Atwood, Jay Dean
Born: June 26, 1933, Kembro, Kansas
Interviewed: April 6, 2003
Interviewer: Jayme Marie Alato
Topic: Military involvement during the Korean War
Q: Did you volunteer to go into the military or were you drafted?
A: I went to join the Navy. I had a brother and a cousin that was in the Navy who I was close to. And you have to take a test to go in then, and I took the test, and they said if I had scored any higher or lower they could take me, but whatever I scored, they had a quota that was full with that many, so I went across the hall and took the test. The Air Force said fine. They wanted me and was going to take me. And then when I went back home I missed connections with the Air Force, and so I told this women who ran the draft, I’d just go ahead and go in the Army.
Q: So how hold were you?
A: Eighteen.
Q: What were their specialties?
A: The outfit I was in in Korea was an ak-ak support group for anti-aircraft for the largest jet fighter base over there.
Q: Where did you do your basic training? And do you have any stories to share about your basic training?
A: I did my basic training at Fort Hood, Texas. When I was going through the infiltration course they told us about what bad things were going to happen to us if we lost a hand grenade, and I got down to the end of it and I didn’t have my hand grenade. I was crouched down shivering in this trench and the guys hollered out there something about “you been in that trench too long,” or something. “Get out of there.” So I reached out a grabbed a clod and threw my hand grenade, and made my holler, and fixed my bayonet and charged out of there. So the next morning they found that hand grenade and tried to somebody to confess whose hand grenade it was, but I wasn’t about to tell them I left my hand grenade, so they just made everybody no more night marching. I knew I’d have been in trouble if I confessed, so I never did say anything about that.
Q: Was your family supportive of you going into the military?
A: Yes and no. They nearly didn’t want me to go because I really wanted to go rather than go to college. I had started to college. After I told my dad I was going, I think they supported me pretty good.
Q: You had some siblings in the military? What were their names and what division did they serve in?
A: My brother that’s two years older than me was in the Navy as a patrol bomber. They did reconnaissance over Korea.
Q: Did he receive any medals that you know of?
A: Oh yes, but I don’t know how much and what all.
Q: How did you end up in Korea?
A: After basic training I was working at Headquarters Company and I was something like a secretary. I was answering the phones. They called up and said they needed so many to go overseas and wanted to know if I knew anyone. I said, “no, I don’t who all else wants to go, but you can put me down for one of them.” Whoever I was talking to said “are you sure?” And I said yes. I hadn’t even taken any leave since basic training. After they put me on orders to go overseas, they let me take leave and I went home for awhile. Then I decided I wanted to go out and see a little bit of California before I went to Korea. So I took a train from Perry to San Francisco where I was going overseas from. I had about a week before I had to go, maybe a week and a half, but I went ahead and reported early. It rained every day I was out there and I got tired of staying in the hotel room instead of getting out and seeing what the city looked like.
Q: What were your feelings about the Korean War and how did you feel about being involved in it?
A: I thought we really had to be in it.
Q: What years did you serve in the military?
A: From the 28th of April 1953 to the 21st of April 1955.
Q: Did you get homesick, and, if so, how did you handle it?
A: Oh, a little bit sometimes maybe, but I really had a lot of people that wrote to me.
Q: Who were they?
A: My aunt wrote me and my cousin. While we were over there, my best friend found a little boy outside of our hut in the snow and ice one day and we kind of adopted him. We paid for him to go to school.
Q: Were you able to write anybody back?
A: Oh yes. I wrote my aunt and my cousin. My aunt sent me packages with cookies and candy.
Q: What were your friends like?
A: This kid from Alabama was the one who adopted that little kid with me. He was best buddy while I was over there. We were both radio operators.
Q: Did you stay in touch with him after the war?
A: For a little while. I don’t have any idea where he is or what he does now.
Q: Were you married or had a girlfriend when you entered the military?
A: No.
Q: How did you friends in the military cope with leaving their loved ones behind?
A: Oh, some of them I think took it real hard. Some of them had young girlfriends or wives. When I was going out there to California on the train, an MP got onto me because thought I was AWOL and I had to dig my papers out of my duffle bag and show him that I was on vacation. A farm man and woman thought it was terrible that he was jumping all over me. She tried to get me to get off the train and have him take me the rest of way. I spent some time with them, but up to that time I had bought my own meals. As soon as everybody found out I was in the service, I couldn’t buy a meal. People at that time always picked up the soldier-boy’s meal.
Q: Where did you travel to?
A: San Francisco, and I spent part of a week there. I was going to look around the city, but it rained the whole time I was there, so I went ahead and reported early.
Q: Where else did you travel to in the war?
A: While I was overseas I went to Japan. It was a pretty part of it. I even went to the zoo while I was there.
Q: Did you learn any new languages during the war?
A: I knew a little bit of Korean and Japanese. Not a whole lot.
Q: How would you compare the weapons used in the Korean War to the weapons being used in the war today?
A: I’d say it was like the weapons the cowboys and Indians used compared to us. Our anti-aircraft guns would be like someone almost throwing sticks and stones compared to what they’ve got now to shoot planes and things down. During the war, we had a big clear plastic map of Korea in front of a desk with radios out front. The generals and officers would all sit out there at a table with the radios and I wore earphones and a speaker and sat behind the map of Korea and I would plot the planes backwards with numbers. I had to write backwards so they could see where the planes were and if they were friendly or unfriendly. I kept track of them on the map for them.
