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“We had had very specific orders from the commanding general that we were to stay completely out of any fire fight unless we were fired upon.” |
AS we prepared to leave Peking, there was scuttlebutt of a great confrontation between the forces of Mao Tse-tung and Chiang Kai-shek with millions of soldiers on each side. General George Marshal had been sent by President Truman to help negotiate peace between them. He arrived in China on the same day that we did and had failed in his mission. The Americans then began to support the Nationalists with massive shipments of weapons and supplies and used the Navy and Air Force to transport Chiang's armies to the front at the Manchurian border.
Our train stopped when we got ninety miles up the line from Tientsin about halfway to the village of Tin-yu where the Great Wall divides old China from its Manchurian province. We had arrived at the village of Lin-si that was dominated by a big coal slag pile that was three-hundred feet high. We hoped that this stop was only to regroup for a great battle at the wall. Instead the battalion was split up, and each of the three companies was sent to occupy separate mining villages. We were ordered to set up perimeter defenses around each of three gigantic coal mines that were about seven miles apart. There was a fourth mine, defended by Fox Company from the Second Battalion. Horse and I were once again back in harness as riflemen in How Company, Second Platoon.
Our commanding officer announced that our mission had been changed because this coal field provided seventy-percent of China's energy and a stop in coal shipments would paralyze China's industry and cut off her electric power. This would win the war quickly for the Communists, and without the necessity of military victory. The catch to this, he continued, was that we were supposed to help the Nationalists without getting directly involved in the fighting. What a letdown! Did President Truman believe that our very presence between these giant opposing armies would really make any difference in the final outcome? Most of the Marines thought that the other two divisions that were still in the islands should be brought to China to help us whip those Commies once and for all. In the meantime, we would gladly help hold them off at the Great Wall.
Later we learned the error of that logic. The corruption in the Nationalist government and army made victory impossible for them. The tax collectors never seemed to get all the money to the treasury, and the government was forced to keep printing more money until the exchange rate became 20,000 yuan to one American dollar.
Lin-si was a walled village. It was built to house the families from Belgium who owned the mines until they fled from the Japanese. Herbert Hoover, as a young engineer, had modernized and provided electrification of the mines back in the twenties before he became President of the U.S. Each mine shipped several train loads of coal per day. Some trains went north to the port of Ching Huang-tao and some went south to Tientsin and points south. The electric power lines made a complete circle of the mines so that if the lines were cut in one place, all the mines would still have power. If the power was ever cut off from a mine, it would fill up with water and be lost forever. The mines were 2,700 feet deep -- the second deepest in the world.
We settled in at Lin-si and found our village fairly comfortable. The houses were used for officer's quarters and the various battalion offices. Also, one was set up as a "slopshoot" for the enlisted men. There was a row of Quonset huts for the troops. The perimeter wall made it easy to control access to the village and mine, but it was totally inadequate for military defense. With only 200 men in Howe Company plus a few companies of Chinese soldiers it would be pretty hard to hold out against a large assault. If Chiang didn't rush some reinforcements to our area between us and the big Communist Army, it would soon be all over for his government -- and for us too!
We began our regular four on, four off guard watch patrolling the mine with Chinese soldiers. One night on our guard round, a mine foreman offered to take Horse and me down into the mine with him. We rode for ten minutes down a steep rail line and then stopped so that we could see the various tunnels leading to the mining areas where little donkeys pulled rail cars full of coal. These creatures were born, worked all their lives, and died without ever seeing the light of day. The miners worked twelve-hour shifts and earned six dollars per month. Later that summer, there was a miner's strike. It was eventually settled for an extra dollar per month plus a bag of flour thrown in. We were glad to get back to the surface before someone pulled the "plug" and sealed our doom!
Horse and I spent our idle time in the slopshoot playing cards and drinking "Three Feathers" whisky that sold for five cents a shot. Poker was fun with Chinese money because you could win a million yuan with one lucky card! It was no doubt a mistake to give us teenagers all that whisky because some went a little crazy from intoxication. Marine infantry companies usually had someone who could speak Apache to serve as company scouts. Our scout was named Red Feather and was quartered in our hut. One night, his two buddies brought him home from the Chinese village outside the wall where he was punching out everything and everybody who got in his way. Red Feather was too full of Three Feathers! While they were steering him to his cot, he saw my samurai swords under my cot, grabbed one, and started swishing it around all over the hut. Finally, two brave Marines grabbed him from behind while a third punched him out! I was beginning to get sick of those damned swords!
