Well Dug In

Heroes Remember

Well Dug In

Transcript

Interviewer: In your position with Baker Company were there times when the Communist Chinese got close? Yeah, we could see them sometimes, like they were, they were on the next hill, not very, not very far from us and there were times like we, I don't know, I guess it was the American Air force or a Canadian Air Force. They would, they would circle around three times on the hill, they'd circle around three times, then they would come down with the fifty calibres. And they would, they would be long gone and the rounds would go off then, they'd go bang, bing, bing, bang all over. And, then they'd circle around three more times and they'd come and then they'd throw the bomb the napalm. And you know the Chinese were pretty well dug in because you know you'd see all the hill, best way I could explain it would probably be a gasoline, jellied gasoline eh.. Interviewer: The napalm? The napalm yeah. And you know everything would be burning, and all of a sudden maybe half an hour three quarters of an hour later when the fire was going down, these guys would come out of their fox holes they were so well dug in. You know they'd come out, but, anyway we got them.

Description

Mr. Pfeifer recalls how well the Chinese were dug into the hillsides, recalling how well they would manage to survive heavy airborne offensives.

Rudolph Pfeifer

Mr. Pfeifer was born February 14th, 1931, the son of a German immigrant. His two half brothers both served in and returned safely from the Second World War. Being in the country and working the land, Mr. Pfeifer had little knowledge of the buildup of the Cold War in the late ‘40s. While in Winnipeg on June 25, 1950, having had to give an injured co-worker a ride to town, Mr. Pfeifer saw recruiters and, wanting to explore the world, joined up on the spur of the moment. Assigned to the 2nd Battalion PPCLI, Mr. Pfeifer was sent to Calgary for training before being shipped to Seoul, Korea. The highlight of Mr. Pfeifer's action came at the Battle of Kapyong (April 22 - 25, 1951) where the Canadians held off wave after wave of Chinese offensives, attempting to capture Hill 677 and move on to Seoul. He and the other participants in this action later received Presidential Citation's for their service. In the summer of 1951, Mr. Pfeifer was wounded when a 2" mortar mis-fired. He was given a medical discharge and returned to Canada.

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