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Chosinvet51
09-06-03, 12:49 PM
All veterans of the Chosin Reservoir Battle mourn the loss of the Commanding General of the 1st Batt. 7th Marines. He personnally blazed a path for the 7th and the 5th Marines out of the reservoir area at Yudam-ni and eventually down the mountains to Hungnam and safety.

We have lost a great Marine and a good friend to all Marines.
But we know he will be leading the troops who are" Guarding the Streets of Heaven."

Saepe Expertus, Semper Fidelis, Fratres Aetrni!

Often Tested, Always Faithful, Brothers Forever!

Member, Southwest Florida Chapter of the Chosin Few

thedrifter
09-06-03, 01:13 PM
Semper Fidelis
By David A. Bounds

Every time I heat their Hymn
And see their Emblem glisten
Glorious struggles come to mind of
Liberty secured…homeland defended
Echoes from the past resounding. Semper Fidelis

Germans knew them as ‘Devil Dogs’
Leathernecks displayed uncommon valor
On land, at sea, in the air they fight
Bravely protecting and securing our rights
Echoes from the past resounding. Semper Fidelis

America’s Marines stand guard still today
Never wavering from their firm commitment
Determined to keep those echoes ringing. Semper Fidelis

Although many have fallen over the years
Never concerned about their plight
Corps values have secured their role…
Heaven’s gates are now defended
Old Breed Marines leave those streets of gold
Resounding with shouts of Semper Fidelis

Sempers,

Roger
:marine:


May He Rest In Peace

Sparrowhawk
09-06-03, 04:43 PM
http://www.chosinreservoir.com/davis.htm

Chosinvet51
09-06-03, 09:09 PM
Thank you, Drifter

thedrifter
09-08-03, 06:20 AM
Warriors remember Ray Davis

By TY TAGAMI
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Sgt. John Henry had hauled the two heavy machine guns from the Korean coast to the mountains, and he wasn't about to destroy them now.

It was December 1950, and with those weapons Henry and his 16 men had survived five days and nights of combat atop a frozen hill, encircled by an overwhelming Chinese army.

Well, a Marine told him, you better talk to the lieutenant colonel. The guns had to be destroyed so the Marines could move south.

Henry descended the hill to look for Lt. Col. Ray Davis, who had just arrived with reinforcements in a heroic push across North Korea that has become the stuff of Marine Corps legend. Henry was wandering in the icy wind when Davis spotted him and slung an arm around his shoulder.

"Son, we've got a hard way to go," Davis said in a soft voice. "Let's blow them up, and I'll get you some new ones when we get back."

Davis, who would come to be regarded as one of the Marine Corps' greatest leaders, had said just the right thing to win another Marine's heart that day.

"He had the love of men," recalled Henry, 78, of Triangle, Va., who was awarded Silver and Bronze Stars for his service in the battles at Chosin (or Changjin) Reservoir.

Raymond Gilbert Davis, son of an Atlanta confectioner, graduated from Georgia Tech in the midst of the Depression in 1938 and joined the Marines at age 23. He rose to four-star general and became the second highest-ranking Marine. When he died Wednesday at age 88, he was America's senior most highly decorated Korean War veteran, having won the Medal of Honor and two Silver Stars there, along with a slew of medals in World War II and Vietnam.

"He was a legendary warrior that Marines love and admire and respect and hold up as one of their greatest," said U.S. Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.), himself a Marine Corps veteran.

Those who knew Davis described him as a humble man who exuded confidence. The confidence was likely fueled by his string of battlefield victories in a career that spanned more than three decades. His willingness to lead by example is legend, along with his performance at the most important Marine battles.

Davis, who chose to be buried in Georgia clay rather than a heroes' cemetery in Washington, will be lowered into the ground Monday at Forest Lawn Memorial Gardens in College Park, in an area he helped set aside for veterans. His memorial service at the Conyers First United Methodist Church will be attended by several generals and Miller, who will carry a letter from President George Bush to Davis' wife, Knox Davis of Stockbridge.

Davis was so successful because he had an innate ability to lead men, said Benis M. Frank, the chief historian of the Marine Corps from 1990 to 1997.

Davis led his battalion through deep snow and under withering enemy fire to rescue his embattled fellow Marines at Chosin. He kept his men going though they were at the edge of exhaustion.

"He didn't drive the troops, he led them," Frank said. "And they knew that they would never have to do something that he wouldn't do himself."

