Korean War Veteran Discusses Life on the Front Lines
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Let's talk now with someone who fought in the Korean War, someone who brought a no doubt unwanted souvenir home with him also. You may recognize James McEachin from his many TV roles, but he's also the author of several novels, with a new one due out this fall. James McEachin joins us live from Washington this morning. Good morning, Jim.</s>JAMES MCEACHIN, KOREAN WAR VETERAN: Good morning, Kyra. How are you?</s>PHILLIPS: Very good. Glad to have you with us.</s>MCEACHIN: Thank you for inviting me.</s>PHILLIPS: Oh, absolutely. What I really want to talk about right now is your experience during the Korean War. Now, you volunteered to become a soldier, correct?</s>MCEACHIN: Yes, but going to Korea was the second time I had volunteered. I mean the first time I went in the Army was 1947 and I served with an all black outfit and then I went to Japan and served three years there and I came back and was discharged. Then the Korean War started and I had to be a part of that, or at least I wanted to be a part of it. And then I volunteered for the front lines and got my just desserts, so to speak.</s>PHILLIPS: Well, now, Jim, why would anyone want to volunteer to be on the front lines?</s>MCEACHIN: Well, I think when you received your training with an all black outfit in the 24th such as I did, they more or less geared you for war. We had a first sergeant who believed that the only way that blacks really could achieve great success and their just dues in this country was to get on the battlefield and prove yourself and that's why. And I grew up with that in the 24th and carried it all the way overseas to Korea with me.</s>PHILLIPS: Now, I do want to talk about that in just a second.</s>MCEACHIN: OK.</s>PHILLIPS: Definitely let's get back to the issue of the integration and segregation within the military. But let's go back to when you were wounded during the war. Will you tell me about that experience? You still carry something with you.</s>MCEACHIN: Yeah, yeah I do. That sometimes, now that it's all coming back to me, I'm probably one of the few guys around that's walking around with a bullet still in his, lodged between his ribs, having been shot as well as grenaded in Korea. But I was wounded on a pre-dawn patrol and very severely, first in the legs and then in the abdomen. And I woke up in a pool of water and I drank this phosphorus water and I ended up in the hospital again and was subsequently had a lung removed.</s>PHILLIPS: Someone saved your life.</s>MCEACHIN: Yeah.</s>PHILLIPS: You have a memory of somebody yet you've never met that person. Will you tell us about that story?</s>MCEACHIN: Well, actually I was hit that morning -- the story sometimes makes me nervous in thinking about it. What happened was that I was unable to walk and I crawled out of this almost like creek that I was in. I think probably the enemy thought I was dead and just rolled me in this place or kicked me in there or something like that. And as I was coming out, I heard a voice that challenged me. And it was a young almost Aryan, Scandinavian looking guy who said, who challenged me. And then he, as he got closer to me he said, he looked at me and said oh, my god, you're hurt. And then he said to me please don't tell. He kept repeating this phrase, please don't tell, please don't tell. And I didn't know what the hell he was talking about. And then it later occurred to me that he had bugged out while we were under attack and, you know, he just probably lost his nerve and something like that. But his job then, I felt, was to try to save me and I thought that he was going to leave me and I had a grenade and I still had my .45 with me and I was going to shoot him in case he took off.</s>PHILLIPS: Jim, have you ever tried to find him?</s>MCEACHIN: Oh, my god, yes. When I, I went to the hospital in Japan and I stayed there for a month or so and then I went back to Korea and then back to the front lines trying to find this wonderful, this incredibly courageous guy. And, but I was never able to find him. And in addition to that, I had lost my nerve and I was, you know, you go through battlefield fatigue, so to speak, and you just can't stay there any longer. But no, I was never able to find him. But interestingly enough, a friend of mine, David Sharney (ph) back in Los Angeles, reminded me that in the four books that I've written there's always this guy's image that's in the book somehow. I mean in the first book, "Tell Me A Tale," he was the old farmer and "Farewell To the Mockingbirds" he was the company commander of these black troops. In the "Heroin Factor" he was this, he was the detective's partner and in my new book, "Say Goodnight To the Boys In Blue," he is the young Aryan cop who befriends this old veteran soldier. So this guy just, he's hung with me for all these years and as much as you try to put him, the war and everything else out of your mind, it comes back.</s>PHILLIPS: Well, Jim, I hate to say this but we're out of time. But I do want to mention your new book, "Say Goodnight To the Boys In Blue." I know a lot of people are looking forward to reading that.</s>MCEACHIN: It will be out in September. Thank you very much.</s>PHILLIPS: Thanks for being with us, Jim.</s>MCEACHIN: OK.