Korean War veterans from Erie area remember 'the Forgotten War'

Seventy-two years ago, a 19-year-old soldier from Harborcreek approached the northern border of the Korean peninsula when he encountered the man who was eager to wage war across it.

"Settle down, boys," Bob Southard, now 93, remembered Gen. Douglas MacArthur telling him and the phalanx of soldiers who snapped to attention.

It was 1950. And Southard, an Army private first class and driver of an M19, an anti-aircraft vehicle now being used as ground support for the infantry, was part of a massive thrust of American troops who had turned the tide of the Korean War, pushing North Korean forces to the apex of the peninsula.

Parking his vehicle along a dirt road, Southard was shocked to see MacArthur exit the vehicle next to him. The brash general who had led Allied forces in the Pacific during World War II and who now commanded the U.S.-led United Nations forces in Korea, was there to survey the ranks — and prepare for his next move.

"All of us knew what he wanted to do," said Southard, referring to MacArthur's urge to attack China after it sent thousands of troops in support of the North Koreans. "But (President) Truman stopped him. And I'm glad he did because I probably wouldn't be here right now."

Southard already had his fair share of close calls. Since arriving in Korea, he had come under mortar fire, dealt with sub-zero temperatures and even had a bullet pass inches from his head, an experience he describes with a waving hand motion and a "whooshing" sound past his ear.

The memories, much like the MacArthur encounter, were at times still immersive, eliciting a quick smile or a moment of somber reflection on what could have been. Other times, the memories were elusive, fuzzy, perhaps ones the nonagenarian would rather not share.

"I was scared," Southard said. "And don't let anyone tell you they weren't. Because I'll tell you what, I'll call them a liar."

Southard, who now lives in a small, idyllic home in Millcreek Township, is one of an estimated 8,000 Erie County residents who served in the military during the Korean War, according to the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission.

While neither the commission nor the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs could say exactly how many Erie County residents deployed to Korea during the conflict, former Erie County VA Director John Williams estimated just over 1,000 are alive today — the bulk of them in their 90s.

As for those killed in action, Williams said 74 Erie County residents never returned home, their names now engraved at the Korean War Memorial, completed in 2006 near the corner of 26th and State streets.

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Southard, who left the service in 1956 as a staff sergeant in the Army National Guard and who later became a truck driver for the Hammermill Paper Co., said he doesn't dwell much on Korea — even with his two adult sons, one of whom is an Army colonel. But service to the country still matters to him.

Strewn across his home is a slew of patriotic and military trinkets, from bald eagle and paratrooper statuettes to American flags and red, white and blue refrigerator magnets.

As Southard put it, the Korean War may be considered "the Forgotten War" — it gets overshadowed in history by World War II and the Vietnam War — but those who fought in that peninsula and those who knew someone who died for it will never be accused of forgetting.

"You really can't forget it," he said. "A lot of people — a lot of men — gave their lives. And they should be taking care of their families."

The history of the war

The three-year conflict in Korea was the first significant clash between communist and Western capitalist forces that set the stage for the Soviet-American rivalry in the Cold War.

While the Korean War never resolved — it came to a stalemate at the 38th parallel in 1953 — its legacy in South Korea, now a thriving democracy, is apparent.

"It was one of the only times where nation-building was successful," Williams said. "We stopped communism from taking over another Western-oriented country. It tested the mettle of the Free World. And it worked out."

By the time the armistice was signed on July 27, 1953, roughly 40,000 American troops had died. The sacrifice was remembered in 2017 by South Korean President Moon Jae-in, when he described the alliance with the United States as one "forged in blood under the fire of war," according to the Korean War Legacy Foundation.

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Building new friendships

For Jack Wonner, building those friendships was critical.

The 89-year-old Union City native, who was drafted into the Army in 1952 and deployed to Korea at the tail end of the war, was assigned to a fire station in Daegu, formerly known as Taegu, a city in the southeast region of South Korea.

A corporal who trained in an Army firefighting unit, Wonner would become an assistant fire chief at his assigned station, on call for any fires in the surrounding community. As he described it, the job was pretty quiet — not only had the fighting stopped but the neighboring Korean fire station would often respond to fires first.

What was left was an opportunity to hang out with the Koreans, he said.

"We got along great with the Koreans," Wonner said. "And the greatest thing that happened is I became real great friends with our interpreter — a Korean man named Kim."

Wonner said Kim gathered all the Korean firemen and presented him with a farewell gift on the day he left the peninsula.

Wonner, who now lives at the Pennsylvania Soldiers' and Sailors' Home in Erie, said he later met Kim and his family when they moved to Toronto and was known by Kim's children as "Uncle John."

"I got along really good with the people in Korea," he said. "I don't regret going."

Erie's Korean War memorial

Those friendships — and sacrifices — were what made veterans like Wonner and Southard so special, Williams said.

It's also what made them deserving of a fitting tribute in the community.

As Erie County's VA director from 1997 to 2007 and the chairman of a committee to develop a Korean War memorial, Williams said he was proud to give the county a reminder of those men whose service often went overlooked.

The memorial, which has the phrases "The Forgotten War Remembered" and "Freedom Is Not Free" forged at its top, took three years to construct and was completed in 2006.

"They went through three years of hell in that war, and it took three years to build this memorial," Williams said. "The significance of that is not lost on me. I think that's something special."

A.J. Rao can be reached at arao@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @ETNRao

This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Memorial Day: Korean War vets in Erie County remember "Forgotten War"