The Star Over Koto-ri
The Marines at Koto-ri had been holding since the Chinese surrounded it ten days earlier. However, the Chinese started coming in greater strength, and if Koto-ri fell to the Chinese, the entire division would be hopelessly trapped! The Marines depended heavily on the Marine Corsairs (fighter planes) to help defend Koto-ri. The Chinese feared the Corsairs because those planes could fire rockets at them, machine gun them, and drop napalm or bombs on them. They hid from the Corsairs in daytime.
We had mostly clear weather for air support, but then it began to snow heavily and visibility was limited. The Marines knew that if it did not stop snowing by morning, allowing the Marine Corsairs to fly, the Chinese would likely overrun Koto-ri. We prayed that night for the skies to clear. Just before dawn, a faint lone star appeared through the clouds in the east. The Marines cheered – they knew their prayers had been answered! That star, known as “the Star over Koto-ri,” is the symbol of The Chosin Few. We owe a debt of gratitude to the Corsair pilots who took off and landed on ice-coated carrier decks in a blowing blizzard to provide us with protection.
We were unable to bring out our dead. I watched from my howitzer at Koto-ri as the stiff, frozen bodies of 117 Marines were buried after their dog tags were retrieved. The site was recorded in hopes that someday their remains would be retrieved.
We found more howitzer ammunition, and the remaining howitzers were placed back into action, firing most of the night in the direction we would be attacking the next day. To keep from cratering the road with high explosive ammunition, we used proximity fuses or air bursts. We had to clear the howitzer breach by hand wearing a heavy mitten to scrape out burning embers to prevent a powder bag from premature igniting. I was very proud of my gun crew’s performance under such adverse conditions.
The night we left Koto-ri our meteorologist reported the temperature at midnight was 60 degrees below zero. South of Koto-ri we came upon 50 Chinese frozen to death as they waited to ambush us.
Bridging the Gap
Marines marching from Funchilin Pass to Chinhung-ri
At Funchilin Pass, a concrete bridge spanned a 2,000-foot chasm with four large pipes that carried water from the reservoir down the mountain to a hydroelectric plant. The Chinese had blown out the bridge, leaving a 29-foot gap. With the pump house on the left and a steep drop on the right, there was no way to bypass it. It looked as if we would have to abandon tanks, trucks, bulldozers, guns, everything!
The ingenuity of our Marine engineers saved the day. Eight portable Treadway bridge sections about 2,500 pounds each were air dropped in by C-119 flying boxcars. One was damaged and another fell into Chinese territory. The rest landed intact, and our engineers erected four of them over the chasm. The bridge was brilliantly built; just narrow enough for a jeep and wide enough for a truck or tank. I walked across one side in the middle of the night, which was good as I could not see how far down it was!
Below Koto-ri, the road descended 4,000 feet from the plateau to Chinhung-ni where the 3rd Army Division was holding the perimeter around the port of Hungnam. The battleships in Hungnam harbor, including the USS Missouri, were firing day and night in support of our
withdrawal.
After the battle, I asked an atheist if he still did not believe in God. He replied that it was God who saved him! Nine Marines from North Texas became ordained Ministers.
Evacuation
On 11 December, totally exhausted after having walked 76 miles in thirteen days with little in the way of food, water or sleep, I reached the port of Hungnam where the Navy was waiting to evacuate us. On 12 December, I boarded the USS General E. T. Collins, which was designed to carry 2,000 troops. With 6,000 aboard it was severely crowded, but it was like paradise to be out of the cold. We received penicillin shots as we all had walking pneumonia. We sailed to Pusan at the southern tip of the Korean peninsula along with almost 100,000 civilian refugees in our convoy.
We had not been able to write home since Thanksgiving. One Dallas Morning News headline read ”Entire Marine Division Surrounded,” giving cause for our families to worry and pray. They spent Christmas 1950 not knowing if any of the 1st Marine Division still existed as all news had been blacked out during the evacuation. A “National Day of Prayer” was declared while the nation waited.
It was 20 December before we could write our first letters home. My letter arrived the day after Christmas. It was hard to write and tell my family about those from Dallas who had been killed. Unfortunately, in some cases the Navy had not yet informed the next of kin. My family, while talking on the telephone to other families, could not reveal that they knew their son was one of those killed.
We spent the month of January at Masan on the southern tip of Korea. It was cold, but we had sleeping bags and stoves that burned diesel fuel in our tents. We still had walking pneumonia, but we were gradually regaining our health. Our fingers and faces had turned black and had no feeling. I could pick up a burning hot stove top and hear the sizzling and smell the burning flesh, but I felt nothing.
Back Into Battle
After a brief respite, it was time for the 1st Marine Division to re-enter the war and for me to earn my fifth Korean War Battle Star. We received new howitzers and replacements to bring us back up to strength. In February, we moved by truck to an airfield at Pohang on the east coast where we fought a gorilla type war with the North Koreans.
General Matthew Ridgeway was now the Far East commander, and he was determined to kill as many Chinese as possible in conventional warfare. Artillery is known as the most devastating weapon for this purpose. During a twenty-hour fire mission of massed artillery, we were credited with killing 10,000 Chinese.
