East of Chosin

by Roy Edgar Appleman

  The Chinese persistently attacked B Company's left flank, adjacent to the C Company boundary where B Company's line bent south. At the same time they penetrated C Company's line below the high knoll. Lieutenant Mazzulla, on the line there with B Company, reported to battalion that the enemy had broken through the line and were headed down the draw leading directly to the battalion CP. On receipt of this message Faith sent all remaining battalion headquarters personnel into the draw east of the CP. But B Company quickly closed the gap in its line, and the Chinese never reached the battalion CP'S

  Tension built at the CP after midnight as the Chinese assaults increased in intensity and severity. Shortly after midnight, Colonel MacLean joined the others in listening to reports on company situations. Faith seemed on edge and about 1:00 A.M. ordered many of those sitting or standing in the room to go outside to help in the defense of the CP.16

  Outside the men took up positions near the hut and listened to the everincreasing level of noise at the front lines. Spent bullets whistled overhead. A 4.2-inch mortar round fell short and landed 5o yards from the CP, knocking out one of the defenders' machine guns emplaced there. Major Robbins, one of those who had just left the CP hut, has given his impressions of that moment:

  All weapons of the battalion were apparently firing as fast as they could be operated from the din going on about us. The mortars were throwing out their incessant bursts. Shadowy figures kept coming and going about the entrance of the CP as wounded were helped or carried bodily into the relative safety of the area. Company runners made their way into and out of the building. A ghostly light pervaded the whole scene as a light snow began to fall and through this curtain a faint moon tried vainly to shine. Flashes of fire from bursting shells and flares intermittently lighted the area and added to the weird effect.17

  The firing died down to sporadic bursts. Lieutenant McNally, the 31st communications officer, was among those outside the CP. Suddenly he was called into the building. He soon came back out and told Major Robbins that Colonel MacLean had ordered the 1st Battalion to prepare to withdraw and to attack if necessary to reach the 3rd Battalion at the inlet perimeter. It was 2:00 A.M.1B

  The details of the discussions between MacLean and Faith and the reasons for the order to withdraw are uncertain. Curtis has written that Faith was afraid that the Chinese, having turned the left flank of A Company, could reach the 81-mm mortar position and the CP and cut off all the troops to the north and northeast. According to one source, MacLean left the decision to Faith as a battalion

  Whatever the details of discussion leading to the decision to withdraw, Colonel MacLean must have agreed with Lieutenant Colonel Faith's opinion. He was the senior officer on the ground and would hold the responsibility. One should remember that, after MacLean and Hodes arrived at the reservoir on November 26, the 1st Marine Division ceased to command the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry, or any other parts of the 31st RCT as they arrived at the reservoir. Nor did the Marines try to exercise any command over these troops. The 31st RCT was under the command of Maj. Gen. David Barr, of the 7th Infantry Division, and through him the X Corps commander. This command situation remained unchanged until the X Corps order on November 29 gave command over all troops in the Chosin Reservoir area to Gen. Oliver Smith and the 1st Marine Division beginning at 8:0o A.M. on November 30.

  The order to withdraw, decided on at the ist Battalion CP about 2 A.M. on November 29, did not reach all the troops on the perimeter until two hours later. At 2:45 A.M., for instance, 1st Sgt. Richard S. Luna, of B Company, received orders to take all the Headquarters Company personnel and cooks to the line to fill a gap. He did so, and he and that group were at the front when the withdrawal order reached them at 4:3o A.M.

