Mr. Clark my name is allen d. Clark. My age is 92. My birthday is 10 september, 1923. Jini and where were you born . Mr. Clark where was i born . I was born in virginia. Jini will you tell me brief information about your family . Where did your family come rom . Mr. Clark well, they are primarily from the english continent. My mother from the welsh. My wife primarily did analysis of where we are and we have a book up to a certain point but we cannot go back much further. Back to about 1760. And we have all that in a genealogy book. I can show that to you before you leave here. Jini sure. Mr. Clark but i was born on the farm. My dad raised corn and horses and cows. And i was born there. There were seven children. Three girls that were older than i, two boys that were older than i, and one daughter that was younger than i. And they all have deceased now. Jini ok. And so, you are part of the hosen few association, which means you are at the chosen reservoir during the korean war. Is that right . Mr. Clark that is correct. Jini then were you part of the marine corps . R. Clark yes i was. Jini that means you enlisted yourself, you were not drafted . R. Clark correct. Jini when did you enlist . Mr. Clark i enlisted in a reserve program. I was in college in william and mary and i enlisted to december 12, 1942. Jini when did you arrive in korea, and where did you arrive to . Mr. Clark i arrived in korea in the peninsula, the battle of inchon. Prior to that, i was in san endleton, and i went to an Artillery School in oklahoma and i studied what i would be doing in korea, which was surveying, flash and sound raging, which meant that we had estimates that could see flashes of guns and mortars. And we had microphones that we put in the ground and we could hear the sound and we could analyze and triangulate as to where they were coming from. And if we saw a flash of a gun, we would call that an a reading. If we saw the smoke of a gun without the flash, we would call them a b reading. If we saw the globe on the horizon, that was a c reading. And i did that most of the time i was in korea. I was there twice. N the second tour i was with the second battalion marines and i was a commander of d battery. Jini ok. So your second tour you were with the second battalion . Ok. Then when you first got to korea, which unit were you with, and what was your rank . Mr. Clark my rank was a lieutenant and i was with headquarters battery the 11th marine regiment. I landed on inchon in the 8th wave in a duck boat. A duck is a boat that has a propeller on the back. It can go on the ocean and also on land. Jini i see. Mr. Clark i landed on the island of woman do womado with 45 men. Jini can you tell me about that story, of you and that vote coming in you in that boat coming into korea. What were you feeling and what did you see, what did you hear . What was it like . Mr. Clark well, we could see the inchon proper where the infantry was landing. The 8th wave, we got to a position we could see, we could see them on their ladders as they climbed up the wall. Then when we got closer to the island, we could not see that but we could hear the firefights of the infantry on the island. Jini and then after you arrived, where was it that you were stationed . Mr. Clark you mean in korea . Jini yeah. Mr. Clark well, we really were not stationed. We did not have a station. We moved all the time. Just a brief analysis of what we did, we landed there and i set up four ops there, and we could observe what was happening in inchon and beyond. And we reported what we saw. We did not see any artillery or mortards, but mortars, but we saw trucks and troops and heavy mortars and so forth. And they were taken under fire on different artillery egiment. Jini got it. And what was the Living Condition like . You said you kept moving around, but wherever you stopped at to stay for, im assuming a few days or so, then you moved around . Mr. Clark you would probably stay for a couple days, maybe a week. But you had a tent, and you had a sleeping bag. And later on, we got a rubber mattress, but early on we did not have that. You are on duty 24 hours a day. He went to work and then sleep, then work and then sleep. Ini which battle were you involved in during your time in korea . Mr. Clark i have five stars on y ribbons. Inchon, seoul, one son anson, the chosen few, central korea at the wonton reservoir in that area. Jini i am sure you have so many stories from all these battles. Can you tell me more of them that are more profound to you or that you remember most . Mr. Clark yes, i would be happy to try to remember. Ometimes you forget. In the inchon area, one of the first things we noticed of course was the families and the children. They were nice people, they were friendly to us. And as i was order to find another op, observation post, i went to this small village near the airport. Kenpo airport. I noticed the villagers were friendly and started to point. And i wondered what they were pointing at. Finally i stopped, then they pulled out a guy and it was a north korean. And they wanted me to take him, which i did, because they wanted to get rid of him. That was the first prisoner that i captured. Jini wow. Mr. Clark and brought him back to the regiment and he was sent through the prison chain of