The Chinese had massed more than a million men for an all-out attack across the peninsula; their intent was to drive all UN forces into the sea. At dawn, the Chinese were all over the hillside in front of us firing their submachine guns with the intent to kill the gun crews. My howitzer had an earthen protection created by a bulldozer so we were in no danger from bullets. A couple of Army mobile howitzers fired point blank into the hillside, and then Marines attacked to clear them out.
The Chinese lost so many men in the all-out assault that it led to truce talks and a two-year stalemate. It became trench warfare with seesaw battles trying to establish a truce line if an armistice should be reached. After more than two years of talks, an armistice was signed by the military commanders on 27 July 1953. A peace treaty was never signed, and technically, a state of war still exists between North and South Korea.
border between North and South Korea today
Bound as One
Whatever we were in that frozen land long ago, and whatever we are now, we are bound as one for life in an exclusive fraternity of honor. The only way into our ranks is to have paid the dues of duty, sacrifice and valor by being there. The cost of joining, in short, is beyond all earthly wealth.
Because the battle took place around a reservoir named “Chosin” and because we suffered a large number of casualties, we are known today as “The Chosin Few.” We served in the coldest temperature ever endured by the United States forces. We served against the most insurmountable odds. And we participated in the longest fighting retreat and the greatest sea evacuation in United States history.
The 15,000 Marines of the 1st Marine Division, suffered 12,000 casualties both from enemy action and cold weather.
The Army on the east side of the reservoir originally numbered 3,100. They suffered more than 1,200 killed or missing and more than 1,500 wounded. There were only 385 combat-able survivors.
The 120,000 Chinese Communist Forces had been ordered to annihilate the UN forces to the last man. But the Chinese themselves were virtually annihilated.
A total of 17 Medals of Honor and seven Navy Crosses were awarded, the most for a single battle in U.S. history.
Welcome Home
After serving nine months in Korea, I was promoted to Staff Sergeant. I left the war in May 1951. I was flown from near the 38th parallel to Pusan and then sailed onboard the USNS General W. F. Hase to Treasure Island in San Francisco. We were the largest group to return home from the Korean War. The newspaper headline read “WELCOME HOME MARINES.” The citizens of San Francisco welcomed us with open arms; while on liberty, they bought us drinks and meals. It was the opposite from the reception the Vietnam veterans later received.
I received a ten-day furlough and returned to my bride of ten days. My next orders were to report to Camp Pendleton. I fully expected to be sent back to Korea after a few months of stateside duty. But at Camp Pendleton, I was told that I had been released from active duty. I returned home but still had time remaining on my enlistment when a directive by the Commandant of the Marine Corps stated that those who had served in World War II and the Korean War could request a discharge. I wasted no time in doing so.
Conclusion
I have known the thrill of victory in seeing our flag raised and the agony of defeat at Chosin. I earned seven battle stars for action in World War II and Korea. My units received four U.S. Presidential Unit Citations – one for Okinawa and three for Korea, plus two Korean Presidential Unit Citations. I have the equivalent of more than five months of front line combat, and I fought every battle I was in from invasion to end. This is a record very few Marines attain. The wars cost me the opportunity to get a college education as I had a Mother to support and no income.
Combat is indescribable. It is Hell beyond belief; you fight each day watching others being killed or wounded. At night you sleep in a shallow grave called a foxhole. You sleep – if you can – in two hour shifts or whenever you can. If an attack is expected, no one sleeps. Days became weeks at Chosin during which we could not sleep.
You live day and night in every type of weather. You wear the same clothes and underwear for months. You live on rations for months. You do not shower or shave. You do not have toothpaste or deodorant. You become hardened to death and the smell of death. You accept the fact that you may be the next one killed or wounded, and you pray to God constantly for deliverance if killed. I served in seven such battles.
In Saipan, the 1st Battalion, 29th Marines suffered eighty percent casualties. In Okinawa, the 29th Regiment suffered eighty percent casualties. At Chosin, the 1st Marine Division suffered eighty percent casualties. What are the odds that one Marine could survive three battles that each had eighty percent casualties? Was this fate? Good luck? Or are prayers really answered?
Many Marines were buried on the islands where they died. Later, the remains were relocated, some to the Philippines, others to the family plot at home. Many were re-interred in the National Cemetery of the Pacific known as “The Punchbowl” which is an extinct volcano in Honolulu, Hawaii. I found twenty-eight headstones of Marines that I served with in World War II at the Punchbowl. Unfortunately, we had to bury many of those killed in North Korea in enemy territory. They may never be recovered, but for as long as I live they will not be forgotten.
At the Dallas-Fort Worth National Cemetery, along the memorial walk is a monument to The Chosin Few, which was my project from conception to completion. Everyone in the North Texas Chapter of The Chosin Few donated the funds. "The Star Over Koto-ri” is visible to anyone approaching from either direction.
Since 1990, I have attended many reunions with those that I served with from both World War II and Korea. Most of them are gone now, and those of us who still attend, shake hands knowing it may be for the last time.
At a reunion in Las Vegas in 1990, our Regimental Commander, Major McReynolds, told me that my howitzer was recaptured in April 1952. It was identified by the serial number.
I give thanks to God every day. Only he and I know what I went through that created the bond I have with him. In combat death is inevitable. I do not believe that God has anything to do with who lives and who dies. I was prepared to die and prayed for deliverance. That has not changed.
Watson Crumbie
June 2012 - June 2013
Sixth Marine Division