  Meanwhile, in the continuing action on the C Company front, Cpl. James H. Godfrey, of the Heavy Weapons Company, gunner of a 75-mm recoilless rifle, again distinguished himself as convincingly as he had the previous night. The Chinese in their attacks the first night had captured the second 75-mm recoilless rifle in C Company's sector. In the ensuing Chinese effort to use this weapon, they found themselves engaged in a duel with Godfrey. He and his crew demolished the captured gun and killed its Chinese crew. In this encounter Godfrey expended all his ammunition, and the rifle platoon to which he was attached was reduced to three men. He was able to get his recoilless rifle on a truck and successfully evacuate it. He then continued the fight with rifle and grenades as C Company withdrew.20

  About 3:00 A.M., Major Miller, the battalion executive officer, climbed the spur ridge to the C Company CP. There he talked over the situation with Captain Seever, the company commander. Seever had been slightly wounded in the leg the day before but had remained in command. With Seever, Miller could hear the din of the battle increase in the A Company sector westward on the battalion left flank. About 3:30 A.M., Miller received a call on the company line from Faith, who relayed to him the details of the projected battalion withdrawal, saying that the battalion would join the 3rd Battalion, 31st Infantry, at the inlet, starting at 4:30 A.M. Faith ordered Miller to organize and conduct a rear-guard action with A Company during the withdrawal.

  Miller walked westward toward A Company. On the way he passed through Lieutenant May's position. Miller told May to withdraw to the ist Battalion CP. He then crossed the road into Lieutenant Smith's A Company CP. There the company was still under attack. Its ist Platoon was still cut off on the left flank. Smith had unsuccessfully counterattacked in an effort to reach the platoon, and he was about to counterattack again when Miller arrived. Miller discussed the situation with Smith and then told him to prepare to withdraw A Company down the draw in the company's rear. 21

  MacLean and Faith wanted to start the withdrawal at 4:30 A.M., completing it during the hours of darkness, and to enter the 3rd Battalion inlet perimeter at daybreak. There were about 4 road miles to cover between the two positions. Flank infantry guards on higher ground on the east would cover the vehicles' passage on the road. No one knew whether there were enemy troops on the high ground who would have to be driven off before the vehicles could pass.

  Faith and his staff sent the verbal orders to the units by field telephone, by radio, and by messenger.22 The general terms and conditions governing the withdrawal were as follows: it would be executed in blackout, which precluded the burning of abandoned equipment and supplies; all kitchen trucks would be emptied to carry wounded; and part of Headquarters Company would serve as advance guard on the road with the battalion headquarters and the vehicles, with Captain Turner's B Company on the left flank on ground east of the road and C Company east of B Company on still higher ground. Since an uncertain overland movement of the company was involved, Captain Seever, because of his leg wound, turned over C Company to Lieutenant Mortrude, his 3rd Platoon leader; Faith ordered Major Curtis to accompany C Company; Major Miller would command A Company, the rear guard. The ist Battalion informed the 3rd Battalion by radio that it intended to join it at the inlet during the morning.23

  In giving orders to his units, Faith talked directly with some unit commanders. Lieutenant Hugh May was one of these. He commented about Faith's instructions to him: "During the preparations for the withdrawal, Lt. Col. Faith instructed me to remove parts from any vehicle we could not evacuate, the object being to cripple the vehicle but not to destroy them, as it was the intent to re-occupy these positions within 24 hours [italics added]. This crippling was done by removing coils, coil wires, and other items, so the vehicles could not be operated under their own power."24 In pondering this order, one wonders whether Colonel MacLean still intended to attack north after his 2nd Battalion, which he still expected, arrived.

  The 31st Regimental Combat Team Consolidates at the Inlet

  Lieutenant Colonel Faith ordered all trucks regardless of their cargo to be unloaded and the wounded put in them preparatory to the withdrawal. The vehicles of the 31st RCT that Major Robbins had brought into Faith's perimeter would therefore have to abandon all the field desks and
contents considered essential to the operations of a command post. Robbins estimated that there were about 6o vehicles in the convoy. He wrote of preparations at the CP:

  Already the headquarters personnel and the medics were busily assisting the ambulatory patients onto the trucks and carrying stretcher cases out of the tents which had been their shelter for the past 24 hours. The snow was now coming down in earnest and the footing had become extremely slippery. Drivers ... began the task of starting frozen engines, and, once having them turn over, driving the trucks out onto the road. Since our own jeep driver was out in a foxhole defending part of the perimeter, I tackled the job of getting our own jeep going which boasted a nearly dead battery to begin with.... McNally came out of the CP and joined me as I wheeled into the column ready to move out.

