BATTLE OF KOREA: Shrinking Beachhead

Early last week, the last units of the X Corps column reached Hamhung after a skillful fighting retreat from the Changjin reservoir to the Sea of Japan. Some of the survivors wore colored silk scarves and hoods made from the parachutes of Major General William H. Tunner’s life-saving airlift. Some of the marine dead were buried in a cemetery at Hamhung, under mounds of raw red clay topped by white crosses. The marine commander, Major General Oliver P. Smith, uttered a brief and moving tribute, chaplains of three faiths said prayers, a rifle salute rang out, a bugler sounded taps.

The 7th Division’s 17th Regiment, which last month had stood briefly on the Yalu (it was the only U.S. unit to reach that fateful river), had also made its way down from the mountains to Hamhung. Altogether some 60,000 men of X Corps, including two R.O.K. divisions, were in the port area awaiting evacuation by a huge fleet of allied ships. Fresh troops, mostly 3rd and 7th Division units which had not been chewed up by prior fighting, manned a defense perimeter around Hungnam, the port.

After a lull, the enemy began a series of probing attacks. One of these, in less than company strength, was carried out by Chinese wearing U.S. helmets and winter clothing. It was easily repulsed. Then, one morning in the darkness before dawn, after a lot of mass singing, bugling and cymbal-clashing, some 2,500 Reds launched a heavy assault on the west face of the perimeter.

A thousand Chinese dead lay in the snow next day. In spite of incessant air strafing, and a rain of shells from U.S. artillery and from cruisers and destroyers offshore, the enemy maintained his pressure. As U.N. troops were evacuated, the perimeter shrank. Star shells and flares illuminated the scene at night—which was the U.S. way of countering the enemy’s preference for night fighting.

At week’s end, it seemed certain that nearly all of the X Corps were safely aboard ships.