

He joined the Army in 1942 with his two brothers, Clelland and Don, and attended Officer Candidate School at Fort Bennings, Ga. He was part of the reserve troops for the D-Day landing in Normandy.

Shortly after the war he married his wife, Bertha Radermacher, in April of 1946, in Colfax.

Jennings would earn a Purple Heart and three Oak Leaf Clusters in the European Theater in WWII. His time in Korea, Roberts said, is less remembered.

Steve Passmore of Dusty, Wash., met Jennings in the 1960s. Passmore said Jennings had told him about being in a “spider hole” overlooking Chinese or North Korean encampments to target higher ranking officers.

Passmore said he hadn’t thought much of the story at the time as he was newly enlisted in the Air Force but it would come back to him later in life. Passmore said he did not maintain contact with Jennings and would start looking into his story decades later after reading Bertha Jennings’ obituary in the Lewiston Tribune.

Passmore said he moved to Dusty in the 1970s and it would be after reading Bertha Jennings’ obituary and retiring from his job that he would have more time to dedicate to learning about James Jennings’ service in Korea. His time in Korea is less easy to track, but now he has the time to dedicate to the “spider hole” story.

Korea, Roberts said, turned Jennings off from guns for years but he would go on to own an outdoors shop in later years, Roberts said. He did not mention the loss from the Korean War often, she said. He would mention as an officer he would write letters home to families of those who died.

“I’m sure everything he did in some way had to do with those wars,” Roberts said. “He wanted to be positive and lasting.”

Nelson can be reached at knelson@dnews.com.

Stroke resurrects Korean War vet’s darkest memories

This story originally was published May 25, 2009, in the Tribune. Robert “Bob” Heitstuman died Aug. 16, 2020, in Pomeroy, at the age of 94.

By DAVID JOHNSON FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

POMEROY — For more than half a century, Bob Heitstuman opted to keep his Korean War experiences to himself.

“Men who are really in battle,” explains his wife, Ann Heitstuman, “don’t talk about it.”

But about 10 weeks ago, Bob suffered a stroke. Unable to talk or walk, he ended up in intensive care. His short-term memory faded to the point of not knowing the names of his four daughters.

Unfortunately, old combat memories came back with a vengeance.

“I hadn’t thought about that stuff for years,” Bob says.

Stuff, says his wife, that renders

war down to a brutal common denominator.

“My theory was to survive,” Bob confirms, “and help people I could help.”

“It’s ironic,” Ann adds. “We have four kids and they’ve hardly heard anything about the Korean War because he doesn’t talk about it. But since the stroke, yes, there have been several days when it was in his head too much, too vivid.”

And like others this Memorial Day, a day set aside for the nation to remember those who have died in war, Bob says catharsis seems to hinge on talking about what he never talked about before — at least, to a point.

“It was a mess.”

Born in Uniontown into a family of seven siblings, Bob, now 82, recalls being just a tad young for duty in World War II. “I tried to enlist in 1944, but I couldn’t get in.” Many

James Jennings was among the many who served in World War II and Korea

James Jennings

After decades of silence, Bob Heitstuman’s family hears about his battlefield experiences

Tribune file Bob Heitstuman recounts his time in Korea.

War: ‘We don’t want anymore’

This story originally was published Nov. 11, 2016, in the Lewiston Tribune. Orland Gage died Jan. 31, 2019.

By ERIC BARKER

FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Having served in the Pacific theater during the “Big One” and as an artillery man during the Korean War, Orland Gage is familiar with the awfulness of armed conflict.

In World War II, he witnessed the terrible devastation wrought by a nuclear bomb, and in Korea the Lewiston man participated in artillery bombardment that pounded enemy troops.

“I don’t want anymore of it,” he said. “I just hope the (United Nations) and the people who try to settle these things do their job. You just can’t believe what the power of that atom bomb was — that you just can’t believe.”

Gage, now 98, was in his third semester at the University of Idaho at the start of World War II. He had just put $2 worth of gas in a green 1937 Chevrolet while working at a filling station on the corner of Sixth and Main streets when a “flash” came on the radio announcing the attack on Pearl Harbor.