The military situation became very tense and we spent half our time "dug in"" on full alert. Bands of guerrilla soldiers were having occasional fire fights with the Chinese garrison. With a million Communists poised to strike across the Great Well from the north, it was an uneasy situation. Each Belgian house was equipped with a secret tunnel from the basement to the wooded area outside the village. Would our officers, who were quartered there, use them if our village was overwhelmed? Of course not! They no doubt would stand and fight with the rest of us because they were the most Gung Ho of all! The tension finally eased as more Chinese reinforcements arrived.
Then the Communists started blowing up the coal trains. Our CO asked for volunteers to ride on the trains flying the American flag which they hoped would deter these attacks. Horse and I made numerous trips to the port of Ching Huan-tao just south of the Manchurian border, and to Tientsin to the south. The four volunteers rode in the caboose, armed with one BAR, two M-1s, and a light machine gun. We could pour out fourteen-hundred rounds per minute, and felt that we could defend our-selves against anything. In addition, there was a platoon of Chinese soldiers riding up on the engine tender to guard the front end.
On our layovers in Tientsin, we would go out on the town and explore that amazing city. It had been an international open city with six European countries sharing the jurisdiction. The city was cut like a pie, dividing each national area. You could tour around in a circle and visit six different national cultures, which were reflected in the restaurants, bars, shops, and, as some Marines found, even the brothels.
We had to cross a big river to get to the downtown area from the railroad yards where we were quartered in a hut. We crossed the river on a "pole boat" which was a platform built on top of a rowboat and propelled by a coolie with a long pole. The filthy river was used as a dump, a sewer, and sometimes, a receptacle for human bodies. After getting tipsy from sampling cocktails from several different nationalities, we, of course, fell in the river on our way across.
Thank heaven they gave us shots for every conceivable disease before we left Guam! They did miss one -- Japanese encephalitis. A number of our company at Lin-si came down with it and consequently two Marines died. Serum for inoculations was rushed over from Japan and shots were administered immediately -- even before the dosage information was received. What a sight that was with 200 men all passed out and strewn all over the mess hall where the shots in triple strength had been administered.
The American flags on our trains worked for a while, until the Communists started blowing up the tracks. Since I had become a squad leader, I was the train guard commander on the day our train was blown up -- right in the middle of the train. I couldn't tell at first if it was a wreck or just a routine stop because the cars always telescoped and caused the caboose to stop with a resounding crash. Then gunfire told us that our train, indeed, had been wrecked, and that the battle was on.
We had had very specific orders from the commanding general that we were to stay completely out of any fire fight unless we were fired upon. He explained that the Communists would love an excuse to attack us and get us out of China. The United States was using us only to buy time to forestall the big Communist thrust, until we got Chiang's army resupplied and in place to defend the country. Our platoon of Chinese soldiers were shooting it out with their enemy while we took cover under the caboose.
Horse and I, more than anything in the world, wanted our baptism of fire, but we had to obey our orders or suffer dire consequences. But we weren't out yet, and there was a good chance that we would have to fight our way to Tientsin, more than forty miles away. Then an enemy round, possibly a stray, smacked into the caboose which gave us the excuse to empty our weapons in the direction of the enemy fire. There I was, on a nineteenth century train, shooting it out with bandits, and wondering if it was the final shots of World War II, the beginning of World War III, or just a John Wayne movie!
I left Horse in charge and took the engine and six Chinese soldiers to the next station where I finally got the telegrapher to understand that I wanted him to wire Tientsin for help. We waited under that wrecked train all day until Baker Company of the 7th Marines finally came to our rescue and took us to their base in Tientsin for a big midnight steak dinner.
On our next run, we laid over at Ching Huan-tao, and quartered in a room near the terminal. We arrived very late at night and two other train guard crews were asleep. One Marine woke up and said they were from Item Company. "Anyone from New York?" came a typical Marine greeting. "No, how about Ohio?" I responded. Then Harold Innis stuck his head out of his blanket and cried, "That you, Hursh?" I yelled, "Horse! It's Innis!" We both jumped on him at the same time, breaking down his cot amid our tears of joy. "We were worried about you old buddy!" I admitted, as we helped him out of his blankets and sleeping bag. What a celebration we had that night! Someone broke out a bottle of real Russian vodka, and we passed it around as we briefed each other on our adventures since we separated on the ship at Guam. Innis told us about getting off the Hughes just before she sank, but all he would say about Okinawa was, "We sure got shot up on that rock."
