What was it really like ... to be fighting in sub-zero temperatures? Those long nights in a foxhole or a ditch with the temperatures hanging around thirty degrees below zero will be long remembered. I said to myself when I awoke in a hospital in Japan after the campaign: "I hope I NEVER say the words: I never have been so cold." If I do, it will mean I am colder than I ever was at the "Reservoir" and this I NEVER want to say again.

I had a Sheaffer fountain pen which I carried in my breast pocket, and the ink froze and burst. Canteens froze and you had to work the bolt of your M1 every now and then in order that it wouldn't freeze shut. Beads of ice formed on your beard and there were some who had to go back to a warming tent and have ice removed from their nostrils.

Standing watch, you stomped your feet constantly and wiggled your toes inside your shoe pacs. The frigid cold seeped through your clothing and you were in constant misery. The wind hit your face until it was raw and the driving snow half-blinded you as you searched for any enemy activity.

You dreamed of being close to a fire. I remember at Koto-ri, several of us set a boxcar on fire and climbed inside until the flames drove us out. Memories of crawling down a railroad track while the Chinese fired machine guns at me ... the tracers striking the rails and caroming off into the inky darkness.

Day or night, it was so very cold! I recall when we were told that we were surrounded by nine Chinese divisions. Our battalion mail jeep came back after running into a roadblock just south of Koto-ri. Then we were certain that we were surrounded.