United States Navy Chaplain Corps - Yearbook

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various squadrons came under direct Air Force con- trol, and were no longer immediately at the call of Marine ground units in accordance with Navy-Marine Corps close air support doctrine. By March first six squadrons were in combat, four operating from Pusan, one from Pohang, and one carrier-based. During the UN counterofifensive they supported other 8th Army units as well as the 1st Marine Division. The lst Marine Aircraft Wing was awarded a Re- public of Korea Presidential Unit Citation for its support of the United Nations effort, from 3 August 1950 to 26 February 1951. The earlier date marks the lst Marine air strike over Korea, by eight Cor- sairs of VMF-214, operating from the SICILY. Air Wing Chaplains Concerning the chaplains Wing Chaplain John P. Murphy wrote to the Chief of Chaplains on 18 April as follows: Since the middle of February MAG 33 has occupied a field near Pohang and Chaplains Uohn H.j Markley and ICharles E.1 Webb are stationed there. The Wing and MAG 12 have been together near Pusan and Chaplain IGeorge W.1 Cummins and I have been there. While we have provided fair coverage we have not done as good a job as we should and would if we were up to TXO strength. There has been a great increase in the number of personnel attached to Marine Tactical Air Control Squadron and their TXO calls for a chaplain. They are scattered all over and it is tough not to be able to care for their small groups. This has left the Marine Wing Service Squadron at Itami with Marine and Naval personnel numbering one thousand to be cared for by Catholic civilian clergy and an Air Force Protestant chaplain. Now a couple of squadrons of MAG 12 have been sent to Seoul and I have not yet decided how best to cover them. It was because of this pressure that the Commanding Gen- eral on 22 March sent the following dispatch to BuPers. From: C. G. 1stMAW To: BuPers Infor: CMC Table organization lst Marine Air Wing presently under- strength two chaplains X Wide dispersion units this com- mand necessitates complement X one Catholic one Protes- tant needed to accomplish mission. Far be it from me to attempt to say what is going to hap- pen in Korea and what future disposition the Air Force is going to make of the lst MAW, but with the present setup there should be, as the TXO provides, two chaplains with each MAG, one with MTACS, and one with the Wing. Further there should be one more chaplain to take care of MWSSI, the Wing's service squadron at Itami . . . There are several Army hospitals in the Osaka-Kobe area and a number of Marine and Navy casualties are sent there. Liai- son work as well as taking care of our own will keep a chaplain as busy as a cat on a tin roof. At Pohang the chaplains of Marine Aircraft Group 33 secured from their Commanding Officer two Quonset huts to be erected into a chapel. There was one hitch: assembling a Quonset hut requires the use of no less than 5,500 screws! Two Quonset huts, 11,000 screws! Chaplain Webb wrote in his ques- tionnaire: About 20 Marines cooperated without hesitation or com- plaint in this thankless task during their off duty hours. fBoth Catholics and Protestantsl, they had been subjected to the very poor acoustics of a large and holey hospital tent and realized its deficiencies in contrast to the relative solidity of the Quonset hut for Divine Services. Noting that these Marines sacrificed their time and energy ungrudgingly, he added: While this kind of spirit endures, we chaplains know that there will always be a definite, concerted core of strength on the side of God. He concluded: I did not remain long enough in Korea to witness the finished product but have heard that Chaplain Cleaves carried the project to a suc- cessful completion. Seaborne Artillery While UN ground and air forces continued their assault against the Chinese Communists, naval forces prosecuted their assigned missions with vigor and suc- cess. According to the authors of The Sea War in Korea 11 there were Hve ways in which the Navy kept the Communists on the run after UN forces resumed the offensive following the forced withdrawals of De- cember and early january 1951. Amphibious demon- strations were made again and again 5 mindful of the decisive nature of the Inchon landing, the Reds were sensitive to the danger of surprise attack and of course never knew, until the critical moment had passed, whether such movements were feints Qas they werel or the real McCoy.U Further contributing to keeping the enemy off- balance were frequent commando raids put ashore and covered by naval gunfire. Heavy bombardment was utilized to lay siege to important Communist ports, notably Wonsan, there round-the-clock interdiction began on 16 February and continued to the beginning of the armistice, on 27 July 1953, the longest such operation in modern American naval ihistory.12 Be- sides Wonsan two other east coast ports, Hungnam and Songjin, in the far north, were besieged. A fourth technique was naval gunfire against the Cagle and Manson, op. cit., pp. 305f. 1' Ibjd., Ch. 12.