Then he changed the subject and asked what we had been doing since we left him on the ship at Guam. Apparently, he just couldn't talk about his memories of the Okinawa campaign. We would have to wait until he was ready to tell about it. He told us that he was now in "I" Company and stationed at the Number Two mine which was about seven miles west of the village of Linsi where our "G" Company was stationed. It was a relief to know that he was OK, and a member of our battalion.
About a week later, Innis' "Item" Company was confronted by a whole division of 23,000 Chinese Communist soldiers who demanded that all Americans get out. Our battalion commander decided to call their bluff and rushed the other three companies to reinforce them. We quickly grabbed our combat packs, weapons, and all the ammunition we could carry and double timed the whole seven miles to the Number Two Mine. In my haste to don my gear, I forgot to remove the Samurai swords that were tied onto my pack. As I clanked along I was afraid that the noise and the reflections of the moonlight on the swords would give away our position. I asked the lieutenant if I should dump them, and his reply was, "Are they sharp?" "Hell, yes!" I said. "You may need them before this night is over!" was his grim reply. Horse and I then each stuck a sword in our belts, quickened our pace, and sped to Innis' rescue! Our whole battalion was deployed inside that perimeter wall all night, just daring those Communists to attack, but they didn't. They didn't cut the power lines either. They just wanted us out of their way. The Marines were apparently just a thorn in their side.
The Nationalists were able to maintain traffic on the railroad by shuttling the trains from one side of the double tracks to the other while repairs were made to the blown rails. The Communists, then started blowing up the railroad bridges and our platoon was sent to guard a key bridge near the northern end of the line called Bridge 54.
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The orders came through suddenly the same morning that I lost my corporal stripes. Horse, Innis and I had gotten together and really "tied one on" down in the Chinese village. We were out all night, a positive no-no. Our uniforms were completely disheveled when we passed out on our bunks at dawn. They couldn't wake up Horse for roll call, but unfortunately, I made it. The first sergeant took one look at me, called me front and center in front of the whole company and told me I looked like a sad specimen of humanity. He busted me to PFC and sentenced me to march up and down the company street with full transport pack and equipment beginning right after breakfast and until 1600 hours. Fortunately for me, right after breakfast we were all marching on our way to the train bound for Bridge 54.
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That bridge looked like another impossible defensive position. It was a long trestle bridge across a river. A battle scarred concrete watchtower was the only semblance of fortification. A large Quonset hut and two small ones comprised our barracks, mess hall, officers' quarters, and storage magazine. There was only one way to defend this bridge -- dig, dig, and dig some more. First, we enclosed a two-acre area with concertina wire, piled three coils high. Then we dug perimeter foxholes, connected with each other by deep trenches and connected to our barracks by more trenches. We kept adding to this network until after a couple of weeks of digging, we had the whole area honeycombed with holes and tunnels like an ant colony.
One day when I was digging a trench, I dug into a grave and started throwing out human bones. I asked the sergeant if I could detour around it, but he insisted that I keep on going. Then a dozen villagers came over and started yelling at me. I didn't know what they were saying, but I got their meaning. We allowed them to remove the remaining bones and then I proceeded with my trench.
There was only one reinforced platoon of forty-eight men to share all of that work and then stand guard watches in the foxholes at night. The platoon leader was a real slave driver and became much disliked. In fact, one Marine threatened to shoot him the next time he inspected the guard in the middle of the night. He said this to me during dinner when the lieutenant was not quite out of voice range. That officer never inspected us after that. Our best sentry was a German shepherd dog left behind by the Japanese garrison. He was always alert and would tell us when intruders approached. This was rather frequent because the villagers would try to steal the tin cans containing pebbles that we tied onto the barbed wire as a kind of early warning system. Many horses were watered at a wide spot in the river near the bridge. When bands of horsemen rode up, it meant another hour on alert in the holes for us.
That province of China was under Communist domination most of the time. Sometimes we could watch the action from our tower as the nearby village changed hands or one band of soldiers was pursued by another. From our vantage point we couldn't tell one from the other. One night Horse and I sneaked over to the village to look around. We met a peasant who could speak a dozen words or so in English. We bought some peanuts and tried to converse with him, but about all we could get from his jabber was that the soldiers from the South were there at night and the ones from the North were there in the daytime. Apparently it was Communist controlled only in the daytime. He showed us his miserable little house that had no water, no toilet, nor electricity. I heard later that there were half a billion peasants living like him. The fields looked very poor, and he was trying to grow a row of barley between each of the rows of corn. They used their precious water five times: to drink, to cook, to wash dishes, to bathe, and then to water their crops.