  Columns of foot soldiers formed on the road on each side of the vehicles and moved on out to the front. All preparations had been completed by around 0430. The column began to crawl forward. Many vehicles which simply could not be started because of the cold had to be left behind, but none of the wounded were without transportation, and that was the imminent thing at the moment. It was strangely quiet behind us as we moved on down the road towards the 3rd Battalion.'

  This view, looking southwest, was taken on the morning of November 29 from a point on the causeway just north of the bridge over the Pungnyurigang. The crest and western slope of Hill 1221 are in the distance near the right edge of the photograph. The mass of men huddled under an embankment at the edge of the inlet (center) and others walking southward beyond them are members of the ist Battalion, 32nd Infantry, crossing the inlet and joining the 3rd Battalion. Hill 1250 is the closer hill mass near the center. The photographer is unknown. Photograph courtesy of Col. Crosby P. Miller.

  In the frontline companies the scene was not so orderly. Although B Company, for example, had received instructions to be ready to move at 4:30, it was 5:00 A.M. when First Sergeant Luna got the word to move out, leaving everything behind, including supplies and bedding. At 5:30, Luna actually started skirting the higher hills on his left. In C Company, Mortrude's 3rd Platoon was the first to leave. Subsequently, instead of platoons moving out in a scheduled rotation, one man would leave his hole, and others who saw him did likewise and made for the rear. There was even a semblance of panic as the men evacuated their positions. Lieutenant Campbell, at the right flank of C Company, thought that there was no panic but that "it was hasty." He engaged in a shouting argument with an adjacent C Company platoon leader over who would withdraw first, the infantry platoon or the Weapons Company section. Campbell argued that the D Company weapons section should withdraw first, since they could not just run off the ridge at the last moment carrying their heavy machine guns but would need some protection from riflemen at the beginning of their withdrawal. He persuaded the infantry platoon leader that this was the proper course. Campbell then had his machine gunners fire, in a sudden burst, the ammunition that they could not carry. This heavy fusilade of fire may have caused the enemy to think that an attack was being mounted and may have thrown them off balance, because when the weapons section began its withdrawal, there was no enemy pursuit or even fire. Campbell said that after they got off their position "it was a walk in the sun," and they reached the battalion CP and the line of vehicles forming there with no trouble.'

  In Lieutenant May's sector there was a Chinese prisoner. What should they do with him? The man's hands and feet seemed to be badly frozen. May examined him and assured himself that this was indeed the case. He gave the Chinese prisoner rations and cigarettes and motioned him northward. May then led his men down the hill toward the battalion CP. There he took a position near the rear of the column. He and his men stayed at the rear of the 1st Battalion column throughout the withdrawal, forming a road rear guard.

  On the battalion left flank in A Company's position the situation was bad. Lieutenant Smith's second counterattack to reach his cutoff ist Platoon on the extreme west flank had failed. Major Miller thought that he could wait no longer. The protection of the battalion rear was more important, he knew, than trying harder to reach the ist Platoon. He ordered Lieutenant Smith to move out. South of the point where the draw behind A Company's front met the road, Miller ordered Smith to keep one platoon about ioo yards west of the road. Before Smith could get his company in motion, the Chinese launched an attack. Most of the enemy were silhouetted clearly against the snow and made easy targets. Many were killed or wounded, and their attack was repulsed.; A Company now began its withdrawal.

  The withdrawal was generally under way by 5:00 A.M. Perhaps the first unit out of the line was C Company, which was to act as the advance guard on the east. As C Company moved out, B Company held its place on the high ground. When C Company cleared, B Company followed. C Company, as it arrived abreast of the CP, was to remain east of (above) the road. Likewise, B Company, trailing C Company, was to remain on still higher ground east of the road to protect the motor convoy on the road below. But in the movement south Faith shouted to Mortrude at one point to move higher up the hill slope, and as it turned out, before the column reached the inlet, B Company was closer to the road on the left. Headquarters and D companies accompanied the battalion headquarters on the road. May and his improvised platoon from Headquarters Company closed the column.

