Cpl. Romeo Daley
Cpl. Romeo Daley: Canadian Korea War Veteran with the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry
I am very proud to be a Canadian Veteran of the Korean War. It is amazing how the country has prospered since the war. The war was not well known, but with the hard work of Senator Yonah Martin and others, it has gained the recognition and respect I feel it deserves.
I am fortunate to live in Canada and to be here as we celebrate the 150th birthday of our wonderful country.
My wife and I were on a revisit to Seoul, The Republic of South Korea in April 2013. It was hard to believe that in a relatively short period of time the country had gone from poverty to prosperity. It is as modern as anywhere else in the world. We found the people in Korea to be warm and friendly and the country is beautiful. The Koreans can be very proud of their many achievements such as Hyundai vehicles and LG Electronics. Korea has a wonderful culture in their food, dance and song. The Canadians who served in Korea love the Korean folk song Arirang and the Korean community honour us at many of the events by singing it for us, it will always remind us of Korea.
We are very fortunate to have Korean communities here. They have helped the Canadians feel proud of our service during the war and we are grateful. Although it has been a long time since the war, the Korean community has always included the Korean War Veterans at their social events and we enjoy being part of their festivities.
On June 25, 1950 Canada’s young men and women were called upon and volunteered to go to the Land of The Morning Calm, Korea. 26,791 Canadians served on land, in the air and on the sea during the war with an additional 7,000 who served as peacekeepers from July 28, 1953 until the end of December 1955. 516 did not return and 1,558 were wounded. The battles stopped on July 27th, 1953 when an armistice was signed, however South and North Korea are still technically at war and the 38th Parallel became the heavily guarded line between the North and South. North Korea was backed by China with material and troops and became the number one advisory of the Canadian troops during the war.
I was one of the 26,791 proud Canadians who volunteered to go to Korea during the war. Korea was to became known as The Forgotten War, mainly because it came 5 years after the end of the Second World War and was not given the same coverage
by the media since it was considered a Police Action and not a war. There is no doubt by anyone who was there during the Korean War that it was a war
I was born in Capreol, Ontario and grew up on a farm in South Porcupine, Ontario, the middle child of three boys born to Marie and Russell Daley. The Korean War started in June 1950 and I joined the Canadian Army in August 1950 when I was 18 years old, and went to Calgary with the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. My goal at that time was to join the PPCLI and become a paratrooper. I took my basic training in Calgary in a little place called Sarcee about twelve miles outside of Calgary. The basic training wasn’t too difficult for me because prior to joining the military I did a few years in the Sea Cadets so basically I had the basic training behind me. I advanced quite fast, six weeks training which I was through in three, then we had the advanced training and in the six weeks of advance training, again I was through it in three. I was trained quite early with weapons and so on. When they started forming the draft for the Special Forces for Korea I was one of the youngest and one of the first to be in that draft. My basic training was done in Calgary and my advanced training was done in Wainwright and from there, I went back to Calgary with the hope of doing my jump training. I didn’t complete the jump course at that time, instead I was sent over to Korea. We went from Calgary to Seattle, Washington and boarded a U.S. Liberty Ship, the USS General Miggs, it took 21 days to cross from Seattle to Yokohama, Japan. You had to be 19 to go to Korea and I turned 19 on May 21st, 1951 on board the ship. From there we boarded a rapid train to Sasebo, Japan where we re-boarded another ship and went to Korea. We landed in Pusan, Korea on May 28, 1951. We spent a couple of days in Pusan just to acclimatize ourselves, I guess. Then we boarded a cattle train and went up to Taegu, Korea and then to Tucheon, from there we de-railed and went by foot to the Imjin River where the Canadians were first involved in battle with the enemy forces. I served two tours during the Korean War in 1951 and 1952.
Being very young and not seeing too much prior to Korea, I was amazed at the poor condition of the Koreans at that time. They had absolutely nothing, it was a primitive country with thatch roof houses, with dirt floors. When we were proceeding north in Korea the refugees were coming down and there were just lines and lines of men, women and particularly children, some with no clothing and most with no food. It didn’t seem like they had anything and anything that we could do for them would be an improvement. It was very sickening, that’s the worst part with wars, wars are not nice and it’s the children that suffer, and the women. There were atrocities that I personally saw and that still affect me. I still have thoughts, dreams and I sometimes wake up at night and wonder where I am. It was tough to see them like that and being Canadians, the way we are, we tried to help them as much as we could, we gave them as much food as we could and as much clothing and some medical supplies, some band aides etc.
When we first went to Korea we were not sent right up into the front lines, as Brigadier Rockingham wanted the Canadian troops to have a little more training, so we were doing hill training and while doing that we came across a lot of dead Koreans and Chinese, also children and women dead. The following winter of 1951, we came across 42 young American Marines in their sleeping bags that were just bayonetted. They were so exhausted from clearing their positions that they just went into their sleeping bags and never even posted a guard, so the Chinese just killed them all right there. That was pretty tough to see, and of course Brigadier Rockingham said that the Canadians would not have sleeping bags, they took our gray coats away, and even took away the hoods from our parkas so we could hear. The winters in Korea were very cold, similar to Northern Canada. We slept in trenches and in the winter months rats would come in the trenches looking for warmth, and the rats were very large. There was a monsoon season with lots of rain and it was impossible to keep our feet dry. The summer brought some very hot days and with it came snakes to share your trench space. The snakes were small but plentiful, so life in the trenches could be quite challenging.