It was like that throughout his career. Despite a wounded knee, Davis rallied his men against Japanese cannons at Peleliu Island in the Pacific during World War II; a shell fragment glanced off his helmet and a bullet pierced his clothing while leading the rescue at Chosin; and as a general in Vietnam he took frequent helicopter flights to visit troops under fire.

In all, Davis earned 43 awards, including the four most revered: the Medal of Honor, the military's highest; the Navy Cross; two Silver Stars; and the Bronze Star with Combat "V," all of which are given for valor in combat.

"He certainly has to be considered one of the most decorated Marines to have ever served," said Dan Crawford, the supervisory historian at the Marine Corps Historical Center in Washington.

Davis fought in three wars, but his most storied feats were at Chosin. Men who were there recall the terror of hand-to-hand combat against a force that outnumbered them by 8-1, and the days and nights on an icy plateau, where the wind chill approached 75 degrees below zero.

Dead hands froze stiff as concrete and frostbitten toes turned charcoal black. Medics carried syringes of morphine in their mouths so the precious narcotic wouldn't freeze.

Despite the conditions, Davis, then 35, led a battalion eight miles past enemy lines, dodging bullets and trudging up ice-covered slopes to reinforce a battered company that was defending a strategic hill. A key road passed below, and two regiments to the north, near the Chinese border, were depending upon it for a safe retreat after 120,000 Chinese combatants crossed the Yalu River into North Korea. The Americans had only 15,000 troops, most of them Marines.

Of the 252 men at the top of that hill, only 37 walked away from the fight.

"We're all lucky; anybody who survived was lucky,"said Kenneth Benson, of Newton, N.J. The 72-year-old retiree was a 19-year-old private first class then. He was temporarily blinded when a Chinese hand grenade exploded near his hand as he tried to toss it away. His foxhole buddy, Hector Cafferata, saved him, fighting through the night and killing dozens. Cafferata was shot in the chest the next morning but survived, and received the Medal of Honor.

"We knew we were in a bad mess with all those Chinese running around, but we didn't realize how close the division was to being chopped to pieces,"said Benson, who was awarded the Silver Star."Only the senior leadership saved us."

Benson met Davis years later, at a Marines' reunion in Miami in the early 1990s. He said Davis, though a retired general, was a regular guy who enjoyed the company of privates.

Chosin veteran Roland Marbaugh, a Marine captain wounded during the battle, said Davis was a small man with big character.

"He was only 5-foot-6, but he was the biggest man I ever knew," said Marbaugh, a retiree who lives in Conyers.

Gregory A. Vandergriff, who was a private first class in Davis' division in Vietnam, remembers the attention Davis paid to his men. The general made daily visits to the front lines.

"You could actually tell he cared about the men," said Vandergriff. Davis dropped in on his battalion and talked with both high- and low-ranking Marines, inquiring whether they had enough boots, ammunition and rations.

"He just wanted to make sure we were being taken care of," said Vandergriff, who said a highlight of his life was the day in 1998 when the aging general pinned two medals -- a Bronze Star with Combat "V" and a Purple Heart -- to his chest in a ceremony in his hometown of Chattanooga.

Davis retired in 1972 as assistant commandant of the Marine Corps. But he continued to work for his men, lobbying Congress to build the Korean War memorial on the National Mall and for veterans benefits.

"He was well-known on the Hill and he was revered by all of us who knew his résumé," Zell Miller said.

Frank Kerr, a combat photographer at Chosin who helped found the Chosin Few, an association of veterans from the battle, said many Marines admire Davis because of his leadership after he retired. But he said men also liked him because he treated them with respect.

"He was the kind of guy that the privates could go up and talk to," Kerr said. "He was just a Marine's Marine, and a man's man. Men just liked him."- Staff writers Jim Tharpe and Gary Hendricks contributed to this article.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/0903/07davis.html?urac=n&urvf=10629802389390.008018763211657176

Sempers,

Roger
:marine:

USMC-FO
09-08-03, 09:23 AM
Ray Davis was the Ass't Division Commander when I first hit Okinawa in 63/64 as I recall. I met him briefly on board ship while we were headed to some excersize on Taiwan. I was assigned to the ship board Command Fire Control Center as a lowly L/Cpl runner--at the time I was in 12th Marines FSCC. In any event I was called into a group that he was invoved in and handed a document to run to some other part of the ship. He, of course, had no idea who I was but I certainly knew who he was. I was in awe for the 30 sec I was in his space.

Rest in peace General Davis !

Semper Fi !