What is your birthday . Six month, eight day, 1926 are. 26 . How old are you today . I will be 91 this friday. You look too young. What is the secret . Having a good wife and a Good Relationship help tremendously. How long are you married . Will be 66 years on july 16. 66 years, where were you born . I was born in the state of washington. In 1926. Family me about your growing up. Came from North Carolina. I came from North Carolina area i have been in two states. How about schools . Highonne school. It has been torn down, it is gone. In the state of washington . It is in North Carolina. When did you graduate . 1945. Since you are born in 1926, you went through the Great Depression. You were four years old when the Great Depression occurs, how was it . My dad was working for the railroad. He got laid off. We lived on a farm in North Carolina. Must be hard. I didnt hear you. Must be hard. It was. Later got a tractor but it was after i left. Im the middle kid of two brothers, one older and one younger. About you know anything it when you went to school and graduated . Was a foreign country to me and i knew nothing about it. What about other countries in asia . I knew about china and japan. Were at war with japan. Of course we dropped the atom bomb over there. Iat ended that relationship was in a hospital that was one of the targets for the atom bomb , it wasnt use. It did not concur. When did you join the military . I did not join, i was drafted. When . June 21, 1950. Right after i got married. You were married at this time . You joined right before the korean war. It was during. Truman. Fted by harry i was in 1951 when i joined the military. Going u know you are were going to the korean war . I had no idea. Where did you get your basic training . Aberdeen, maryland at the army proving ground. I had no training. I had no combat training. I did Machine School in atlanta, georgia. What did you learn . To be a machinist. Like what . Aids,rating metal machines, all of that stuff. Were you good at it . Was 33 in our class and i was top three. I worked for General Motors at the time i was drafted. When did you leave for korea . January 1, 1952. In february,ere 1952. Japan first and then was shipped around that. What was your unit . Assigned to the division. 220 . 223rd. Regimen and . Ismy wifes birthday february 12, i was on the front line the day after her birthday. That is why i remember that. Said 223 regimen and love italian the battalion . And item 223rd company, im having a brain cramp. You are on da the front lines one day after the birthday of your wife in 1952. Where was it . Kind of in the Rolling Hills area. We were about a mile and a half in front of the mainline. We were the most northern troops in korea, whether that is true or not, i dont know. Were you at a naval coast or camp . No, we were out in the wilderness. I went on patrol from that group. Probably two miles into north korea at the time. Was georgeader smith. We came on the backside of the control. Heres a mound of dirt we almost killed george. You almost killed him . How was it, how did you do it . I might as well tell you what happened. Killed we fought the enemy off and they left. We fought them off and i stayed there with george smith. Supposedly all of them left. I stayed with george smith. Walt farley was there with me. He was from chicago. Minutes. E been 30 all of a sudden a white flag appeared. The first one, i motioned him to me. We kept him prisoner. It wasnt anything special on my part. How many . One. That is a north korean . How do you know . I have some of money that came with him, you might be able to tell where it came from. I think he was chinese. I had a bird gun. It was a fine weapon. Effective forally about 50 yards but it fired terry rap. Very rapidly. They took it away for me because they would start to negotiate and the russians swore under shippedt they had not any arms to the koreans the war started. This was alive. They took the ammunition away from me as evidence. I dont know how many i collected. You told me that you went to Machine School. I still am a good shot. I did a lot of hunting in my lifetime. Im a good shot with a right. Was near the triangle . Im not really sure where it was. Punch bowl . Heartbreak ridge . We had a new regiment commander, nobody knew who he was. Im the one that got that. This new regiment commander, nobody knew who he was, he was Harry Trumans first cousin. Lewis the truman lewis v truman is the result of that. What was his rank . He was the colonel at that time. He left korea. He was the head of the division. He was a one star general. What is his name . Lewis truman. First cousin of harry. Then what happened . R r Easter Sunday morning with a different location on the front line. It was north of seoul. There was a hill right in front of us. We called it another name. It was called Marilyn Monroe hill. Breast. A big human about 1500 yards from where we were, we were on the coast. I came back from my r r, there was a fight going on. , it had see a pilot been shut down. I saw the pilot coming down. He went limp in the parachute. When i saw him hit the ground. They put together a patrol to go out and get him. We lay down a bank of fire. The bullet grazed the back of his neck. It burned his skin. He went limp. We got him out of there. You didnt really have r r there . I didnt really get r r. It was one of the r r centers. Were you nervous . You were married at the time. I was married, yes. When you get married in korea you get four rotation points a month. Rotation points a lot