Veteran's Day 2012

On the eve of Veterans Day 2012 my thoughts reflect back to the greatest soldier I had ever known, my dad Cpl. Patrick Harper. In 1949, at age 17, my father escaped from the orphanage in Brooklyn New York and joined the United States Army. He was sent to Oklahoma and trained as a forward field artillery observer (radar man). He learned in three months what it took a World War II soldier one year to learn. He got his real training for what was ahead of him growing up in the orphanage in Brooklyn, New York, during the 1930s. He said the North Korean's could take lessons on torture from the preist and nuns he knew. At the end of July 1950, he boarded a US Navy ship in San Francisco headed for some "easy duty" in Japan. At the last minute the ship turned away from Japan and  entered the harbor at Pusan, South Korea. The Communist had crossed the 38th parallel and push the South Korean troops all the way to the Pusan Harbor. Pres. Harry S Truman decided to fight communism. This was the first military action for the newly formed United Nations. My father's first  combat started the day he landed in South Korea August 5, 1950, in what was known as the Pusan perimeter. The first three months were a brutal battle for the United States, 8th Army. My father was in the eighth Army 24th infantry division, first Field artillery Battalion, Company A. After three months, they had pushed the North Koreans back. General Arthur had his famous Inchon  landing and met up with the advancing 8th Army. By this time, my father could best be described as, a seasoned combat veteran. He had seen more combat in three months than most soldiers see in a lifetime. Daily they would carry out the dead American soldiers and new soldiers would arrive. To the soldiers that were scared they refer to my dad as Cpl. Harper. To the soldiers that my dad save their lives. He was known as Pat from Brooklyn. The 8th Army arrived at a river and asked for a volunteer to swim to an Island in the middle of the river to see if there were any North Koreans on the Island, if so how many? and what equipment they possesed. My dad volunteered mainly because he didn't trust anyone else's observations. He wanted to see for himself. He swam at night in the cold, frigid water to the island and found it to be swarming with North Korean soldiers very heavily armed. After making his observations without  detection. He swam back to the shore and made his report, and saved hundreds of lives. The eighth Army advanced and liberated the capital of Korea, Seoul. They pushed the Communist North Koreans back past the 38th parallel. They advanced into North Korea. And arrived at the Manchurian border and looked over the Yalu River into China. In October of 1950 they had noticed that some of the dead enemy soldiers were not North Korean but Chinese. Things settled down in the month of November, as they prepared for a big Thanksgiving dinner. The rumor was they would be home by Christmas. On the night of November 25, 1950, the temperature droped 70°, to 50° below zero. The eighth Army soldiers were equipped with spring clothing. That night, 900,000 Red Communist Chinese soldiers sneaked attack the Americans. My dad fought all night long. My dad was on a hill surrounded by Chinese. They had used all their ammunition and as dawn approached the Chinese sounded a bugle and made one last charge up the hill to take the Americans. My father jumped out of his foxhole with his rifle and used it as a baseball bat and started hitting Chineese soldiers and knocking them to the ground, this startled  the Chinese, they had never seen a 6 foot tall red-headed irishman using his gun like a baseball bat and they turned and ran. Mortars rang out throughout the night and my father was wounded. Every other man lay dead. The American soldiers were told "leave the dead behind". One of my father's fellow soldiers threw my dad over his shoulder and carried him out. My father was wounded twice during the Korean War. Both times he was sent back to the front line. Because my father was an orphan and had no family back home he would take other soldiers place on the front line who had families back home and were scared, because of this, he spent more time on the front line then any other soldier in the Korean War. My father was captured by the Chinese and taken prisoner of war. They tied bamboo poles to his arms and marched him through villages toward Manchuria. When going through the villages. The people would come out and throw rocks at his face and punch him and hit him and kick him.  That night, he and his fellow POWs were housed in an old barn in the morning were they were going to go on a forced death march to Manchuria. My father told his fellow POWs "I'm going to take this size 13 foot and kick out this wall and escape"he told the others to all run in different directions and the chineese could shoot, but couldn't kill everyone. My father kicked the wall out and ran. He ran all through the night. He would run into tress and would be knocked to the ground and get up and keep running, he ran and ran and ran all through the night.Then a new fear set in. He had reached the front line and didn't want to be shot by an American soldier. He arrive safely in camp. I met a man at my father's funeral. He knew my father before the war in New York. He also had joined the Army and was sent to Korea in the eighth Army. He knew my father before the war, during the war and after the war. He told me after three months in Korea your father changed, he said not only were the North Koreans afraid to your dad and the Chinese afraid your dad. He said that the Americans were afraid of your dad also, He said whenever there was any kind of combat action. This fellow would go and hide in the rear somewhere so he wouldn't get hurt. He said my father would pick up a machine gun and run to wherever the fight was. A man wrote a book about the Korean War and told the story about my father. He said one day they were attacked by Chinese and everyone turned around and ran. He said my father grabbed machine gun and ran out to the middle of a rice paddy and started shooting Chinese. My father told me when he escaped from the orphanage that what had happened to him in the past was not his fault, but from that moment on, he was responsible for his own destiny. My father was awarded the bronze Star with the "V" insignia for Valor. This metal was pinned on his chest in North Korea by Gen. Ridgway. He was also awarded the Purple Heart. He liberated Seoul South Korea twice. After the war, my father never picked up a gun, ever again. He was asked to go hunting one time, and he responded that he had done enough killing. The man that I knew was kind, gentle and non-violent and never beat me ( even though I deserved it sometimes.) I saw him bravely stand up to the Ku Klux Klan in Sherman, Texas in 1962 defending civil rights.I asked my father to tell me the story about the Korean War when he was 60 years old. He had never talked about his experience before, but on that particular night in that particular tavern, he told me the story. I have shared some of the story with you here today. Some of the story, I'll never repeat to anyone for it was to horrific. So, on the eve of this Veterans Day 2012, as I sit back and enjoy freedom and liberty. I recall the greatest soldier I ever knew.