Personal Narrative Film, Video Manuscript/Mixed Material Photo, Print, Drawing Richard Alvin Simpson Collection
Veterans History Project Service Summary:
- War or Conflict: Korean War, 1950-1953
- Branch of Service: Army
- Unit of Service: 196th Field Artillery Battalion, 8th Army
- Location of Service: Korea
- Highest Rank: Corporal
- Collection Number: AFC/2001/001/51032
Though he did not arrive in Korea until shortly after the July 1953 truce was signed, Richard Simpson does offer a vivid account of those first two years of uneasy peace. In his first days in country, he was introduced to 100 soldiers, all of them gone within two months. He points out that had the hostilities erupted again, there were few men with real combat experience left to wage the war. Living and working near the DMZ, he found the tension palpable. Booby traps and land mines abounded, random shots were fired. He saw much destruction and stark evidence of starvation. Opposed to the war while he was a college student, he changed his mind once he saw how much worse conditions might have been under North Korean rule.
Interview / Recording
Share
-
PlayFirst job in Korea was surveyor; measured distance to other mountains in North Korea for future targets; first impressions; landed at Inchon, noted the huge difference in tide levels; kids begging for food; Seoul was shot up, with sporadic electricity; greeted as first replacement soldier in his battalion; within two months, the 100 soldiers he was introduced to on his arrival were gone; scary that there would be no soldiers with combat experience if the war started again; pulling guard duty, working along the DMZ to maintain the peace; over 50 years later, there are still 30,000 soldiers there doing the same thing. 00:04:01.8 - 00:08:14.1
-
PlayFrom his tent, every hundred feet there was a barbed wire fence all the way to the DMZ, with booby traps and land mines; never walked any place in Korea where someone had not walked before you; pulling guard duty in the cold winter weather; using guard dogs, protecting them from the locals, who would eat them. 00:08:22.1 - 00:10:46.9
-
PlayOn guard duty, encountering two Korean boys likely coming through fence to steal food; South Korean soldiers tied them to a tree and beat them with a branch; recalls at Christmas going to an orphanage and seeing the appalling condition of the children there, so thin and with nothing to wear but blankets the U.S. had given them. 00:10:55.1 - 00:13:03.4
-
PlayLiving conditions; 8-man tent with mosquito netting; taking pills to prevent hemorrhagic fever; rigging up shower for 3-minute sessions; avoiding eating kimchi but its smell was a giveaway for a Korean; filtered drinking water from the river; running trucks without stopping them in the winter to avoid their freezing up. 00:14:03.0 - 00:17:06.8
-
PlayNot seeing any women for months; doughnut dollies paid visit; one of them was a woman he dated in college; North Korean radio propagandist Pyongyang Pearl would tell them exactly what their activities were; incident involving Christmas lights and sabotage. 00:17:15.8 - 00:20:01.6
-
PlayWhen he was in college, thought the war should end; understood once he was there why the war had to be fought; examining intel photos taken from the air; discovered much later that the North Koreans had been digging a tunnel into the South, big enough for train tracks that could move one regiment of soldiers in one hour. 00:20:20.6 - 00:22:32.4
-
PlayNot in favor of war in general but would rather see us with 30,000 troops guarding Korea than having another war; speaks of the war as being forgotten; thrill of coming home to St. Louis on train; belongs to veterans group that tries to promote education of the war among high schools. 00:24:18.9 - 00:25:39.4
About this Item
Title
- Richard Alvin Simpson Collection
Names
- Missouri State University
- Kohut, Jessica M.
- Simpson, Richard Alvin
- Johnson, Julie A.
- Jason Lowry
- Christina Buchholz
Home State
- Missouri
Headings
- - Simpson, Richard Alvin
- - Korean War, 1950-1953 -- Personal Narratives
- - United States. Army.
Form
- DVD
Extent
- 1 item
Repository
- Veterans History Project, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress
Gender
- Male
Race
- White
Status
- veteran
Service History
-
Korean War, 1950-1953
- Branch of Service: Army
- Unit of Service: 196th Field Artillery Battalion, 8th Army
- Location of Service: Korea
- Highest Rank: Corporal
- Dates of Service: 1953-1955
- Entrance into Service: Drafted
- Military Status: veteran
Materials
- Video: DVD [1 item] -- Oral history interview (collected 2006-11-22; 2006-12-04)
Collection Number
- AFC/2001/001/51032
Cite as
- Richard Alvin Simpson Collection (AFC/2001/001/51032), Veterans History Project, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress
Online Format
- image
- video