“I looked down Main Street and I looked up Sixth toward the university and there wasn’t a car moving. Believe it or not people were out

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of his high school classmates, Bob recalls, went into the military. He remained home working with his brother on a cattle ranch. By the time the Korean conflict erupted, Bob barely missed another age cutoff.

“When I got drafted into the Army, I was lacking about three months from being too old.”

Soon to be 26, he went to California via Fort Lewis in western Washington for basic training and within a few months was aboard a ship destined for Korea.

“I’ve still got some problems remembering,” he says of the details leading up to the harrowing events. “I know you don’t learn too much about the country when you’re getting shot at.”

Bob was a member of the 19th Regiment within the 24th Infantry Division. As a private pounding the ground and packing an M-1 rifle, he found himself to be a unwitting leader. “I was 26 years old, so I kind of knew what things were like. But we had kids who were 18 and 19 years old. It was really hard on some

of their cars walking up and down, talking to each other,” he said. “I think they were in shock. They just didn’t think it could happen, but it did, and you know it could happen again if we get to trusting people too much. Right now, I don’t trust Russia worth a hoot.”

Gage went to work at the Potlatch sawmill in Potlatch after the war started but soon joined the Army.

“The company got me a deferment that I didn’t ask for. It looked like the war was going to pass me by so I volunteered for induction.”

Like all recruits, he took a battery of tests and his skill at math served him well. He qualified for his pick of pilot, navigator or bombardier. But as is often the case in the military, other forces intervened.

“They decided they needed gunners so they jerked 25,000 of us out of the system and sent us to gunner school,” he said.

His time as a tail-gunner in a B-25 bomber was largely uneventful. The real story came after the end of the war. Gage was sent to mainland Japan and briefly visited Hiroshima just a few weeks after it was nearly wiped off the map by an American atomic bomb.

“You can’t believe it. The only

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of those kids.”

As he talks, Bob points to a map of South Korea, finding Pusan, where his ship landed, then Seoul just south of the 38th parallel, and finally North Korea where battle sites like Old Baldy, Heartbreak Ridge and Pork Chop Hill are delineated.

“We didn’t know the names of any hills. We just fought on one, then another.”

And once the fighting began, Bob recalls, it seemed to never end. “The first time,” he says of the bad memories, “came when the guy right alongside me died. A machine gunner died. Before the day was over with, I and another kid, a little French kid, we got shot up trying to save another kid. Everybody else ran off to the rear.”

While Bob talks, Ann watches as if hearing for the first time stories she wishes her husband had been able to leave in the recesses of his mind.

“We were hung in. We couldn’t get out, just the two of us trying to save that kid’s life,” Bob continues. “Nine bullets went right across his leg. You take your belt and use it for a tourniquet, but by that time it’s too late. He got hit so many times. He just turned

color and that was it.”

Bob also got hit. “Twice across the fingers here, and then this one by the eye. It really didn’t hurt too bad.” The wounds, he says, were enough for a Purple Heart. “But it wasn’t worth it to go back. So I just stayed right there and fought. We shot our way out of it.”

Bob recalls reading a national story more than one year ago about Master Sgt. Woodrow Wilson Keeble, who received the Medal of Honor posthumously for military valor in Korea. “He was in the same outfit right alongside of me. The only name we knew him by was Chief.” Keeble, who died in 1982, was a Sioux Indian.

Combat, says Bob, is a euphemistic word for what happens on the battlefield. After surviving for weeks through day and night close-quarter fighting, Bob says he decided to document the atrocities. His father had sent him a camera and he began shooting pictures.

“My thought was that everybody should see what’s happening.” He shot two rolls of film, then kept them in a pocket and planned to eventually have them developed. “But the longer it went, and the worse it got,

I thought, well, people shouldn’t see that ... what we did to them, what they did to us.”

After leaving Korea and spending time in Japan, Bob says he decided to destroy the film. “I felt so bad. I took those two rolls and spread them out.” Then he used lighter fluid and put a flame to the film.