command. I did not know what happened to him after that. Jini wow. Was it kind of an intense moment or was it kind of easy to handle . Mr. Clark it was not it was kind of easy to handle but it was intense not knowing if he was the only one. I just had a jeep and four eople. I did not really know much about how the Korean People felt about us coming there. Right . But they were friendly and they were helpful. So, it helped us, it helped the whole engagement along. I finally got an interpreter, and he traveled with us the whole time that we were in korea so that we would be able to know whats going on. Jini right. So when you did not have the interpreter yet, he mustve had to read body language. Mr. Clark you did it with your hands. They could shake their heads like that. But another thing that happened before we got to seoul, we reached the han river, and i still had the duck. And the observation was best on part across the han river, and part of it on, what would that be, the east, the west side of the han river. So, i found some observation post on the others of the han river, which i occupied, and i ad some on the side. And we were able to see seoul. The outskirts of soul, not downtown, but the outskirts of it. While we were doing that, a message came over the radio with a set of coordinates and said dont fire on these coordinates. T is a brewery and there was beer there. I said geewhiz, that is interesting. After a day, i saw people going and coming back with cans of eer. And my men said, we have to have some beer. So i had five, five gallon water tabs. Ne for each observation post and one for the center ahead. I sent five water tankers down to the brewery and brought back beer. And each op had a five gallon full of beer. After two days, i got a call from one of the op leaders and he said, lieutenant, i have washed in beer, i am shaved in beer, i am tired in beer tired of beer. Can you please get some water . So i got some water. We all had water then. But those were two wonderful observation posts because we could see what was coming out of seoul before our troops crossed the han river and after they crossed it. We had a good position to see. And while there, we saw a number of targets which we reported. And finally, we observed six tanks coming out of korea, right towards our infantry. So, i reported that and they we had an air observer, so we sent the air observer up there and they spotted them. Then the 155 howitzers fired on the six tanks and knocked all of them out before they could get down to the infantry. So that was a major piece of information that i felt good about and we were able to stop them there. Also, with the same observation post, we saw some glows to the south of seoul, and it was a pretty good distance from the south of seoul. And we got some coordinates on it and sent it back to our headquarters. They said we do not have any weapons that can hit that, but would you wait just a minute, i think we can get some ammunition o you. So a little bit later said, weve contacted the missouri, the battleship, and they can hit it. So, we gave them the coordinates, and they fired, and we adjusted, and they fired again. They fired three times. I do not know whether they hit it or not, because there was a sea reading. We did not see any flashes. We saw the glow, but they stopped firing because they were firing into our troops, they stopped firing. So we felt good about that. Jini yeah. Then going back, what was the reason that you were given this specialty, the surveys, the flash and sound . Did you have background in that . Mr. Clark no. I did not have background. I had college training. Jini what did you study at william and mary . Mr. Clark and had enough math hat i could do that. And the colonel of the artillery regiment at pendleton did not have anybodys schedule that knew anything about this. So i had another job at the time. My job was treasurer at the commission office. He used to come up to have lunch and so forth. He said, i need a lieutenant to go to school. He said, what are you doing, and would you like to go to school . And i said, well, what are you talking about. He told me, and i said sure, i would love to go to school. So we went to the school. It included we had a survey on ops, and we did not have a surveying instrument except the instrument they used to site with had a circle and all these things on it and we could survey with that instrument. We were supposed to survey every op, and every microphone we put in the ground, to make sure that when we give them an answer on a set of coordinates, it was correct with the coordinates. But i was at fort sill when the war started. I was just about finished. I had about one week left. I missed the first deployment with the First Battalion that went down. I missed that by about 10 days. I came back and was at pendleton and organized to go out with the division. And pendleton was quite a place then, because we began to bring in all the reserves, the organized reserves, and individual reserves that had specialties. And they came from all over the country. And was organized into their battalions and supplies, artillery, tanks and all. And we boarded ship and went to japan. Japan, we got off on our ships and went to some barracks, and the weather was bad and some of the ships