Posts Tagged ‘US Navy’
They Pray Like Angels and Fight Like Demons
“The Puerto Ricans are proud of their heritage, and on top of that, the soldiers of the 65th Infantry are very proud of their Regiment . . .” – William W. Harris, Commanding Officer, 65th Infantry Regiment Fought in sub-zero temperatures, brutal terrain, and knee-deep snow, the Chosin-Hungnam campaign, the most costly and potentially disastrous four weeks…
Read MoreA “Timeless” Tribute to the Korean War
In one of the most unlikely events of holiday primetime television, the writers of “Timeless,” a science fiction drama series with a following of millions, showcased the Korean War’s Hungnam Evacuation. The show’s final episode, which aired on December 20 and highlighted the little-known military and humanitarian operation, became the talk of the town on…
Read MoreA Christmas Miracle
Thousands of refugees, huddled at the water’s edge and anxiously waiting to board American ships, knew what would happen if they were left behind. The Chinese, massing in the nearby mountains, would storm into Hungnam and make an example of anyone who had defied them. US and ROK collaborators, Christians, anti-communists, and anyone deemed a…
Read MoreWork, Fight, Sacrifice!
On December 7, 1941, a day that would live in infamy, Pauline Peyton Forney, a mother of three, including a son who was serving in the Marines, knew her life was about to change. With over 2,300 Americans dead, more than a thousand wounded, and the US Navy’s Pacific Fleet crippled, President Roosevelt would soon…
Read MoreAn Eternal Brotherhood
On a cold, starless night deep in the snow-covered mountains of North Korea, John Lee, a Korean interpreter with 1st Marine Division, watched as about twenty people cautiously entered a small building. Worried that the suspicious-looking North Korean civilians might be communist sympathizers plotting to infiltrate American units at Chosin, he made his way silently…
Read MoreGuided by God’s Own Hand: Captain Leonard LaRue and the Meredith Victory
From deadly World War II Murmansk runs, to history’s greatest rescue operation by a single ship, to a life of prayer as a Benedictine monk, Leonard LaRue, or Brother Marinus as he was called after entering St. Paul’s Abbey in Newton, New Jersey, led a life of service to others. He has recently been remembered…
Read MoreHe Promised Me He Wouldn’t Do Anything Heroic
On April 9, 1949, 2nd Lieutenant Robert “Bob” Reem and Donna Zimmerli, both 24, were married at the US Naval Academy Chapel in Annapolis, Maryland. Bob, a prior enlisted Marine and graduate of the Naval Academy, and Donna, the daughter of a US Navy Captain and an alumna of the University of North Carolina, had…
Read MoreFrom a PT Boat to the Streets of Seoul, William H. Shaw’s Life of Character and Conscience
Should I Stay Or Should I Go? For Bill Shaw, a 28-year-old husband, father of two, and first-year doctoral student at Harvard, the answer was clear. He told his wife, two young sons, parents, and professors he’d be back soon. His studies could wait, he explained. Three months later, on September 22, 1950, US Navy…
Read MoreFollow Me! The Life and Legacy of a Medal of Honor Recipient
In one of the most iconic images of the Korean War, a Marine lieutenant climbs out of a landing craft, his right foot on a rocky seawall, his right hand gripping a rifle. Smoke fills the sky. Ladders, with ominous-looking hooks, jut upwards. His body, lunging forward, gives the impression of a man with confidence…
Read MorePhysically and Emotionally Frozen
Sixty-seven years ago, on November 27, 1950, one of the most monumental battles in US history began in the desolate, unforgiving mountains of North Korea. What occurred over the next two weeks was nothing short of a terrifying, grisly, and frozen nightmare. Chosin, as the savage fight between US and Chinese forces is now called,…
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