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J-2 Historical Report for CIL 2002-124-I-01 & 02: 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, Democratic People's Republic of Korea by Mr. Lyle Otineru Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command 310 Worchester Avenue Hickam AFB, HI 96853 6 April 2006 J2 HISTORICAL REPORT for: CIL 2002-124-I-01 (Sgt Floyd W. PRYOR) CIL 2002-124-I-02 (Sgt Harold R. SHREVE) JOINT POW/MIA ACCOUNTING COMMAND 6 April 2006 Individuals Associated 1. Floyd W. PRYOR, U.S. Army Sergeant (Sgt) RA 15257482 2. Harold R. SHREVE, U.S. Army Sergeant (Sgt) RA 16307866 ABSTRACT From 27 November to 1 December 1950 the United States Army’s 31st Regimental Combat Team, to which the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment was temporarily assigned, fought elements of the Chinese People’s Volunteer Forces in the area of the Changjin Reservoir, North Korea. By the end of the 31st Regiment’s fight for survival, several hundred of its soldiers were killed, captured or missing in action. Corporal Floyd W. PRYOR, RA 15257482, and Corporal Harold R. SHREVE, RA 16307866, of the 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment fought in the battle at the Changjin Reservoir and were declared Missing In Action as of 2 December 1950. Soon after the war’s end both soldiers were posthumously promoted to the rank of Sergeant. On 31 December 1953 both soldiers were declared dead and their families so notified. From 7 through 14 September 2002, during Joint Recovery Operation 28 a joint Central Identification Laboratory-Hawaii/ Korean People’s Army Recovery Element operating near the Changjin Reservoir battle area excavated a site identified by a citizen of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea as the location where he reburied human remains found earlier that year. As the joint team recovered the reburied remains, a second set of remains were discovered in an adjacent area of the same field and subsequently recovered. Material evidence and remains from this site (identified as site KN-0885) were sent to the Central Identification Laboratory (CIL) in Hawaii and were accessioned on 27 September 2002 as CILHI 2002-124 (later redesignated CIL 2002-124) for scientific analysis and possible identification. J-2 Historical Report: CIL 2002-124-I-01 & 02 Approximate area of the Changjin Reservoir Figure 1. Approximate location of Changjin Reservoir, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Page 2 of 12 J-2 Historical Report: CIL 2002-124-I-01 & 02 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND On the morning of 25 June 1950, the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) attacked across the 38th Parallel and pushed disorganized U.S. and Republic of Korea (R.O.K.) forces south in an effort to reunify the entire Korean Peninsula under the communist rule of Kim Il- sung.1 Acting under United Nations (UN) Security Council resolutions, the United States and 21 other UN members contributed combat and support units for the defense of the R.O.K.2 As the war progressed from June through November 1950, United Nations Command (UNC) forces in Korea steadily turned the tide of the war against the North Koreans. Just as a UNC victory seemed imminent, approximately 180,000 soldiers of the People’s Republic of China’s (P.R.C.) Chinese People’s Volunteer Forces (CPVF) secretly crossed the Yalu River and were ready for combat operations by the end of October 1950.3 Seeking to avoid the full superiority of American firepower in their first engagement of the war, the CPVF tested R.O.K. and U.S. forces in the Eighth U.S. Army’s (Eighth Army) area at the North Korean town of Unsan from 1 to 4 November.4 This first encounter between the CPVF and Eighth Army was short and violent, but the sudden disappearance of the CPVF by 7 November gave the UNC the impression that it was a limited attack and that the threat had turned back. The CPVF did not turn back. Using the lessons learned at Unsan, the CPVF prepared and launched a second, and much larger, offensive at the end of November in an attempt to destroy the UNC. Unaware of the CPVF’s commitment to full involvement in the war, the UNC and its two subordinate ground commands in Korea, the Eighth Army and the U.S. X Corps, prepared to attack and destroy the NKPA while moving north to the Yalu River. The X Corps, located in the eastern portion of North Korea, was separated from the Eighth Army by the Taebeck Mountain Range, an area not suitable for maneuver warfare that was left unoccupied.5 The X Corps planned its offensive in the east to start on 27 November, three days after the Eighth Army began its offensive in the west. Part of the X Corps’ plan was to move the U.S. 1st Marine Division (1st Mar Div) north along the west side of the Changjin (Chosin) Reservoir to the town of Yudam-ni (midway up the west side of the reservoir), then west to the town of Mupyong-ni. On the east side of the reservoir was the 31st Regimental 1 Roy E. Appleman, South to the Naktong, North to the Yalu, June-November 1950, United States Army in the Korean War (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1992), 21. 