broke loose in the harbor, and we thought we were going to be delayed on the inchon landing, and that is what we were therefore. But they got the ships back in, and we went back aboard the ships for the lending. We got aboard an lsd, a landing ship dock. And it was operated by the japanese. They fed us food, which was good food. And most of the japanese, the small, amphibious boats were manned by japanese crew. They did a wonderful job bringing us there and putting us nto the right place. Jini how about the chosen eservoir, your time there . I heard from a few veterans that it was so cold, the sleeping bags would freeze up, and all those stories. What was your experience ike . Mr. Clark well, we went up from the east coast around seoul. E got aboard ship and got on one side to the other side of the peninsula, then we went north. From there, we were ordered to go up to the chosen reservoir, which we did. And i went ahead and just my driver and i and a radio operator, with the other people that were in the regiment there. We went up there and we got up there late in the afternoon and they began to pitch out tents and so forth. And we had some native people helping us. Some of the young people could speak english, and they said chinese, chinese, in my village, chinese, they say they are coming tonight. So we knew they were coming. We were put into that division and they knew they were coming. They were to set up inside the perimeter with our artillery. They did hit us that night. The first night we were up there. And they broke through the lines and came in through the perimeter. And we stopped part of them at our perimeter there, and some of the other units did the same there. Long about 5 00 in the morning after the fighting was still going on, the infantry counter attacked and ran them out. And then the next day, they prepared and the lieutenant of one of the third marine battalions was hurt or killed, i do not know which, and they said we need an officer for this platoon. So i moved over to the third arines and the platoon commander. I was there as a platoon commander the rest of the time we were there. And even though there were no major attacks in our section, there were sporadic attacks and sniper fire and so forth. And coming out of the reservoir, we got the people back, and got them organized and started out was transferred over to this First Battalion, seventh marines. I was assistant liaison artillery liaison officer. And we came out with the First Battalion, seventh marines. And on the way out, as you probably know by now, it was just one road, a real thin road, you could not pass most of the time. And you just went down that road, that was the way out. You could not do that. We were ambushed several times. One was a major ambush, with my part of the convoy. Nd they hit us we did not know they were they, they hit us all at once. The jeep we were in, i was in the back at the time, the jeep was hit in the engine, it stopped the engine, it hit the gas tank, and punctured the rear tire. Nobody in the jeep was hit. But we all jumped out, got in a little hill on the backside, and they started coming over the Railroad Tracks on the other side. And we had a pretty good firefight. I had an m1 rifle, and about the second or third round, it jammed. And there i was, in the middle of a firefight, with a jammed rifle. I looked around and there was a marine who had been hit, and he was not moving. And i said something to him, he did not say anything. I picked up his carbine, went to his pocket and got some ammunition, and continued to fight. Nd finally, with 50, 100 men altogether in this one section, our sergeant said, i am a sergeant, who is in charge here . I said, i am a lieutenant, i do not know whether he would i said ok, lets move over to the Railroad Tracks. Lie down and use the Railroad Tracks. Get down and continue to fight, and that is what we did. Then they finally stopped. The jeep i was in, the driver was pretty resourceful and he looked for something and he found a rope in the truck in front of us and he tied a rope to the truck, to the jeep, and we were pulled behind the truck. So that was pretty resourceful, i thought. Jini so intense. I am picturing the scenes in my head. All of a sudden, you are asked, what do we do and you just have to think of a solution quickly. Mr. Clark with that particular section, there was nobody really in charge. It was just the end of one column in the beginning of another and somebody had to be in charge. Jini wow. Mr. Clark i have some clothing, if you want me to discuss. Yeah, lets show that to the camera. You have some jackets here. If you can just hold it up, we can shoot the camera. Mr. Clark ok. First off is the field jacket. It has the hood on the back that can zip onandoff. The other one is a godsend we had. It is an overcoat that has an insert, and it is london fog and everybody had one of these and everyone wore them. You slept in them. And you were lucky to have one. In addition to that, we had a wool scarf, which was wonderful, because you could put it around your face in the wind, which was really cold. You can put it under your helmet and just have your eyes out and that was wonderful. In one place, the wind was blowing like crazy and we were out near the bridge that was broken and