The problem, of course, was that the images remained seared in the forgotten memories that Bob’s recent stroke resurrected.

“It’s just a miracle he’s alive,” Ann says of Bob surviving both the stroke and the war. “He does speech therapy twice a week. The most problem he’s had is with short-term memory.” But that’s coming back with each new day, says Ann. And she hopes the bad memories will likewise continue to fade.

“There’s nothing this man can’t do,” Ann says. “He’s a good guy. He’s one good guy.”

After Bob returned from Korea, the Heitstumans were married and farmed nearby for decades on original family ground.

Lewiston’s Orland Gage served in World War II and Korea

Tribune file

Lewiston’s Orland Gage sports his bomb group hat from when he was a tail-gunner in a B-25 during World War II. He later served in Korea in the 148th Field Artillery Battalion.

Army veteran returns to South Korea

Marvin Jackson received plaque for his help in establishing school

This story was originally Feb. 19, 2013. Marvin Jackson died April 16, 2023.

By KERRI SANDAINE FOR THE FORGOTTEN WAR

More than six decades after his stint in the Korean War, an 84-year-old Clarkston man returned to South Korea this month to visit a school built in the midst of war with donations from American soldiers.

Marvin Jackson, a Port of Clarkston commissioner and longtime business owner, was presented with a medal and honored as an “ambassador of peace” at a graduation ceremony at Gapyeong High School, northeast of Seoul, South Korea.

“I wasn’t prepared for a lot of it,” Jackson said of the ceremony. “We were immediately presented with flowers and taken to the

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principal’s office for tea. At the graduation ceremony, they wanted to show the young people how they got their freedom and we were part of the history lesson.”

Park Sung-choon, minister of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, presented an appreciation plaque to five Korean War veterans, including Jackson, at the ceremony attended by about 1,000 students and alumni. The school was established during the 1950-53 Korean War by the U.S. Army’s 40th Infantry Division, which was stationed in the Gapyeong area.

According to news accounts, then-division commander Maj. Gen. Joseph Cleland and his soldiers were deeply moved after seeing about 150 Korean students studying under two tents at the battlefields. Each soldier contributed $2 to help build the school, which now serves

building left standing was a brick building that had the telephone system in it. Everything else was gone.”

The Army was busy building barracks on the mainland, and his experience working for Potlatch and his propensity to speak his mind got him a promotion.

“They had a sawmill, and the officer in charge didn’t know doodly-squat about saw milling,” he said. “I made the crack to the C.O. that I could do better and I got the job and then I did better. I literally buried them in what they needed. That was no problem, I just changed techniques.”

about 950 students.

During the recent visit, the five division veterans, all in their 80s, were escorted around the city and given the royal treatment, Jackson said. They visited the War Memorial Museum and the Korean Demilitarized Zone, a strip of land that serves as a buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea.

“We were able to look north, but we were told to make no gestures, no mooning or anything like that,”

When his time was up, Gage returned to Idaho and a waiting job.

“I got out on a Friday, and I went back to work for Potlatch on a Monday.”

He also joined the Idaho National Guard. Before long, world turmoil returned and Gage was called to duty again, this time as an artillery specialist in Korea.

“I’m pretty good at math, so first thing I know I ended up as fire direction officer and on my shift I fired 360,000 rounds of 105s. We are still paying for that by the way.”

Squared off against the Chinese, Gage said U.S. troops quickly learned how the enemy intended to fight. The Chinese didn’t have as

Jackson said. “The guards are touchy.”

The last time Jackson landed in Korea, the year was 1952. He was a Jeep driver in the war, spending eight months in the Iron Triangle — an area about 30 miles north of the 38th parallel, the boundary that separated North Korea and South Korea. He remembers temperatures dipping to 20 degrees below zero on his first night there.

The thermometer was at

much equipment as the Americans. But they had a lot of men and were willing to use them as cannon fodder.

“We found out that the Chinese would open their offensives with 4,000 to 5,000 rounds of mortar ammo and artillery and when it lifted they would be sitting right there in front of you,” he said. “As soon as this happened, I would drop ours on top of them. Our boys had overhead cover but the Chinese were out there in the open, so we slaughtered them by the hundreds.”

