Tag: 7th Infantry Division

1969 began as a particularly deadly year for U.S. troops in South Korea. In January an EC-121 intelligence gathering plane was shot down over international airspace by a North Korean MIG jet that killed 31 American servicemembers. The deadly attack was just one of many from this time period has been called “DMZ War“. North Korea continued its DMZ War when in on October 18, 1969 it ambushed a U.S. Army truck traveling near the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) killing 4 U.S. Soldiers.

The four U.S. Soldiers from the 7th Infantry Division were traveling in a truck marked with a white flag and labeled with a sign that said “DMZ Police” when they were ambushed by a North Korean patrol with rifle fire and grenades. The North Koreans then went up to the truck and shot each soldier in the head at close range to ensure they were dead. The ambush killed Staff Sergeant James R. Grissinger, Specialist Charles E. Taylor, Specialist Jack L. Morris, and Private First Class William E. Grimes.

Following the attack U.S. and ROK troops patrolled the area in an attempt to locate the intruders. Four North Korean commandoes were spotted and engaged by a U.S. patrol. However, the commandoes successfully escaped back across the DMZ into North Korea with no casualties. Three days later the four soldiers were remembered during a ceremony prior to their honor flight back home.

Few know or remember this period of increased North Korean attacks that killed and wounded hundreds of U.S. soldiers who served on the DMZ.  The U.S. and ROK military’s success in the DMZ War had important strategic consequences that unfortunately the four 7th Infantry Division soldiers killed in the truck ambush would never live to see.

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1967 is when the first US-South Korea Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) was signed which handed over legal jurisdiction of crimes committed by US troops while off duty to the Korean authorities.  The most serious case that was first tried in a Korean court involving a US servicemember was the 1967 murder of Chun-ja Kim by Private Eugene D. Taylor.  Taylor was a cook assigned to Headquarters Company, 2nd Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry DIvision.  Taylor was just days away from completing his tour of duty in Korea when he arrested for the murder of his Korean girlfriend on November 5, 1967.

From the November 27, 1967 edition of the Stars & Stripes.

Before redeploying to the US, Pvt. Taylor decided to go on a drunken bender at his girlfriend’s residence.  For some reason during his drunken bender he decided to strangle and kill his Korean girlfriend, Chun-ja Kim that he supposedly had plans to return to Korea to marry.  He committed this murder two days before redeploying to the US.  This just shows that even back in the 1960’s soldiers at high risk of getting in trouble are those within 30 days of going home.  It also shows that the old Korean complaint of GIs committing crimes in Korea and then getting away with them by flying back to the US was also not true back then.

From the February 8, 1968 edition of the Stars & Stripes.

The landlord of the home that Ms. Kim lived at discovered the body in the morning along with Taylor bleeding with a neck wound.  He claims that when he woke up and discovered Kim’s dead body that he tried to commit suicide by slashing his neck with a piece of broken glass.  It appears he was drunk enough to kill someone else, but not drunk enough to kill himself.

From the March 7, 1968 edition of the Stars & Stripes.

Ultimately Pvt Taylor was convicted of the murder of Ms. Kim and sentenced to 8 years in a Korean prison.  It seems like a pretty lenient sentence, but the Korean court took into consideration the mitigating circumstances of him being a soldier deployed to defend Korea and the fact he was drunk.  So being drunk back in the 60’s was considered a mitigating circumstance just like it is today in Korean courts.

From the April 11, 1968 edition of the Stars & Stripes.

Taylor’s crime is now long forgotten in the dustbins of USFK history, but he does have the dubious distinction of being the first American servicemember convicted and sentenced for murder in a South Korean court.  This case shows that US servicemembers were held accountable for the crimes in Korean courts back then and continue to be held accountable today.

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