Local soldier’s remains identified
Smead, of Hadley, killed in Korea, to be buried in Sept.
The remains of a Hadley resident who was killed during the Korean War, nearly 71 years ago, have finally been identified.
Army Cpl. Walter A. Smead, 24, was killed on the sixth day of a disastrous retreat at the Chosin Reservoir on Dec. 6, 1950.
In January 1951, his family received the dreaded notice that he was missing in action.
On March 16, 2021, his remains were identified as being among those in 55 boxes turned over by the North Korean government in 2018. Scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used mitochondrial DNA analysis to identify him, along with other evidence.
He has a living younger brother, Doug Smead of Corinth, and other family members. He will be buried in the Gerald B.H. