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Five nights. Never gave up the hill.
The entire 1st Marine Division walked out because of them.
On the night of November 27, 1950, three Chinese divisions fell simultaneously on X Corps at Chosin. Fox Company, under Captain William Barber, held Toktong Pass: a critical mountain gap 14 miles south of Hagaru-ri.
The pass was everything. If it fell, the road was cut. 10,000 Marines had no way out. Barber's 246 men had to hold it at temperatures dropping to −38°F.
The first assault came at 0200. Barber sent one message: "We will hold." They did. For five nights.
Fox Company repelled three assaults before dawn. At first light they counted 62 Chinese dead in the wire. Nobody talked about leaving.
Shot through the hip, Barber refused evacuation. He crawled position to position in frozen mud. "We're not going anywhere." His example held the company when every calculation said run.
Marines who could not stand manned positions on hands and knees. Frostbitten fingers worked bolt actions. They stripped Chinese dead for weapons. Sheer refusal to stop.
Plasma froze in bottles. Morphine froze in syrettes. Marines kept their M1s warm against their bodies. A weapon left on frozen ground for ten minutes would not cycle. Nobody set their weapon down.
26 killed. 89 wounded. 82 men walked to meet the rescue column under their own power. Captain Barber received the Medal of Honor. 10,000 men walked out because 246 held five nights at Fox Hill.
Two months before Fox Hill, MacArthur executed the move that nearly ended the war. An amphibious assault at Inchon with 32-foot tidal swings and a six-hour window to land 75,000 men. His own admirals called it suicidal.
They landed September 15. Seoul liberated twelve days later. The North Korean Army cut in two, in full retreat. For eight weeks, the war seemed won.
Then 300,000 Chinese troops crossed the Yalu River. Everything changed.
Nineteen stainless steel figures advance across a triangular granite field on the National Mall moving in patrol formation toward an American flag. Behind them, 164 feet of polished black granite bears the sandblasted faces of 2,500 servicemen drawn from archival photographs. The statues' reflective steel surfaces mirror the wall as they pass. The living and the dead, moving together.
Dedicated July 27, 1995. The 42nd anniversary of the armistice. The same day the war quietly ended.
