Local man served in Korean War

WASHTUCNA – Roy McKenzie was just 17 years old when he enlisted in the Army in 1948.

Growing up in Primeville, Oregon, he joined the Army before finishing high school, and left the day after Christmas for basic training in Fort Ord, California.

World War II was over, and the country was at peace.

After a 15-day visit home, McKenzie shipped out of San Francisco for Japan in the spring of 1949.

“I spent 17 days on the troop ship, and I was never so glad to get off,” McKenzie said. “I think we take things for granted nowadays. It’s so much different now, the modern way they go; they get on a plane and in about 12 hours, the GI’s are in Afghanistan. It’s just a different world, the way they ship people around now.”

McKenzie said there were 900 people on board the troop ship from different outfits, fresh out of basic training. They docked at Yokohama. South of Tokyo, it was one of the first Japanese ports opened to foreign trade in 1859.

“We docked at Yokohama, and they called out the names of different outfits, and you left,” McKenzie said. “I was assigned to the 58th Signal Battalion, attached to the 25th Division.”

His unit was sent to Kyoto. The former capital and the oldest capital city in Japan, Kyoto is located on the island of Honshu.

“It was the old capital, and the only major city not bombed in World War II,” McKenzie said. “We were there about a year, when the war started; Sunday, the 25th of June. It was a shock. We were just laying around, being an occupation troop. Somebody came over, busting into the cook shack in the early morning when we were having breakfast, and said North Korea had attacked South Korea.”

About 75,000 soldiers from the North Korean People’s Army crossed the 38th parallel, the boundary separating the pro-Western Republic of Korea in the south from the Soviet-backed Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the north.

Two days later, President Harry S. Truman announced he was ordering U.S. air and naval forces to South Korea, to defend the country against the forces of international communism.

“We shipped out, as Truman had declared war and decided to send troops,” McKenzie said. “It took awhile to get everything organized, but we loaded everything onto a troop train, and went to Sasebo, Japan. From there, we went down past Hiroshima, got on a landing craft, and went across the channel.”

McKenzie landed in South Korea July 8, 1950.

“We got to Pusan (also spelled Busan), a major city, and got unloaded. Then we went up the road, along with tanks and artillery,” McKenzie said. He was serving in a communications division.

“I was with the Signal Corps, and we did everything to set up communications. We went through telephone and telegraph school, and learned about switchboards. I was in a little squad, where we had jeeps and different outfits,” McKenzie said. “We put a spool of communication wire down the paths, across rice fields. We ran it by hand.”

McKenzie said he never knew from one day to the other where he would be sent next.

“Weeks went on, and eventually we ended way up in North Korea,” McKenzie said. “We strung telephone wire, miles and miles of wire, down roads. Sometimes we might only use it for a few days. Every time you moved and people started setting stuff up, you had to have communication.”

McKenzie said a lot of his time was spent driving truck.

“I dug a few fox holes in the early days of the war,” McKenzie said. “I wasn’t infantry, but we still saw a lot of stuff you don’t really want to see.”

The war finally ended in July, 1953, but not before it claimed some five million soldiers and civilians; with the country remaining divided still.

McKenzie said the homecoming process began for him in the early fall of 1951, with final discharge taking place in Fort Lewis in January 1952.

“We took the troop train back down to Pusan, come across to Sasebo, Japan, and loaded on a troop train in Yokohama. I came home in the fall of 1951,” McKenzie said. “With a lot of things in between.”

McKenzie said North Korea was “terrible, cold and miserable,” with lots of snow.

“One never changed clothes, except socks for about a month,” McKenzie said. “I never had my clothes off. I tried to keep warm, it was so cold and miserable. Before you got up into that country, you tried to find a river you could take a bath in.”

McKenzie said his inspiration for enlisting was “wanting to get out of town.”

“I was 17, and just like a lot of other kids. I wanted to be a paratrooper when I enlisted, but they said I had to go through basic training first, then go on,” McKenzie said. “Then they shipped us overseas, so I never did get in the paratroopers, just the old Army.”

One memory McKenzie shared was the opportunity to see Hiroshima, the Japanese city bombed during World War II.

“They were still rebuilding it,” McKenzie said. “I got a chance to go with a buddy on a three-day pass. We went on a military train. I got to see a fair amount of damage, but most of it was rebuilt by the time we got there.”

McKenzie said he saw a few exciting things, “but I’m not going to talk about it.”

“I lost a few friends, we’ll let it got at that,” McKenzie said.

“I came home a 20-year-old man. I went overseas at 17, and turned 18 August 11, 1949,” McKenzie said. “I turned 19 in Korea.”

After coming home to Primeville, McKenzie lived in Bend, Oregon, for 30 years where he worked for the Forest Service in Descartes National Forest.

“I went to Wyoming and worked in the oil fields a year, but I didn’t like it, and turned around,” McKenzie said. “One thing led to another, and I ended up in Washtucna driving school bus for 27 years.”

McKenzie said when his relative, Ginger McKenzie urged him to apply to drive school bus, he told her “no.”

“I said, ‘I can’t stand kids,’ and she said ‘do it awhile,’” McKenzie said.

After 27 years, I retired, but I wish I was still driving school bus. It turned out I loved it.”

McKenzie lives in Washtucna still, with his wife Magi. He turns 90 on his next birthday.