we were communicating with headquarters. As i stood there with the wind blowing, it was at that time it was 42 below zero and the wind was blowing like crazy and if i faced the wind any length of time, i could not close my eyes. They were freezing. So i turned my head around to try to blink them. Jini my goodness. Mr. Clark once we got to coterie, we refurbished and replenished and the real blizzard hit that i am talking about. We waited for it to come down. It was a major obstacle. We had to take care of the mountains overlooking the bridge. We had to occupy the mountains and we kept waiting and the blizzard was about two days. It was one of the worst blizzards in history is what they said. Worst blizzard in history. And the colonel was well known and he was there and kept wanting to know if we could leave. And after about the third day, the wind began to dissipate and the clouds begin to part and at night he went out of his tent and saw it was clearing and he saw one star. And he said, we go in the morning. That one star is what they view few hasthe chosen chosen for their motto. I have a copy of it right there. That is a wonderful star. And we really appreciate it but not many people other than the chosen few people can get this. Their wives could get it but in a different color. So i am proud of that. I am proud of every marine that was up there. You helped one another and you tried not to create anything that would be more dangerous for anyone else, and you tried to help them, all the way through. Jini of course, it was the war. You have so many hardships you had to endure. Would you say you could pick the most difficult, the most dangerous moment or instance you went through of all of those . Mr. Clark oh, boy. That would be difficult. I would say coming out of the chosen and before we started out was probably the most difficult moment because most of the marines did not know and even though the officers would not tell you this, they did not know either. Our division commander, general smith, what a wonderful man he was. Macarthurs former chief of staff was in charge of the 10th brigade, and he came up and general smiths division was under the 10th brigade. And he came up and we did not know if we were going to make it or not and he said, what i want you to do, general smith, abandon all of your equipment, destroy it, and walk out the best way you can. General smith looked at him and said, general, we come in as marines. We bring in our wounded. We bring our dead. We bring our equipment. And we come out. And that is what he did. He was a religious man, i think, in some ways. But he was well respected by his staff, he made sound decisions and trying to take care of everybody. For example, they wanted to have an airfield and there was not really a place for it on the strip but he talked to the engineers and said, you know, there is a flat area right here and the mountain is not too big. Why cant we have a flat area right here and have the roadway up the mountain . And it would stop the planes, so you would not have to go so far. That is what we did. That is how a lot of aircraft came in. They brought in supplies and so forth. But general smith was a wonderful man, and he got us out of there. When we continued on down after coterie, we got the bridge settled and a battalion from the south came up and took the mountain. We got down to the area where the navy was, and we started boarding ships, and it was crowded, really crowded, sometimes 10 to one. For example, i went aboard a small craft, a pc boat, little smaller than a destroyer and the mess hall served 24 hours a day beans and meat and everyone was there and no one was assigned a bunk but people took bunks and finally it was agreed between the people that were there, you sleep this long and then i will sleep. It reached the point where it was 4 to 1, you had four people sleeping in a bunk. The civilians wanted out. They did not like the chinese. They did not want to be there. They left their homes, they brought their children, they brought their whole families, and tried to get into the convoy. We started letting them into the convoy and finally the chinese infiltrated the civilians coming into our convoy and firing on us. So we kept them out of the convoy to get us into the convoy. That is what they did. We got down to where there were 99,000 two 100,000 people who wanted to get aboard and they had trouble finding ships that could carry them. Finally a chaplain was i think instrumental in talking to some of the commanders of the ships and finally he got command of a lst, which can run aboard the bank on the sand and he agreed to take them. That is what they did. And one other ship that the same thing. Two different ships took the civilians and got them on board and it was 10 to one what it should be. They took them down to an island off of south korea, put them on the islands because they were not sure the ship would hold up. The one the chaplain got them on, there were nine babies born. [laughter] jini wow. Oh my gosh. Mr. Clark so that was really something. Those people wanted out of there. 