more. Line about aront week after july 4. I had never got back in combat after that on the front lines. Yumi july 4, 1952 . You mean july 4, 1952 . Them in the10 of outfit, one of them was a little girl, they are all under the age of 10. For some reason or another their parents either got killed or they got separated. All give you another story about one of them. The nickname we called all of the g. I. Down some of uniforms and put them in clot hes. Eventually we started an orphanage. I had nothing to do with that, just put the kids in there. Practically every outfit had the. They would collect them. They are the real victims of war. The parents of the what is going on. They are victims, too. One was a little girl. She was very young. We were down there, they promoted me to squad leader at the time. I was checking on my squad. Would from silk this littleheres boy running around, we cannot catch him, he is hiding. We would like to put a uniform on him. We had given all of them names. He knows a little bit of english and i was talking to him. It worked. We got him into uniform. The only thing he had on the was what we called a burlap sack. We put him in a uniform. Kids thathat group of later became an orphanage over there. They built that. I didnt have anything to do with that. Where they are now . I dont know. Were you able to look around seoul . As i remember there werent roads in that place. That a major city now area landing occurred before we were there but i did land there. What did you think about . What made you feel about it . . Id you feel was savage when you seefeel this destroyed . Knowe country i didnt much about. I didnt know much about the. Land tos strange of a me is america would be to them. Education. Ttle i was active in sports. I messed my leg up playing sports. I reinjured the same leg over there. You thought it was strange . It was a strange land. People spoke the language i did understand. Did you know why you were there . We were fighting a war. That puzzled me for a little while. This is a strange land. I learned a little bit more about it. Korea was prisoners of the japanese. We risk them in that and the risk them in north korea going down through the. We drove them back just as we got back there. I was not part of that drive. A lot of americans lost their lives. Two of them right next to me. One from south dakota and one from california. They nearly got me. I had no scratches. Did you write a letter back to your wife . What is her name . Joann. I wrote practically every day when i could. I got free postage on the frontline. I have a photo album in here. I had a camera with me. It must be very hard for you and your wife to be separated like that. I got the honorary one and a regular one. I was one of the first people who got two r rs. Only because of harry truman first cousin. I happen to be at the right place at the right time. He had enough of it. There was no evidence that they were lying with the negotiation. What did you write to your wife . Tried to not worry her too much about where we were. I dont remember too much about it. She told me if you ever get a get some dishes, get them over there. This is kind of a funny story. They were kind of expensive but you could go in and the guy told me where to go. It was about a mile and a half. I mailed it to her, it cost me more to mail it than it did to buy it. They steal the dishes and other items and sell it at the flea market. [laughter] the only reason they are in e is so you can see my return address is where i was at those dates. That is the only reason they are in there. What was the most difficult thing during your service in korea . What was the most difficult thing to you . Facing the enemy was the most difficult thing. You never knew when one of those bullets was going to hit you. Firefight that started as a miscue lasted about 810 days. They were shooting to knock my machine gun out with the mountain gun. They were 75 caliber. They got my machine gun after about three shots. The first one thank goodness was under it. I gave silk wood, farley and a chance to get out. We lay down in a trench. About the third shot they hit that machine gun and knocked it up in the air about six feet. Process we had an artillery gun dug into the hill. I started to got some of them. That, three days later the artillery was shooting at this 90 millimeter. It took them two days to hit it. It was 300 rounds of artillery round. That was almost aroundtheclock. They had some good information. Anyway, this happen for about three days. That was the worst part. You never knew when one of those was going to hit you. It killed six of our guys. They thought they were secure. Where did you sleep, what did you eat, and how much were you paid . Had sea rations. Dayt every fifth or sixth we rotated people out of our front lines back to the rear where they would get a shower and clean clothes. When you went back to the rear you would eat good food. Like the army cafeteria. It was pretty good food. What was your favorite menu . You want to hear the worst one. The worst one is corned beef hash. Everybody says that, why is that . Imagine eating a bunch of grease, that is about what it was in. I see. Ones, you the best might laugh at this, frank said frank franks an d beans. Frontlinee from the and i weighed 120 p9ounds. What did you sleep . Was it in the trench . Trench in ain a sleeping bag, we went two hours on and two hours off. We slept more in the daytime then we did at night. Actually sleep. At nighttime it is two hours on and two hours off. Often times