When 3/5’s commander learned that the spur of Hill 1384 was unoccupied, he dispatched a platoon of Company I to an outpost position 500 yards up the slope. About 300 yards behind the Item Company unit, on a portion of the spur directly above the battalion CP, a platoon of South Korean police deployed with two heavy machine guns.
At 2045, fifteen minutes before any other unit on the Yudam-ni reported a contact, the outpost platoon of Item Company began receiving fire from above. This harassment, probably involving advance elements of the 237th CCF Regiment, continued sporadically for several hours, throughout the period of the first Communist attacks against other fronts.
In the valley at 2120, a few men of How Company, 7th Marines, entered 3/5’s positions barefooted and partially clothed. Taplett, personally noting the time of their arrival, questioned them in the battalion aid station, and they told how their 60mm mortar position on Hill 1403 had been seized by the Chinese.[392]
[392] MajGen H. L. Litzenberg Comments, 20 Jul 56.
The battalion commander returned to his CP, and after listening to the far-off din of the initial Communist attacks, placed his perimeter on a 100% alert at 0115. Half an hour later, the Item Company platoon on the spur of Hill 1384 reported an increase in enemy fire coming from above. A message from H/7 next warned that CCF troops were moving around Hill 1403 to cut the MSR. Company I observed activity in that quarter shortly afterwards, and at 0218 opened fire on an enemy platoon, which promptly retracted.
A few minutes later, a company—possibly two companies—of Chinese swept down the spur of Hill 1384, overran the Item Company platoon outpost, and continued on towards the police platoon. The South Koreans, after inflicting heavy casualties on the Reds with their two machine guns, vacated the high ground. Enemy troops then spread out along the crest and poured plunging fire into H&S and Weapons Companies defending the draw.
Weapons Company, on the far side of the depression, held its ground, but H&S, directly under the gun, shortly fell back across the MSR. Taplett’s CP was left in a no man’s land, with enemy bullets raining down out of the night and Marine fire whistling back from across the draw and road. Upon learning of the withdrawal, the battalion commander elected to remain in the tent in order to keep telephone contact with his rifle companies, which were as yet uninvolved. He did not consider the situation too serious, and it seemed as though the police platoon’s machine guns had taken the sting out of the enemy assault.
Except for a few individuals, the Chinese did not descend from the spur. Nor did they direct much fire at Taplett’s blackout tent, which they probably took to be unoccupied. Inside, the battalion commander studied his maps, received reports and issued instructions over the field phone while his S-3, Major Thomas A. Durham, sat nearby with pistol drawn. Major John J. Canney, the executive officer, left the CP to retrieve H&S Company and was killed as he approached the MSR. Private First Class Louis W. Swinson, radio operator, whose instrument had proved unreliable in the severe cold, took position outside the tent and covered the approaches with his rifle. This unique situation—a battalion commander under fire in an exposed position while his rifle companies lay peacefully entrenched several hundred yards away—lasted for over an hour.
The Battle of North Ridge
At approximately 0300, when Taplett, Durham, and Swinson began their lonely vigil, the 79th CCF Division launched another assault on North Ridge (see Map 16).[393] As a result of the enemy’s first attack, and in anticipation of the second, Colonel Murray earlier had moved elements of the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, into position behind 3/5.