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thedrifter
05-04-04, 08:04 AM
Close Air at Chosin


by Maj Fred H. Allison, USMC(Ret)


Col Ed Montagne, USMC(Ret) served as an aviator in World War II and the Korean War. On the evening of 1 December 1950, then-Maj Montagne was assigned as a pilot with Marine Fighter Squadron 212 flying out of Yonpo Airfield in North Korea. For this mission his wingman was Capt Tom Mulvihill. Most of the missions from Yonpo were in support of the 1st Marine Division at the Chosin Reservoir. That evening the two pilots were assigned to fly in support of Task Force Faith—elements of Regimental Combat Team 31 (RCT–31), then embattled on the east side of the reservoir. The following narrative is based on an interview with the author of the Oral History Branch of History and Museums Division.


On the evening of 1 December 1950, some of the Army units were on the east side of the reservoir. Maj Montagne and Capt Mulvihill had already flown some missions in support of the Army. RCT–31 had been hit hard and was moving back. From the air, Montagne and Mulvihill could see that RCT–31 had to go through some roadblocks—they were in deep trouble. That evening, the two pilots had been assigned to go up to the reservoir and make paradrops from their Corsairs. Montagne didn’t know that Corsairs had that capability. To allow the paradrop, a large tube was mounted on the center pylon of the aircraft. It could be stuffed with ammunition and supplies and then parachuted in.


Maj Montagne had flown an early morning mission and was on standby that afternoon. He had been briefed to lead the paradrop mission with three other aviators. The five pilots had difficulty getting the tubes to work. It turned out that they couldn’t get all five to work, so only Montagne and Mulvihill flew up there.


It was dusk when they arrived over the Army units. They could see the whole battle going on. A lot of trucks were stalled on a road up on the northeast side of the reservoir. They saw bodies in the snow and people moving around, as well as the exchange of gunfire.


Chinese tracers were going into the Army trucks, and the soldiers were shooting back—their fire going into the hills on the other side of the river. The two pilots tried to get some instructions from the forward air controller (FAC) about where to drop their supplies. The FAC’s call sign was “Boyhood 14,” and he was a Marine officer assigned to RCT–31. But he would open up his microphone and all Montagne could hear was gunfire going off. Then the FAC would yell into the phone, “They’re shooting at us; help us over here!”—just constant yelling.


Finally Montagne told Mulvihill, “Lets go make our drop, just on the left side of the trucks, right along the creek bed. That way we won’t hit anybody.” So they made the parachute drops. The two Marine aviators had rockets and 20mm cannon shells loaded on their Corsairs. They could see where the Chinese were shooting from by following the tracers. They methodically worked the area over on their passes. It was dark when the two left and returned to Yonpo. The runway was slushy when the mission began—it was icy when they landed, making for an easy landing. Montagne and Mulvihill went back into operations and asked if they could go up there again to help the guys, because now they were familiar with the area. The pilots were told, “No,” as the night fighters were going to take that mission over.


The next day Montagne and Mulvihill were flying missions supporting the 1st Marine Division over on the west side of the reservoir. After making several passes they pulled out and circled over the reservoir itself. When Montagne circled around he could see all the soldiers working their way down the frozen reservoir. At one point, he saw three soldiers together—two helping a third. They were all headed for Hagaru-ri. They completed their mission at the reservoir and returned to Yonpo Airfield.


Montagne never knew if the soldiers ever got the ammo he and Mulvihill had dropped the evening before—that is until the 40th reunion of The Chosin Few. At that reunion, Montagne, by then a retired colonel, saw someone wearing a nametag that said, Boyhood 14. It was Edward Stamford, the Marine officer who had been the FAC with Task Force Faith. Montagne asked him if he got the ammo, and he said, “Yes.”

>Editor’s Note: This incident was also incorporated in Eric Hammel’s Chosin: Heroic Ordeal of the Korean War, Presidio Press, 1990.


>>Maj Allison retired in 1998 after serving as an F–4 radar intercept operator and historian. He is currently an oral historian with the History and Museums Division, Marine Corps University.

http://www.mca-marines.org/Gazette/sting.html


Ellie