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risen from 15-,000 to 25,000. Perhaps the chaplain had received further information! Still, nothing can dim the luster of what was in fact a notable example of American philanthropy and Christian brotherhood. After the front lines became more established, the cha lains were later able to or anize their relief work P S on a more permanent basis. Individual units of the fighting forces often accepted the responsibility of sup- porting a Korean orphanage in whole or in part. The pitiable condition of the homeless waifs of Korea gripped the hearts of the American service men. Chaplain W. M. Hearn described how the men of his unit sometimes adopted orphans. Hearn wrote: One time when we moved out we had three little girls who had lost their parents. We took them back to a MG fmilitary governmentj unit to be sent to a home, but the whole company were like a bunch of bereaved parents. The fathers in the HQ company who had little girls at home helped to take care of them. When we gave them a bath we found that they each wore five to seven dresses, all of their worldly goods. At another time we left a boy at an orphanage and found him back in 2 days-a walk of several miles. Many times we had Koreans in our church services. One boy was quite dis- turbed by the undignified slouch of our men during services. As he demonstrated, they should sit erect with folded hands or bow their heads and hold their hands together during prayer. --....z,- A Guide. Chaplain R. L. Patton leads two small children to safety somewhere near the front. Many of the chaplains wrote letters to churches, service clubs, relief organizations, and individuals in the States urging them to send clothing, toys, and other needed items to be given to the needy and desti- tute children of Korea, innocent pawns of war. Particularly impressive was the initiative shown by the Marines in contributing money, materials, and labor for the rebuilding of churches, schools, and orphanages. The generosity of the Marines confronted by the needs of civilian Korean refugees proved to be a constantly recurrent theme throughout the story of UN operations there. Marine Air Wing After the evacuation at Hungnam the lst Marine Aircraft Wing had found itself involved in the re- location problems of the 5th Air Force. Only a limited number of usable fields were available, and with the fall of Kimpo in the January Communist offensive Far East Air Forces, the senior air com- mand, had pulled many of its units back to Itazuke, Japan, including the jet aircraft which could not operate from any of the available Korean fields. Headquarters of the 5th Air Force, as well as that of 8th Army, were installed at Taegu. Maj. Gen. Field Harris, Commanding General of the lst Marine Aircraft Wing, settled both his Wing headquarters and those of both Marine Aircraft Group 12 and Marine Aircraft Group 33 at Itami, the Air Force base near Osaka, Japan which had been assigned the Wing in August 1950 by agreement be- tween Commanding General, Far East Air Forces and the Commander, Naval Forces Far Eastfo Itami had been all along the Wing's center for personnel re- assignment, supply, and repair. On 10 January 1951 there began a giant airlift of personnel replacements from the West Coast, and eventually Itami became the air terminal for Marines en route to the Division in Korea. After helping cover 8th Army's withdrawal in western Korea, operating off the carriers SICILY, BADOENG STRAIT, and BATAAN, the tactical squadrons were at Itami for repairs and training. When in February they returned to combat the 10 Brief notices in Lynn Montross, 'KButtoning up the Offensive: The Marines in Operation Killerf' Marine Corps Gazette fFebr-uaxy 1952j , pp. 35fg Montross, Advance to the 38th Parallel: The Marines in Operation Ripper, Marine Corps Gazette QMarch 19521, p. 21. The author was kindly permitted by Mr. Montross, of the Historical Branch, G-3, Marine Corps Headquarters, to read the first draft of vol. IV, the official Marine Corps his- tory of operations during the period here under consider- ation. Ch. I fAddendum: Redeployment of the lst Marine Aircraft Wingj and ch. II are concerned with the Air Wing. -65,