they would wake you up before two hours were up. You arrived in february in the frontline. Have been very cold . It was pretty cold. We werent there during the real cold other. We had snow on the ground. You sleep in the trench with the sleeping bag . I cannot imagine how you went through those. The sleeping bags were pretty heavy. They would keep you warm. We had fairly warm clothing. We had gloves. Then you had the helmet on top of that. The name for bernie powell, he. As a photographer he was a writer and wrote about the army. How much were you paid at the time . Not very much. The biggest part of my pay went to my wife. I think you get about 25 or 30 a month. To your wife . She got most of it. I went to Machine School in atlanta, georgia. That was like a honeymoon for us. We lived about a mile off base. She transferred her job down to atlanta. What this she work . She worked for Prudential Life insurance company. They transferred her work down there to be with me. That was basically our honeymoon. Have you been back to korea . No. Vivid memory of korea in 1952. Now you know the korean economy and democracy, how do you contrast this . Can you put it into perspective . Theres no comparison, it is more like our country here. The people in the south have freedom. By the way, i know one of the , she lives here in kansas city. She was from south korea at the time the war broke out. The other one is about a girls being taken by the japanese and then made comfort women out of them. She writes about that in one book. She lives here in kansas city. She used to play in the symphony orchestra. To see her from time to time. She is a nice girl. A nice woman. When did you leave korea . Plane withorea in a my leg torn up. I could barely stand up. I spent a week in the hospital. The generalays in hospital in japan. That was in the fall of the year. Ut, i waseball n listening to the world series of time and the yankees were playing the dodgers i believe. Was named dr. Tors bobby brown. He was at one time a third baseman for the yankees. I was listening to the ballgame and he had talked to me a little bit. We were getting a rebroadcast. In the hospital it took about two weeks where i was totally in the bed. I could barely get up. Then i started moving around a little bit. Days begins to i began to walk pretty good. I didnt have much money. To where itrain up spent two r rs. I met one of the guys i was in Machine School with. I stayed with him. When did you leave korea . I dont remember the exact date. The world series was going on at the time. 1952. So it was september or october . Tell me about this. What do you think about the whole thing that happened you . Korea, you didnt know nothing about it. Now you know it is the 11th largest economy in the world. How do you characterize this . I wondered why we were over there. You look now and you know why we were over there. People have the same freedom as we do. Bird in the north wants to taken away from them. He wants to enslave south korea again. I have mixed feelings about that. It is a good thing we did that. Tremendous thing. It is hard for me to deal with it. More People Killed in korea in three years then the word vietnam in 10. I had three months left in the military before i could get a discharge. Was stationed me and i testing the new inductees. I took the test again to see how i would do on it, i have improved my score a little bit. Thing to do. N had monday, tuesday, and wednesday. , thursday,oing this friday. I was living off base. I really got to know my wife again. We had access to a library and read all the books. Was the legacy of the korean war and your service . At the time i didnt think it was a good thing but harry truman did a great thing. Look at the freedom they have. When i was over there i didnt think it was. Are you proud of your service . Yes. , the best thing i did was join this organization. It bothered me a long time. I wouldnt trade that for anything. These guys are all my friends. Told me your grandson is going to go to korea, what is going on . Hes not really my grandson. Hes my grandnephew. Musicquite talented in and plays a cello. He lives in dallas. I was talking to him yesterday. He didnt know the exact date yet. The country you saved, now youre grandnephew is going there. Hes about six foot tall. Played four tours. He is a nice kid. Father got to be pretty wealthy. He is quite talented. He plays in the dallas orchestra. My nephew plays in the dallas orchestra. He won a musical scholarship. While he was down there he met in ands, they bankrolled wanted to start a company that does background checks on people. Detective school to start this company up. They wantedrs ago the money out of it and some new york buyer bought them out and made them all multimillionaires. All three of them are millionaires. He is still down in dallas. That is his son. The whole family is talented. Thank you for sharing that. Episodes ofecific your battle experience in korea that you want to share with us . I want to tell you about the little boy in the lumber yard. We became one of those guys. Ok, keep talking, please. I dont know where he is today. But i hope he is still alive. Thank you very much. Next on the civil war, historian Harold Holzer and Valerie Paley of the New York Historical society talk about artifacts featured in their joint publication, the civil with a focusects, on soldiers uniforms and accoutrements. In 45 minutes, activists kate tello talks about her involvement with the civil rights movement, starting with her participation in the