99,000 of them. That is the estimated amount. Jini a recent movie was made that captured, reenacted that scene, and it was so many people running for their lives to get into the ship and some people even fallen off of the ship after having gotten on, because it was so crowded on the deck. They fell off the ship. Mr. Clark oh yes. Because a ship just has a low chain around it and if people are not used to it and the ship is going like this, they can fall off, particularly young people. Even older people sometimes. Jini yes. It was a really intense moment. Mr. Clark and i was right there in the midst of it. I was not there when the chaplain talked to the skipper but i was close, and the skipper said, we have to do something. I will take them. Jini and that was it. Mr. Clark yeah. And the other captain said, if you are taking some, i will take some. So they got all of them that were there. Jini how about with korean soldiers, did you often Work Together with korean soldiers, Korean Marines . Mr. Clark yes. Korean marines, primarily. Some korean soldiers. Korean marines were tough. The discipline was 10 times tougher than ours. They just did not put up with anybody that did not cooperate, they did not even try. They did not put up with it. They had wonderful advances when they were asked to advance. When they were asked to defend, they defended. They were wonderful. They were absolutely great. The marines, i am talking about. I do not know much about the soldiers. But i am sure it was the same thing. Jini were they smaller in stature compared to u. S. Marines . Mr. Clark yes. Smaller. Jini and probably a lot of them did not speak english well, but there were translators to help . Mr. Clark that is right. There was always an interpreter somewhere and the interpreter i had was so good, he got so he could speak pretty well. After we came down, we were replenishing and getting supplies and training and he said, i have a friend who would like to have you for dinner. I said, that sounds nice. What are you going to have . He said, they are going to have octopus. I remember i said, octopus . [laughter] i said, ok. I will be there. So i went over, and it was good. Really good. [laughter] jini [laughter] wow. You had some delicacies. Did you ever get the chance to tour the country and do some sightseeing during your time . Mr. Clark i never did that. But normally, if there is no fighting, we did tour the villages and talked to the people and saw the people and saw their little church. Their little children. Most of them wanted a candy bar. That is true wherever you go. The children want a candy bar. They were nice. I was impressed by their culture. On the second tour, we got to know the people next to us better and i observed several burials, which was interesting, how they did that. Emphasis on certain parts of it more than we do. They helped us out while we were there on the 38th parallel, they had the socalled cease fire and i was veteran commander on the second tour and we still had to fire, particularly when they would send out patrols across dmz and find out where we were and what we were doing and maybe get into a firefight, we had to be prepared, and we did. We did that the whole time. And i came out with a division when it left korea, we came to Camp Pendleton and i still had my d battery there. Jini were you wounded at all in korea . Mr. Clark i was not wounded but i had a chronic sickness on my second tour, no, my first tour. My first tour. I was in central korea and i had breakfast one morning and had cereal and i used canned milk, and i had more pain in my stomach, i could barely stand it. There was a doctor in the battalion next door to ours and some of my people went and got the doctor and he came over and examined me, and he said, we have to get him out of here right away. They called a helicopter and took me down to an army center they had there and i was in the army aid center and they diagnosed me with peptic ulcers. They said, we do not like to do it here, the best bet is the hospital ship in pusan and you need to go to that hospital ship. Train. T me on a korean it is smaller than the trains here. I do not know how wide the rails are, but it is smaller and the train took me to pusan and i went aboard the hospital ship. They got me to the operating room and said, we are going to take one more picture before we operate. There were about six doctors there. They took the picture and they came back and got together and said, we do not see any peptic ulcer. We are not going to operate. We are sending you to japan to go to the Army Hospital. So i went to the Army Hospital by plane to the hospital and they examined me and tested me and said i had stones in my bladder, my gallbladder. And also your stomach juices are not what they should be, they are different than what they should be and we are going to operate. So i was operated on. They cut some of the nerves that control stomach solutions and they operated on my stomach. I was there for a couple of months, and then i came home and was at home for little while, and then i went back on my second tour. But i still have what they operated on. They changed the valve in my stomach, they cut it so it releases more than it normally does and they cut some of the bile ducts through there. So i take medicine for that and it seems to work fine. Jini so during your second tour, no trouble . Mr. Clark no problems, no injuries. Very lucky. Jini wow. So when did you leave korea . What