The Battle of Kapyong is one of Canada’s greatest, yet least-known, military achievements. For two days, April 23 to April 25 1951, about 700 Canadian troops with the 2nd Battalion PPCLI helped to defend a crucial hill in the front lines against about 5,000 Chinese soldiers. The Canadians held their position, they did not retreat or withdraw in the face of overwhelming odds. They held fast and stopped the Chinese troops. The Battalion suffered amazing low casualties with 10 men dead and 23 wounded, they contributed significantly to the defeat of the Communist offensive in South Korea. The 2nd Battalion PPCLI stopped the Chinese from advancing any further into South Korea. The actions of the 2nd Battalion of the PPCLI, the 3rd Battalion Royal Australian Regiment, as well as “A” Company 72nd U.S. Heavy Tank Battalion under UN Command were each awarded the United States Presidential Unit Citation. Today, the valley of Kapyong is much the same as it was in 1950. I served with the 2nd Battalion PPCLI and was at Kapyong, but was not there during that battle.
The Battle of Kapyong was only one of many battles fought valiantly by many regiments during the Korean War. The Canadians fought in many major battles: at Kapyong, Chai Lai, Sami-Chon Valley, The Hook, on Hill 355, to name just a few.
The first action that I was in was Hill 156, called Old Baldy or Old Smokey and we were to clear the Hill of the Chinese, all of the Canadian action was against the Chinese and not the North Koreans. On patrols they would let us go as far as we wanted to go, and once we started to come back they would come out, they were just like rocks coming out of the soil, they were all over the place, it was not nice. We lost six dead that first day, there was myself along with three others, half of a section, two got killed, one got wounded and I never got a scratch, why, I keep asking myself why, I still don’t know and I still ask the question. We accomplished what we were supposed to do and when we came back they gave us an issue of pusser rum, which kind of brightened a lot of us up, it took a lot of thoughts away. The second action that I was in personally was a patrol and again, patrols in Korea were not just a two or three hour thing or even a four hour thing, sometimes they could be for two, three or four days or sometimes a week. The Chinese would let you go as far as you wanted to go, they wouldn’t stop you from coming out, but they would stop you from going back. Another time like the first patrol it was a contact patrol and a prisoner patrol, this time we were to ambush and get a prisoner but we ended up getting ambushed and although we didn’t get any prisoners, we didn’t lose anyone, so when I think of all these things and I am lucky to be here to tell about it.
It is pretty difficult to pinpoint my most frightening moment during the war, because for me there was quite a few. The one that stands out in my mind was on a Hill 277, the Chinese were attacking Hill 355 where the British Glouchester Regiment was and they got just about annihilated when the Chinese over ran the Hill. Then the Chinese came to the Canadians, and they were like ants coming out of the ground and our orders were: “you don’t retire, you don’t retreat, you don’t pull back, you stay”, and when you see this as a 19 year old it is overwhelming. I was a bren gunner and I burnt three barrels on the bren gun that night, they got so hot they just bent, and of course they are interchangeable. One question that is asked is, “did you ever kill anyone”, my answer to that question is, we had a job to do and most of our actions were at night and you see shadows, but you can’t see anything definitely. Later that night we were overrun and we moved from one trench to another trench. When I went into this other trench I bumped into a person that ended up being a Chinese soldier. We looked at each other and I don’t think that he was any older than me, I don’t think that he was any older than 19 or 20 and we both picked up our weapons to fire and his didn’t fire, mine did, and that was an experience that I will never forget and that wasn’t a nice feeling.
We went out on a seven man patrol and it was what was known as a contact patrol, to find out where the enemy is and who it is, what their regiment was and so on. We were crossing a rice paddy and somebody said there is a couple of shadows up to our right, and there must have been 50 Chinese soldiers standing up waiting for us. We had a fire fight then went back through a Royal Canadian Regiment line and we were just about to the front of the RCR line when a Sergeant said “freeze, you are in a mine field” and we were in the middle of a mine field. He got his radio man to call the RCR position and an Engineer came down, his name was Roy Reid. He came down and took every one of us out of that mine field without a casualty, he told us to step here and step there, that was an awful experience, knowing that at any moment you could be gone. Roy Reid received the Military Medal for his actions that night. Roy and I would meet again many years later when I was a Customs Officer at the Peace Bridge along the Canadian/U.S. border. We called in an explosives expert to examine a suspicious parcel and this expert turned out to be Roy Reid. We both became members of the Korea Veterans Association Unit 15 Niagara, and we remained friends until his passing in 1991.