2 James I. Matray, ed., Historical Dictionary of the Korean War (New York: Greenwood Press, 1991), 507- 508. 3 Appleman, South to the Naktong, North to the Yalu, 765-769. The entry of the P.R.C. into the war prolonged the fighting until July 1953, when an armistice agreement was signed. There continues to be no formal Peace Agreement between the D.P.R.K., the R.O.K., and the UN. 4 Appleman, South to the Naktong, North to the Yalu, 675-681 and 689-708. The CPVF inflicted great losses on the U.S. 8th Cavalry Regiment, which was a prelude to the type of CPVF attacks the UNC forces could expect in the near future. 5 Roy E. Appleman, Escaping the Trap: The U.S. Army X Corps in Northeast Korea, 1950 (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press, 1990), 24-28. Page 3 of 12 J-2 Historical Report: CIL 2002-124-I-01 & 02 Combat Team (31st RCT) of the 7th Infantry Division (7th ID), commanded by Colonel Allan D. MacLean. Assigned to the 31st RCT was the 3rd Battalion (Bn), 31st Infantry Regiment (3/31 Infantry), the 1st Bn, 32nd Infantry Regiment (1/32 Infantry), the 57th Field Artillery Bn (57th FA) and D Battery, 15th Antiaircraft Artillery (Automatic Weapons) Bn (D/15 AAA).6 The mission of the 31st RCT was to move north along the east side of the reservoir to the town of Changjin (approximately 30 miles to the north of the reservoir) and then continue north to the Yalu River, thus providing flank security for the 1st Mar Div on the west side of the Changjin Reservoir.7 Due to extreme weather conditions and the distances involved, the 31st RCT was not in place until the afternoon of 27 November (Figure 2). The RCT was spread out on the east side of the reservoir for approximately 10 miles, with the 1/32 Infantry north of the Pungnyuri Inlet, the 3/31 Infantry, 57th FA and D/15th AAA on the south side of the inlet, and the regimental tank company and other support elements farther south near the town of Hudong-ni. Figure 2. U.S. positions around the Changjin Reservoir, 27 November 1950.8 On the night of 27-28 November the CPVF attacked the Marines on the west side of the reservoir and the 31st RCT on the reservoir’s east side. The attacks were violent and lasted throughout the night. During daylight hours UNC air support kept the CPVF attacks 6 Roy E. Appleman, East of Chosin: Entrapment and Breakout in Korea, 1950 (College Station, TX: Texas A& M University Press, 1987), 42-43. Commanded by Lt Col Don C. Faith, the 1/32 Infantry was assigned to the 31st RCT because of its close proximity to the Changjin Reservoir just prior to the beginning of the offensive. 7 Appleman, Escaping the Trap, 14 and 33. 8 FalconView Compressed Arc Digitized Raster Graphic (CADRG); Map Sheet NK 52-10, 1:250,000 Scale, Joint Operations Graphic. Map oriented to the north. Page 4 of 12 J-2 Historical Report: CIL 2002-124-I-01 & 02 short and sporadic. As darkness fell, the probing attacks gained momentum and lasted until daylight made UNC air support possible again. This pattern continued for the next several days. On the day of 28 November, elements of the 31st RCT, both north and south of the Pungnyuri Inlet, began assessing their losses. North of the Inlet the 1/32 Infantry believed it could hold out and began reinforcing unit positions in anticipation of more attacks that night. South of the inlet the remnants of the battered 3/31 Infantry and 57th FA drew their perimeter in closer and placed the highly effective anti-aircraft weapons of D/15th AAA around the perimeter to increase the defensive firepower of the surrounded units. As night fell on 28 November, the full scope of the CPVF’s offensive was realized by the American units around the reservoir. While at the 1/32 Infantry Command Post, Col MacLean and Lt Col Don C. Faith, commander of the 1/32 Infantry, decided that the battalion should move south and consolidate with the rest of the RCT units below the inlet (Figure 3).