Several weeks passed and the news from the North became more and more discouraging. It seemed that all of North China would be taken over soon. Hostilities were beginning here and there on a thousand-mile front, and a million Communists were poised to pounce from Manchuria, which was only a few miles up the line. It seemed that they were only waiting for us to get out of their way, and they threatened us frequently.
Our position was becoming increasingly more precarious. If our escape by rail was blocked, we would have to fight our way across hostile country to the sea. Without a bulldozer, we would have to leave our trucks and jeeps and take only what we could carry to fight with. So it was decided to bring a bulldozer from the town of Tang-Shan where the second battalion had a garrison.
Volunteers were asked for at breakfast for a dangerous mission and two hands flew up immediately -- Horse's and mine! We were told to take a six-by and drive to Tan-Shan and accompany the dozer thirty-five miles down the back roads, through several villages which may be either Communist or Nationalist dominated. After breakfast, we loaded plenty of ammunition for Horse's machine gun and my BAR, and took off down those dirt roads. People stared at us as we sped through the villages with our weapons ready and our flag flying high. It was a strange feeling, knowing that some of the people were our friends and some were our deadly enemies -- but not knowing which was which.
The town of Tan-Shan had a cabaret. Horse said that of course, he knew that. Why would he have risked his neck otherwise! We had a great time that evening drinking, dining and dancing -- just what we needed after waiting night after night for action that never came. Our return trip was equally without incident, and my platoon could now escape to the sea if suddenly ordered to pull out.
Our China saga ended when President Truman gave in and decided to evacuate all Americans from North China. We went the way that we came and departed from the Taku sandbar. The USS Breckenridge lay at anchor two miles out in the bay, waiting to begin the American pullout, and to speed us home. As we sailed back across the Yellow Sea and around the tip of Japan, my thoughts were of our Chinese friends, whose homeland was being torn once more by a bloody revolution.. Their last hope had been for us to join their fight, but instead we were pulling out. We hoped they would be able to flee the country before they were captured by their enemies. Later a "Bamboo Curtain" was drawn around China, and little would be heard about the bloody struggle that would cost one hundred million lives.
The Breckenridge sailed past the beaches of Kyushu where the landing of 800,00 soldiers and marines would have taken place just one year before. Then we passed the harbor of Nagasaki, a city that was sacrificed in order to end the war. Next we veered north towards the cold waters of the northernmost reaches of the Pacific on our great circle route. We were all very anxious to get home, but even more so when we realized that we were going so far north. We had left all our clothing, except the summer khakis we had on, for the marines left behind in Shang-hai.
It got colder and colder as we proceeded on our northerly course, and the ship seemed to go slower and slower. We finally heard that our ship was twenty-four hours early for its berth in San Diego, and the Captain was deliberately slowing the crossing by frequently stopping or changing course to give his passengers a better view of a school of whales or seals or a pretty sunset. However, we wanted none of that -- only to get home and into nice warm civilian clothes. But we journeyed from China the same way we journeyed to it -- shivering in our boots!
We were very excited about returning to America and the fabulous post war world that we had been hearing about in recent months. There would be automobiles that could don wings and fly! Fantastic dream homes were being built on assembly lines like autos! We also heard that each veteran would receive a free jeep if he preferred instead of the large bonus for mustering out.
By coincidence, the first thing we saw when we entered San Diego Harbor was an experimental automobile flying over our ship to welcome us home. Everyone was saying, "I'm trading my Jeep for one of those!" The next thing we saw was the Marine band marching smartly down to the pier to "play us in." The leader was resplendent in his fancy dress blues and many battle ribbons, his wide drum major's sash, and his long white baton. It made us proud to be Marines and was almost enough to make us want to re-up! The band leader was watching intently as we came down the gangplank when suddenly I realized it was my brother, Jack!
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He had heard we were coming home and had brought his band down to welcome us. What excitement there was on that pier! Jack came over with his wide grin saying, "Welcome home, Bob! Wait till you see the party we've planned for you! I have a cute blond lined up just for you! And, guess what! We're going to re-enlist for six more years! We get a 30-day furlough, a round-the-world cruise on a carrier, and then we'll be assigned at Pearl Harbor!" "Wait a minute - not so fast!" I protested. "What do you mean, 'we'? I've got other plans, and all I want now is out!"
As luck would have it, I missed the big welcome home party. A medical corpsman broke the test tube containing my blood sample at the dispensary causing me to stay another night -- confined behind those high, well guarded walls of the San Diego Marine Base, while my gala welcome home party ensued. The Corps was taking no chances on our bringing home Asiatic diseases. When I finally got to Jack's house, all that was left of my party were empty bottles and "full" Marines sleeping it off on the floor!
