Combat Encounters

Heroes Remember

Combat Encounters

Transcript

When I first went over there we were on a position called the outpost, and we were separated out in the valley away from the rest of the company. And there was a patrol out, they had to come through us in order to go out to this, I think it was called the Sangok or something like that, I forget the name of it now. They were on a patrol and anyway the North Koreans came in that night. I think they got in behind them, but they knew they were around there somewhere. Finally it broke out and the corporal, he was killed. I should wrote down a lot of those things when they’re in my mind. He was riddled right up this way. That’s the way burp guns go sometimes buurrpp, you know, burp, and that was the first casualty that I saw. They were, our MA was there, they were feeding him morphine and that just to ease the pain, but he died right there. That was my first person I’ve seen killed. "You know when you hear them coming, blowing the bugles and they’re yelling and everything”, he says, “it’s spine chilling.” He says, “it’s an awful feeling.” He said, “it goes through ya.” Like myself, as I said, I didn’t hear that. So I’m only elaborating what somebody else he said, “it’s a hell of a feeling”, and he said, “they’re coming at you that way and you’ve got nothing there to protect you” really, compared to what they had and if you were out there, unless you were in the Bren gun pit, you know, there’s only so many of them around and the rest was all rifles. So he said, “I remember when I first heard the bugles,” he said, “I started to shake.” He did. He wasn’t afraid to say so neither.

Description

Mr. Rees describes combat encounters with the enemy.

Charlie Rees

Charles Rees was born in Lance Cove, Newfoundland on July 14, 1930. He first experienced the consequences of war at the age of 12, when he and the rest of his community were involved in rescuing the crew from two ships torpedoed nearby. While working in Toronto, Mr. Rees made the decision to enlist for service in the Korean War. He was sent overseas with the 1st Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment, where he served a one year tour of duty on the 38th Parallel. When he returned to Canada, he trained as a paratrooper. After leaving the service, he was a pressman in the printing trade. Mr. Rees joined both the Atlantic and Canadian Korean Veterans Associations.

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