month and year . Do you remember . Mr. Clark i think the spring of the year. I forgot exactly. Maybe i can figure it out. Jini the war ended in 1953, right . Not ended, but cease fire in 1953 . Mr. Clark i came back in 1953 or 1954. Not long into that. Jini ok. You mentioned a few friends and colleagues you were with that you remember and talked about. Any other friends or colleagues you would like us to know about during the war . Mr. Clark no, not really. Most have passed on. And i thank god every day that i am able to do this. I really do. And so does my wife. She is 93. But we work at it. We walk every other day. We try to walk 2 miles up and down the road. We pick up trash as we go down. We even pick up cigarette butts. So we try to clean up the road and make it more beautiful for everybody else. Jini is that how you have stayed so healthy . You look very healthy. Mr. Clark i try to eat right. We both do. Economist andome was famous for her entertainment when i was in the marine corps. She was famous for that. I make a salad every night. I have canned vegetables and salad. And i try to rotate them and have as many colorful vegetables, red, yellow, green, purple, any of those. And we do that. I got started on that in 2008, because my wife was in the hospital. She had colon cancer and i was at the hospital reading some of their books and it said you need to eat at least five vegetables a day to be healthy and i said, geewhiz, i dont think we are. So i came back and started eating five and said, what is wrong with 10 . So now i eat 10 vegetables a day. That is what we have been doing now for a long time. We try to stay healthy and try to walk and keep our bodies in the right shape. Just like marines. You have to be ready. We have to be ready for what we are going through. [laughter] i have done a lot of work for the church. With helping her, i am not doing as much in the church anymore. Jini when you returned from korea, where did you come to in the u. S. . Mr. Clark when i went to korea, my wife and children went to her family in ohio. It is a small town in belleville, ohio. Everybody knows the family. Everybody knew her. When i got up to the reservoir, with all of the publicity, no one could mail anything up there. There was not any mail. You had ammunition but no mail. So i could not write and until i got aboard the ship, that i finally got a postcard from one of the sailors and i wrote to my wife. And she got it on christmas eve. How she got it, the postmaster knew all about this, and the postmaster brought it to her at 8 00 at night and gave it to her. So she knew i was aboard ship. The wives and families suffered as much as the marines did, particularly the children, because they did not know what had happened and once they found out, a lot of them were real glad and others were real sorry because they did not make it. Jini once you returned, did you think of korea often and think back to your time there . Mr. Clark oh yes. I thought about it often. I still do. I really thought about it often. Later on, when i went to school in quantico, i got on a traveling team, there were five of us, and we talked about amphibious warfare, and if asked questions, i would never bring it up. But if someone in the audience brought it up and asked about it, i would tell them about it, whatever they asked about. But i do not consider myself a hero. I know what everybody did up there and how they suffered, and i think about the men who had frozen feet. I have on support hose right now. My feet are cold all the time. When i came back, my feet were black and blue. I hope you will be aggressive in the rest of your life and do what you are doing. I am so happy you came over and i am so happy you are doing this. Jini i really thank you for your time and telling me all your stories so now i know more about the history and the things you talked about, like the situation right now, it is good for me to hear all of these things. This was really good for me. Thank you so much. Mr. Clark thank you for coming. And i hope you can get a dvd or tape or something. I really appreciate it. I know my grandchildren dont think much about it, one of them does, i have three grandchildren. One is 14 and one is 12. The 12yearold is more into doing this than the other one. But they are both into it and i know they would love to see it. That oral history interview was provided to cspan by the korean war legacy foundation. For more information about their archive of hundreds of interviews with war veterans, video clips and photos, you can visit their website at koreanwarlegacy. Org. This is American History tv, exploring our past every weekend on cspan3. This is the 70th anniversary of the start of the korean war on june 25, 1948. 1950. American history tv is on cspan3 every weekend and all of our programs are archived on our website at cspan. Org history. You can watch lectures and college classrooms, tours of historic sites, archival films, and see our schedule of upcoming programs. That is cspan. Org history. Next on the presidency, an encore presentation from cspan series first ladies influence and image. We will look back on the life and times of dolley madison. She served alongside the fourth president , james madison. Dolley was both socially adept and politically savvy