  Faith had ordered Major Curtis to accompany the troops on the high ground east of the road. He accordingly joined Lieutenant Mortrude's unit there. With Major Miller accompanying the rear guard, Faith had his two ranking staff officers in the most dangerous places from which to give leadership if trouble developed. Captain Bigger, Major Jones, Captain Stamford, and Lt. Henry Moore, of the A&P Platoon of Headquarters Company, were with MacLean and Faith in the command group.

  The locations of the troop units in the withdrawal were logical in view of their positions on the line. Headquarters and D companies were closest to the battalion CP and could be most quickly assembled with it on the road. While B Company, closer to the withdrawal route than C Company, covered that company's withdrawal, it could follow after it, both staying on high ground east of the road. A Company, which was hardest pressed by the Chinese at the time, might have trouble. But with a machine gun at the rear, which let loose intermittent bursts of fire, the Chinese were kept from closing, and the company got away without serious trouble. But it left its 1st Platoon behind.4

  One of the men in the command group, as it went ahead of the road column to find the rumored enemy roadblock near the inlet perimeter, was a young, boyish-looking former paratrooper, now the commander of Faith's Weapons Company, Captain Bigger. He was considered a special officer in the 1st Battalion as an acknowledged expert in the use of 8i-mm mortars. Faith used him to coordinate all supporting artillery fire-not just armament of the Weapons Company, the recoilless rifles, the heavy machine guns, and the 81-mm mortars.

  Bigger graduated from Castle Heights Military Academy, in Lebanon, Tennessee, in 1938. He was called to active duty in January, 1942, as a second lieutenant and sent to the Infantry School at Fort Benning, where he graduated in April. He also attended the Airborne Parachute School at Fort Benning. Thereupon he was assigned to the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), which later became part of the 82nd Airborne Division, commanded by General Ridgway. Bigger made the assaults with his regiment at Gela, Sicily, and Salerno, Italy. Bigger's 504th PIR landed at Anzio on D Day and was there for 62 days. After World War II, Bigger eventually found himself in the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry, 7th Division, in Japan. By the time of Chosin, Bigger was an "old-timer" in the 1st Battalion. He had activated the battalion's Heavy Weapons Company and had trained the men who formed its ranks. He said unabashedly, "They knew their job and I knew mine." Faith had a close personal relationship with Bigger and relied heavily on him. Bigger and Jones, the latter also an airborne combat soldier in World War II, appear to have been Faith's closest friends in the 1st Battalion.f

  Except in the A Company area, the Chinese did not react aggressive
ly to the 1st Battalion's withdrawal. They may have been taken by surprise. There was no pursuit, and only a little small-arms fire fell anywhere near the withdrawing column. The most important factor in the failure of the Chinese to follow up closely on the withdrawal was perhaps the great amount of plunder they found all along the front line just vacated, and even greater amounts of food, supplies of all kinds, and various kinds of equipment in the vicinity of the battalion CP. To freezing and starving Chinese all this must have been temptation beyond the power of resistance. For the battalion it may have been worth all that was left behind to gain an unmolested withdrawal.

  The men of C and B companies encountered no enemy on the hills east of the road as they moved south toward the inlet. This was the greatest good fortune. If the Chinese on the north and east sides of the perimeter had launched a determined close pursuit, or if they had emplaced troops and roadblocks between the battalion and the inlet, the going might have been very rough indeed. But there was none of this.

  The road column progressed halfway to the inlet and halted opposite the 31st Heavy Mortar Company and near Colonel MacLean's former advance CP. There Capt. George Cody, commander of the Heavy Mortar Company, had, in the words of Major Jones, "the force drawn up in a circle `Wagon Train style!"' Some vehicles from the road column were directed into this circle of vehicles, including the Weapons Company jeeps.6 It was daylight when the battalion column stopped at Cody's position. The Chinese had never attacked the heavy-mortar position, although it must have been known to them. In its stop the 1st Battalion column picked up Cody's mortars.