The most heated battle that I was involved in would be on Hill 277, the night that the Chinese attacked, it was roughly 24 hours of continuous battle, they just kept coming and coming and of course our orders were: “you don’t retire, you don’t retreat, you don’t go back, you stay”. I think it was about 8 o’clock in the morning, when a hand grenade went off in front of me and blew my right ear just about off, cut my eye open and the next thing I knew I was in a pod in a helicopter going back to an American M.A.S.H. I didn’t know if I was dead or alive. I have to give the American M.A.S.H. unit credit for attaching the ear, and they did a beautiful plastic surgery job on my left eye. The M.A.S.H. Unit that I was treated in was M.A.S.H. 4077 which was the same Unit that the television show was based on. It is documented that I was the first Canadian soldier treated at M.A.S.H. 4077 Uijongbu, South Korea. I was there for roughly six days, they did an excellent job and from there they sent me to a British hospital in Yeongdeungpo and I was there for about another six days, and then they sent me to rear brigade headquarters and from there to my unit. After I came out of the hospital and went back to the regiment, I was put in a position where I was not in the front lines anymore, just administration.
I don’t talk about the war, even my kids don’t know a lot that we did, I just started to talk about it, and I feel better, so maybe it is a good thing.
A situation will remind me of an incident and a comrade, and I would swear he is sitting right there. I don’t do it too often now, but I used to wake up in the middle of the night and it’s just like being with the old group and we are just sitting there talking, and of course they would disappear and I would be sitting there soaking wet.
On my disembarkation leave I went to Sunnybrook Hospital and they gave me some treatment and when I completed my disembarkation leave I planned on going back to Calgary. When I got to 6PD, they said I wasn’t going back, but was being sent to Headquarter Central Command in Oakville. The question was why, and they said it was for further medical treatment. They didn’t want to send me to Calgary, back to the regiment when I could be close to Sunnybrook Hospital, so I was there for about six months before going back to the regiment. I have to give them credit, they helped me get through a touch time and gave me a whole different outlook.
I feel bitter in the way that the Canadian Government treated us at that time. I didn’t know much about Hong Kong but the older soldiers said that it was similarly the same thing, that they sent the force to a foreign country with no training, no background and definitely no instructions what so ever. I have to give Rockingham and Stone credit for their military training to take the time when the United Nations wanted us to go in right away they both said “no, we have to train our troops” and the Canadian Government didn’t give us any support what so ever.
I feel that most wars are unnecessary, they are caused by either religion, politics or economics and unfortunately, it is the civilians that suffer. If the politicians or religious people were able to settle their differences we wouldn’t have wars. I personally think that the difference of ideas can be resolved without war. It’s a crying shame to see the young people that are killed, that are maimed, and that are scarred. A lot, and I put myself in this category, are scarred and wounded inside and it’s hard to come out.
My message to the Canadian youth of today would be to be proud of yourself, be very proud of yourself, Canada is the best country in the world, we are appreciated and we are noted militarily for our peacekeeping. Our peacekeeping is the best in the world and in my opinion our troops are the best trained in the world, they may not be the best equipped but they are the best trained. We are treated excellent all over the world. I have been to Europe and to Asia and the only place that I haven’t been to is Eastern Asia, but I understand that even there Canadians are very well treated. The Canadian youth should be proud of who they are, and strive to be the best in whatever they endeavor and wear that Canadian flag proudly.
I lost some very close comrades, most were very young and didn’t have a chance.
Every year we go to Meadowvale Cemetery in Brampton to the Wall of Remembrance, there are six names on the wall that were very close buddies of mine and I make a point of putting a poppy on the wall for each and every one. I think of them and miss them, but for the grace of God I could be there.
If I could talk to the men and women who did not come back, I would say, “Rest in Peace it was not in vain, you did an excellent job.”
The Korean War was the start of my volunteering. I received my release in 1957 and moved to Fort Erie, where I worked for Canada Customs until my retirement in 1989 as a Customs Inspector.
I served my community as a member of Volunteer Fire Department #2 Company, serving as their Captain. While with the Fire Department I became a founding member of the Fort Erie Underwater Recovery Unit. I served as President of the Support Committee for Fort Erie Army Cadet Corp 2966 and still support the Corp.
I am President of the Korea Veterans Association Unit 15 Niagara. A member and Sgt.-at-Arms for the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry Association of Canada, South Niagara Region, and am a member of The Royal Canadian Legion Branch 71 where I served on the Executive and as Branch Vice President. I assist as liaison with Veterans and Veterans Affairs Reps. I have assisted in locating and in some cases presenting deserving Veterans with the Quilt of Valour and have presented a Quilt of Remembrance to the Mother of an Afghan soldier who committed suicide after returning and being discharged from the military.
In 2012 I was awarded The Queens Diamond Jubilee Medal for my service in Korea and to the community. In 2016, in Ottawa I was invested and knighted into the Order of St. George.
I would encourage everyone to study their history. My good friend, Daniel Rodrique, produced a wonderful historical series called “The Veterans, a Documentary Series” in which many veterans, from WWII, Korea, including myself, Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda to Afghanistan and many other peacekeeping missions spoke about their experiences serving in the Navy, Army, Airforce and in the Merchant Navy. Hopefully everyone will take the time to watch all of these videos as this is Canada’s military history told first hand. Thank you.