Three more contacts were made before the end of the month along the division front. On 19 February CCF soldiers, in two-platoon strength, engaged KMC sentries forward of COP 33, located about a mile east of the action the previous week. After the initial exchange of small arms fire, the Koreans moved back to the outpost and called down supporting fires on the Chinese. Artillery and mortars tore into the attackers causing numerous casualties and forcing the enemy to withdraw. On the morning of 22 February, a raiding party from the 5th Marines assaulted a smaller enemy force at Hill 35A, approximately 1,300 yards southwest of the Ungok hills. In this second raid staged by the 5th Marines that month, assault troops (H/3/5) used flamethrowers in the early stages of the action to help clear enemy trenches of hostile grenade throwers.
Late the next night a 7th Marines unit, consisting of a reinforced platoon and four M-46 tanks, set out to raid Yoke, located near the peace corridor five miles north of Freedom Bridge. The assault against that position never came off. At 2137 as the B/1/7 platoon moved into preliminary positions on Hill 90, north of the ultimate objective, a Chinese company ambushed the patrol from three sides. When the Marines closed with the enemy in hand-to-hand fighting, a support platoon was sent from the MLR. After an intense 30 minute fire fight, the CCF began withdrawing at 0138. Enemy losses were listed as 45 counted KIA, 33 estimated KIA, and 35 estimated WIA. As a result of the assault, orders for the 7th Marines raid on Yoke were cancelled. Marine casualties numbered 5 killed, 22 wounded.
Whereas February was characterized by a marked increase in ground contacts between Marines and their CCF adversaries, during the first part of March the Chinese again assumed an inactive posture. Marine patrols reported few contacts. Except for a KMC raid on 3 March, little action that could be considered a sizable engagement took place until after midmonth. On the 16th there was a brief skirmish involving a 5th Marines combat patrol near Reno and a short fire fight between Carson defenders and an enemy squad. The next night a Chinese platoon, waiting near Vegas for a Marine patrol to pass by, was itself put to flight by the patrol.
Two encounters with the CCF on 19 March marked the heaviest action yet of the month. Early that morning, a predawn raid was staged by B/1/5 (Captain Theodore J. Mildner) at Hill 31A, one of the Ungok twin objectives in CLAMBAKE the previous month. The March ITEM raid employed 111 Marines. One platoon was to make the assault and the second platoon to support the operation and assist in casualty evacuation. Following a series of nearly a dozen air strikes on the objective and artillery preparation, Captain Mildner’s two assault platoons jumped off from the MLR check point at 0518. As usually happened in such operations, the preliminary fire drove the Chinese to reverse slope defenses. No enemy POWs were taken and at 0700 the Marine units disengaged, due to casualties sustained from enemy shelling and machine gun fire.[351]
[351] Prior to the raid various combinations of flamethrower fuels and pressure were extensively used. The purpose was to determine the maximum effective range of the flamethrower teams in order to “neutralize the hand-grenade throwing potential of the enemy, this being one of the major problems confronting assault elements on other raids.” Final tests resulted in flame being thrown more than 40 yards up hill. 1/5 ComdD, Mar 53, App. IVf, p. 3.
Earlier that same date, two attacks had been made simultaneously by the enemy on outposts in the center regimental sector, where the 1st Marines had relieved the 7th on 10 March. At 0105 one CCF company struck in the vicinity of Hedy while a second lunged at Esther, about 1½ miles east. When a G/3/1 reconnaissance patrol operating forward of COP Esther observed enemy movement, the Marines pulled back to the outpost, alerting it to the impending attack. After a heavy incoming artillery barrage, the enemy assaulted the outpost, but when a three-hour effort failed to carry the position, the attackers withdrew. By that time the Chinese company which had hit COP Hedy had also broken off the attack.
Actually the fight in Captain Carl R. Gray’s Company H sector, to the rear of Hedy, was mainly at the MLR, for the Chinese indulged in merely a brief fire fight at the latter outpost, bypassing it in favor of a crack at JAMESTOWN. The main line of resistance failed to yield to the enemy thrust, which was supported by 2,400 rounds of mortar and artillery fire along the MLR and outposts.
After being thwarted by Hedy-Esther defenses, the enemy shifted his efforts westward to the 1st KMC area. The Korean regiment received the brunt of the enemy’s minor infantry probes immediately preceding the Nevada Cities battle. Late on 25 March a series of skirmishes broke out in the 1st Marines sector between one-or-two platoon size Chinese infantry forces and Marine outpost defenders. Following a quiet daylight spell on the 26th, the Chinese resumed the offensive with a probe at COP Dagmar. This coincided with what developed into a massive regimental assault unleashed against Carson, Reno, and Vegas, outposts in the 5th Marines sector, to the right. There Colonel Walt’s regiment would shortly be the target of the bloodiest Chinese attack to date on the 1st Marine Division in West Korea.