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:oastal Hanks of the enemy frontline, directed by for- Nard reconnaissance upon enemy troop, armament, nd supply concentrations. And Hnally, along the nemy's exposed coastline, bombardment was main- :ained unremittingly against all major military targets, nflicting both physical and psychological damage. Seaborne Padres Illustrative of the difhculties under which chaplains arried on their ministry during this period are sev- ral paragraphs from the questionnaire reply of Chap- ain Oscar Harris, who was attached to Destroyer quadron 16 from August 1950 to September 1951. e wrote, in part, as follows: On a destroyer in the combat area Divine Services were iot conducted according to schedule. A time might be set, out chances were the schedule would be interrupted. In nany instances the chaplain would have to wait until after :he evening meal .... Attendance was good considering the difficult routine the nen had to endure. Their rest periods were interrupted by :onstant general quarters and watch-standing. Every op- oortunity they had to sack in' they took full advantage of. In one instance the chaplain was conducting a service when general quarters sounded. The sonarmen thought a submarine was lurking in nearby waters. After a 2-hour :hase and discharging several depth charges, it was discov- :red that a few whales had been playing havoc on the sonar gear. Result: no Divine Service. Duty of a different sort is illustrated by the following xcerpts from a letter to Chaplain Salisbury on 15 ebruary 1951, in which Chaplain Edward E. Helmich told of his work in the amphibious flagship MOUNT MCKINLEY. We have just completed a very successful campaign for the March of Dimes and the Ship's Company and Staff re- sponded with a total of 31,422 collected and sent via chan- nels to the national foundation. The average came to 31.74- per person. Attendance at Divine Service has showed a marked in- rease, and what pleases me especially is the large percentage bf officers attending .... There has also been a definite upswing in attendance at the Sacrament of Holy Communion. .Then too, a Sunday Bible Class, recently organized with an verage attendance of 27 thus far, indicates a definite interest End appreciation for such a class, Several weeks ago I was able to secure the Korean Navy nformation and Education Music Groupfa 45-piece sym- hony orchestra and 60-voice choral group-for a series of concerts. All of us were more than pleased with the enditions. The Bridge of Toko-ri Diverted from their attack upon Yalu River bridges, arrier planes of Task Force 77 were employed from he end of January 1951 in attempting to disrupt the railway network in eastern Korea over which rein- forcements and supplies were moving to the front.13 Three main lines running south from Manchuria pro- vided plenty of targets: 956 bridges and 231 tunnels, an average of 1 bridge every 1.2 miles of track, 1 tunnel every 5. On 2 March a PRINCETON pilot spotted the nearly perfect target: a six-span bridge 600 feet long and sixty feet above the floor of what the flyers came to call Carlson's Canyonf' a tunnel at each end, an-d paralleled by a partially completed second bridge. It was this which became James Michenerls Bridge of Toko-ri. Exactly a month was spent bombing it, again and again the Reds desperately repaired it, until finally they took the only alternative and built a by- pass through the canyon on low ground. Involved in this struggle to strangle were the carriers VALLEY FORGE, PRINCETON, and PHILIPPINE SEA. On 27 March Old Faithfulf, the VALLEY FORGE, was relieved by the BOXER, aboard which was the first carrier air group composed of organized Naval Air Reserve Squadrons to see duty in Korea. The LEYTE had left the Korean theater on 19 January. Concerning her skipper Chaplain C. A. Frame later recalled: The captain of our ship was Cand isj a fine man. If he had a problem troubling him, he would call the chaplain in and ask for spiritual guidance. We usually ended by having prayer together. I felt that those talks and prayers helped in some way to clarify his mind and make it easier for him to carry on his difficult mission. Needless to say, it always made the chaplain fecl very humble and inadequate. PatRons The necessary but largely routine activities of sup- port groups tend to get lost in the backwash of the ushootin' war. Everyone recalls the poignantly hu- morous efforts of Mister Roberts to get a transfer from his rusty supply ship to the firing lines of World War II. In the Korean War, as always, various units devoted themselves to the faithful performance of duties almost guaranteed never to make a stateside headline. Among such were the Navy patrol squadrons CPat- Ronsl whose vigilance added greatly to the effec- tiveness of 7th Fleet operations in the Far East.14 Surveillance of merchant shipping, antisubmarine patrol, weather reconnaissance, aerial mine spotting and destruction, occasional Haredrops for Marine night-fighting planes and naval gunfire target spot- ting, and even logistical transport-such were the U Ibid., pp. 229-236. 1' Ibid., ch. 10 and app. V. 535332 0--6016 - 67 -