During the final stage of the enemy’s attack, Company A was being relieved on Observation Hill by 3/5. Stevens told his platoon leaders to leave their grenades and extra ammunition on the hill, since his orders were to withdraw to the rear. While the relief was taking place, however, Company A was ordered to reinforce Fenton’s unit against the enemy’s attack on Hill 125. Muetzel’s 2d Platoon, after recovering its ammunition, was augmented by a machinegun section, mortar squad, and two SCR-300 radios, before the young officer led the unit across the MSR to lend a hand.
When Stevens’ relief by 3/5 was completed, he added the 1st Platoon to Company B’s reinforcements, and himself withdrew to Cloverleaf Hill with the 3d Platoon as ordered.
The reinforcements were fed into Fenton’s line as fast as they reached the summit of Hill 125. By this time every man in Company B had been committed to the forward wall—mortarmen, clerks, signalmen, and all. Lieutenant Howard Blank combined his Able Company mortars with those of the defenders and immediately followed up the artillery and 81-mm. fire which had blunted the attack. These final concentrations of 60-mm. mortar fire on Obong-ni and Finger Ridges and the forward slopes of Hill 125 ended the enemy attack. The surviving Reds withdrew to Tugok.
At 1600, during the dying minutes of the Brigade’s final action in the Pusan Perimeter, Newton was ordered back to the regimental CP for a conference. The executive officer, Major Merlin R. Olson, took over 1/5 from the battalion OP on the ridge east of Hill 125.
The 5th Marines commander had called the leaders of his battalions to brief them on General Craig’s last field directive, which began with the long awaited words:
“THIS MY OPN ORDER 22-50 X COMMENCING AT 2400 5 SEPT BRIG MOVES BY RAIL AND MOTOR TO STAGING AREA PUSAN FOR FURTHER OPERATION AGAINST THE ENEMY X PRIOR TO COMMENCEMENT OF MOVEMENT 5TH MARS WILL STAND RELIEVED BY ELMS OF 2ND INF DIV COMMENCING AT DARKNESS ... CONCEAL FROM THE ENEMY ACTIVITIES CONNECTED WITH YOUR WITHDRAWAL....”
Taplett’s 3d Battalion had sustained 24 casualties from artillery and mortar fire between its occupation of Observation Hill and the time it was relieved by a company of the 23d Infantry shortly after midnight. Plodding rearward through mud and driving rain, 3/5’s long column began its three-and-a-half-mile march to an entrucking point 2,000 yards west of Yongsan.
Following 3/5 were the weary, mud-soaked troops of the 1st Battalion. Having successfully defended Hill 125 at a cost of 2 killed and 23 wounded, Baker Company had filed down to the road after being relieved by another company of the 23d Infantry. Muetzel brought up the rear with Company A’s contingent, and a battalion column was formed at Olson’s check point east of Hill 125.
By dawn of 6 September, the two battalions were loading aboard trucks to follow the rest of the Brigade. Numbed by fatigue and icy rain, the bent forms huddled together in the cargo vehicles had no regrets as they bade good-bye to the Pusan perimeter.