Gage pauses when telling stories like this and takes a moment to himself before adding. “We don’t want anymore.”

After his service in Korea, Gage returned to Idaho and continued

zero when he arrived earlier this month, and there was a foot of snow on the ground, but that didn’t slow down the citizens of Seoul. The bustling city was a sight to behold, Jackson said.

“What they’ve been able to do in 60 years of freedom is magnificent,” he said. “Now the town is filled with bridges everywhere and rapid transit. It’s fantastic what they’ve been able to do.”

working for Potlatch. He retired after 43 years. He also continued on with the Idaho National Guard, eventually retiring as a major.

Now he lives in the Elks Addition with his partner of 31 years, Flora Jones. Jones built B-25s for Boeing during the war and also served as a nurse.

“We are living in sin,” he said.

For years he was active in the 38th Bomb Group Association and helped compile the book “Sunsetters of the Southwest Pacific Area.” To this day he remains enamored with the B-25 that he calls the most versatile airplane of the war.

His one regret is that at 98 he might not be able to fulfill one of his

Tribune file

Marvin Jackson of Clarkston recounts a trip to South Korea, where he represented the other veterans of the Korean War. Jackson received a medal from South Korea’s Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs for his wartime service.

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missing in action telegram that they had received.”

GOING HOME

The peace treaty was signed July 27, 1953.

“That night we did not know what was happening, but normally there was not a light anywhere after dark and around 10 p.m., they got us all out and had us go to an open area where there was several lanterns burning bright.

“A Chinese official that we knew could speak English very well told us in Chinese using an interpreter that the peace treaty had been signed and we would be going home.”

The POWs sat around for almost three weeks with no more word on their future.

KOREA 1950-1953: THE END OF THE WAR

“Finally, they loaded us into trucks and hauled us to a train station. Through each little village we went through, the locals would throw rocks and other things at us.

“We rode on the train in cars similar to cattle cars for four days until we reached the exchange area.”

Servatius was there another six days. “They did feed us fairly well, trying to fatten us up some. I weighed about 180 pounds when captured and 135 when I got back.”

During the Korean War, 7,245 American soldiers were captured. Of that number, 2,806 died in captivity, 4,418 were returned to military control and 21 defected.

When he left Korea, Servatius was told he would go home first class. “The first class ended up being a troop ship and instead of putting someone in every bunk, they had us

in every other bunk.”

Servatius had contracted tuberculosis of the lungs and in the bone of his left shoulder and was told he would be assigned to a military hospital in Seattle to recuperate.

“Then they realized there was a hospital in Spokane that was closer to my home, but I didn’t have to report there for 30 days.”

That’s how Servatius wound up sleeping in the garage on his first night back in Clarkston.

LIFE AFTER WAR

Seventy years later, his wounds have healed but the memories linger. “I think about how lucky I was quite often. I’ll tell you what, everything that happened to me I volunteered for.”

Servatius, who grew up in An-

ton, Texas, moved to Clarkston as a teenager in 1947. After the war, he married Carol Caragio, a Lewiston native, and they have three grown children, Cheryl Renslow, of Spokane, Randy Servatius, of Clarkston and Rick Servatius, of Scottsdale, Ariz.; six grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

He and his brother Fred operated Servatius News Agency, a wholesale magazine distributorship, from 19541989. These days Servatius enjoys sitting on his deck overlooking the Snake River in Clarkston, and spending time with his wife and kids.

“The Chinese only had to put up with me for 309 days, but she’s had to put up with me for 69 years now. She takes good care of me.”

Sandaine can be reached at kerris@lmtribune.com.

Associated Press/George Sweers

Gen. William K. Harrison Jr., chief U.N. armistice delegate, seated left, and North Korean Gen. Nam IL, right, chief communist delegate, look up as they complete signing armistice documents at Panmunjom, Korea in July 1953. With Gen. Harrison are Comdr. J.E. Shew, U.S.N., left, and Col. J.C. Murray, U.S.M.C., right. Military policeman, center, is not identified.