Then I was discharged while Jack arranged his thirty-day furlough. He bought a '31 Ford, the best car he could find on those empty car lots, and we headed east: "Ohio or bust!" And "bust" it was when that car repeatedly broke down and left vital parts in several different states. That was quite a contrast to the flying auto and the big bonus that I had dreamed about.
When we finally reached Ohio, those Tuscarawas County hills sure did look good in their fall colors. When we crossed the high ridge road into Washington Township and could see our family homestead in the valley far below, what a welcome sight that was! We could see Grandad's herds of animals dotting the steep hillsides, and the neat rows of corn shocks in the familiar fields. To me that peaceful scene was what the war had been fought to preserve, and it brought a tear to my eye and a lump to my throat.
On the next evening, we went to Newcomerstown to look for our cousins and friends who were usually out on Saturday nights. We found everyone congregating at the VFW Club. They were having quite a time in the smoke-filled room. The swing music was blaring, the booze was flowing, and everyone was talking at once about their part in the war.
I did notice, however, that the veterans who had earned the battle stars sat quietly while the men that had none did all the talking. Back in the days of Chief Goschachquenk those braggarts would never have earned a place at his war council.
On Sunday two dozen relatives joined us for a family reunion on the big flower-bordered lawn at the homestead. Everyone had made it safely home from the war, but it was very sad and ironic that Grandma, who had worried the most about each of us, was the only one who didn't live to see this happy occasion. Some of the veterans showed off souvenirs from far away lands, but all I had salvaged from my saga was a handful of Chinese coins which the children scrambled for on the lawn. I had purchased solid silver cigarette cases for my siblings and cousins, but they never caught up with me after our sudden move from Peking and subsequent frequent moves in the northern provinces. Somewhere those souvenirs may still exist with their wall of nine dragons embossment and personal engravings. As for the dozens of snapshots that we took that day in Peking with the Chows, the Samurai swords, and other mementos, few survived our final frantic months of "blind man's bluff" in our futile attempt to forestall that terrible civil war. Under those circumstances, considering all the close calls, I was just grateful to be back with those good people that I loved.
As I visited with each of my aunts and uncles, I realized that nothing had really changed much at home. My two-year absence only seemed so long to me because it had been filled with so many earth-shattering events. I also realized that the post-war products were only dreams and still a long way from reality. Many veterans had a hard time adjusting to the routines of their old life styles when they got home. Years of regimentation in military life caused them to over react to their new freedom. They loafed, drank, and caroused while they collected twenty collars a week on the GI Bill for being unemployed.
My sister, Mary Margaret, wanted to keep me from falling into that pit and took the initiative of enrolling me at Ohio State University. She dropped that on me during the reunion. She said, "You should get to Columbus right away because your classes started two weeks ago and it will be hard to catch up." "But I'm not ready," I protested. "I want to unwind and wait until next quarter, at least. I need to review my math and English. Besides, I don't even have a high school diplomat!"
Aunt Helen overheard that, and said, "We have your diploma, Robert. They awarded it to you anyway." "Besides," Mary argued, "I spent a whole week standing in long lines to get you registered under the GI Bill, and you can't back out now! You are enrolled in chemical engineering. I remembered that you liked chemistry."
I gave in then, and promised to go to Columbus just as soon as I looked up some classmates and bought some civilian clothes. Then Jack spoke up and said that he doubted I would find any civies yet, but he would give me his new suit that he had been lucky to find in Los Angeles.
We split up the next morning with Mary Margaret returning to the campus and Dad and Jack leaving for California. Then I headed for Newcomerstown to look up Mary and Dorothy to thank them for all of those wonderful letters, and to see if they were still angry with me for accidentally switching my letters to them. I also had to report to my draft board in Dennison, Ohio.
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I stopped first at Mary's house to see if she wanted to ride along. She was polite, but said that her boyfriend wouldn't like it. I realized then that my stupidly writing to two different girls had given my friend, Irvin, the opportunity to win the love of a wonderful girl who would become his life mate. I learned that Dorothy was away at Wittenberg College. I would wait to thank her some day when we were both home during a holiday.
I now accepted my civilian life, returned to the farm, packed my only worldly possessions -- a useless uniform, a "Ruptured Duck" veterans' pin for my lapel, and a "Parker 51" pen -- and prepared to take the train to Columbus. Uncle George took me to the train, which I did not miss as I did in the past when I was kissing the girls goodbye. Little did I dream that I would have exactly four years almost to the day to get my education before being called up to serve in another war.