Q: So how would you compare the techniques of fighting in the Korean War to the techniques of fighting today?
A: It would probably be cruder, but it would be closer on the techniques. The weapons they used would be no comparison with what we use now and what we had. When I got off the boat, they put us on a little train and it had little wooden coaches, almost like stagecoaches for cars. No heat on it. It was during the winter and I almost froze to death on that train before we got to our destination.
Q: What kind of food did you eat and did you like it or did you just tolerate it?
A: I tolerated it. It was mostly all rations. In fact, that’s one of the first things about when we went to Japan. We got to eat at what would have been like a fancy café. You know how much I love onions. I ate two or three bowls of onion soup before they started the meal. That tasted good.
Q: Were you ever hungry and didn’t have enough food to eat?
A: No, we had enough food, it just wasn’t the best food.
Q: Did you sustain any injuries during the war? Or did any of your friends?
A: No, not that I know of. The place where I went, though, they bombed the week before I got there. When I started overseas on the boat the war was going on. And when I got off the boat, they had signed a peace treaty. So I wasn’t really involved in war.
Q: Did you receive any medals?
A: Yes, I got some medals for serving in Korea.
Q: What were the medals you received?
A: National Defense Service Medal, United Nations Service Medal, Korean Service Medal, and Good Conduct Medal.
Q: How much sleep did you obtain while you were in the war and what were your sleeping arrangements like?
A: Usually, as radio operators, we had different shifts. Sometimes we would almost go without sleep, or work a double shift and then we’d be off for awhile. I slept pretty good. The best I think I ever slept was when a lot of them didn’t sleep on that boat going home, especially. I slept like a baby. The Navy people had hammocks that they sleep in and to me that motion was conducive to going to sleep.
Q: Would you have wanted any of your children or grandchildren to have served in the Korean War?
A: Well, I’d rather them not have anything going on, but if the United States is involved in something and I think it should be involved in it, I would think that they could serve, or that they ought to serve.
Q: As a war veteran, how do you feel about the war protests?
A: I think everybody’s got a right to protest, but I think anybody that defaces the American flag or burns the flag ought to be thrown in jail. I feel that most people that are protesting don’t even know what they’re protesting. Nobody really wants war, and I don’t think any of those people that are serving really want a war, and a lot of them would rather not be in there, but I think if America’s involved in something, you ought to support it. If they’re not going to support America, like they said, “love it or leave it.” I won’t hold it against them if they want to protest, but I think they ought to be careful how they protest it, like that little girl who was playing basketball and turned her back to the American flag. I don’t think that’s really just protesting the fact that she doesn’t like the war, that’s being anti-American and disrespecting the flag, which I don’t go for.
Q: Do you feel that your children are as patriotic as you were?
A: Yea, in different ways. All of mine work at a military base and they put in more hours whenever something like war or conflicts are going on. They work at crucial jobs and they are required to be there. One of them works as an AWACS mechanic, one of them has been in wiring for the airplanes.
Q: What base do they work at?
A: Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma City, which is where the AWACS are based.
Q: What were the Korean people and children like?
A: Korea is probably a real pretty country now, but it was kind of dusty and dirty while I was there. A lot of the kids were orphans. I even helped roof an orphanage while I was there. People appreciated us so much when we put the roof on the orphanage, they had us sit in the audience at their little stage at the school and they put on a little program and sang for us, dressed up in real colorful costumes.
Q: Did you learn anything while you were over there?
A: I learned how to play ping-pong!
Q: Did you do that often while you were there?
A: Yes. I was really pretty good at ping-pong. They had a big tournament just before I came back, and everybody was telling me this guy was real good. I just trounced him the first game I played him, and they told me how good he was. So the next game, I thought I would try a little bit different, and I kind of played around and he beat me 21 to 18 or something. Then the last game was about the same way. He beat me out and he ended up taking the tournament. And I would have just trounced him if I had kept on with my game. I think I would have won it.
Q: Do you have any other stories you want to tell?
A: While I went through basic training, they had us dig a hole and gave us so much time to dig the hole, then a tank ran over us.
Q: So you dug it before the tank ran over you, right?
A: Yea, and it didn’t cave in.
Q: Wasn’t that dangerous?
A: I guess not! The scariest part was when you went through an infiltration course at night and had to crawl under this barbed wire and all they were shooting machine guns over top of you. They had tracer bullets at night and it seemed like fireflies right over top of your nose while went underneath that barbed wire.
Q: Were you ever scared?
A: It wouldn’t have done you much good to be scared. You still had to do it. I think sometimes people did panic or get scared and raise up and they would have an accident every once in a while and somebody would get shot.
The little Korean boy that we found outside our hut during the winter when it was icy and cold, we kept for a hut boy who was supposed to shine our shoes and all during the day and help keep our hut clean. When they told us we had to get rid of him, we went and found somebody for him to stay with and paid money so he could go to school.
Q: Do you have any advice for kids going into the military now?
A: I think if they can think about what they want to do when they get out of the military – a good part of them aren’t going to know, but if they have any idea at all, I think they ought to try to get them to send them to that type of school, because I think the military will work with them and send them to the type of school if they possibly can that they want to go to. I think all of them ought to try to further their education while they are in the military.
Q: What was your schooling like?
A: I was a radio operator and that’s what I went to school for.
Q: What benefits did you get from graduating from the military?
A: They gave you what they called the GI Bill and it paid for my education to go to college.
