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The Battle Of Chosin. Part 4: Task Force Drysdale To The Rescue

   DailyWire.com

At Haguru, Smith’s rag-tag group of cannibalized riflemen was hanging on to East Hill and the base perimeter. But he knew his position was growing more perilous as the Chinese had now moved south to cut the supply road and attack the garrison at Kot’o-Ri eleven miles farther down the MSR. Nor was he sure how long the men at Yudam-ni, and especially the lone company over the Toktong Pass, without which his main body would be cut off, could hold out. They had to fall back before they were overrun. But they needed an intact base to fall back to. Smith desperately needed reinforcements. On the morning of the third day of the battle, November 29, he contacted Col. “Chesty” Puller, commander of the 1st Marine Regiment at Kot’o-Ri, and ordered him to send a relief force to Hagaru. Puller complied, calling for some 900 men to saddle up and make their way north along the MSR to reinforce Smith’s embattled headquarters.

Puller’s relief force was commanded by British Lt. Col. Douglas Drysdale. It consisted of 235 British commandos, a Marine and Army infantry company amounting to roughly 700 men, 140 supply vehicles, and a Marine armored company with 29 tanks. The Chinese were as aware of Hagaru’s importance as was Smith, and they made every effort to stop what came to be known as Task Force Drysdale from making the dangerous trek to reinforce the besieged Marine base. At one point, Chinese attacks swarming down from the hills cut off and forced the rear third of Drysdale’s column to abandon the mission and fight its way back to Kot’o-Ri. When the Briton radioed Smith of the potential for disaster should his march continue, the Marine commander was adamant. They had to make it through to Hagaru “at all costs.” Drysdale knew this was a do-or-die command and he pressed on. Although ten hours behind schedule, and weary from steady combat on the march, what remained of Drysdale’s relief force eventually fought their way through to Smith’s beleaguered command. They were reduced in number by over half and arrived with only 16 tanks, but Smith knew with the some three hundred added seasoned infantry and the heavy firepower the tank company brought to bear, he now had the forces to hold the key East Hill and with it the main base.

Smith’s desperate gamble to bring Drysdale’s men north was a critical turning point. As said before, it’s doubtful the First Division could have survived without holding Haguru and its now-completed airstrip, onto which C-47s landed under fire to bring in war materiel and evacuate the wounded. By the time the airstrip was abandoned for the break-out to the sea, over 4,500 wounded men were flown out to Japan, hospital ships, or bases south. With his main base relatively secure, it was now up to Smith’s surrounded main body of two Marine regiments up in the hills around Yudam-Ni on the west side of the reservoir, currently in the process of burning their excess equipment and collecting their dead and wounded, to break out and hack their way down to him.

But what had happened to the Army contingent?

Brad Schaeffer is an historian, author, musician, and trader. His eclectic body of writings have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, New York Daily News, and a variety of well-read blogs and news outlets. Of Another Time and Place is his first novel, which takes place in World War II Germany and the deadly skies over the Western Front. You can pre-order his book here:

Amazon: http://amzn.to/2FEnCb0
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/of-another-time-and-place-brad-schaeffer/1128170819?ean=9781682616635

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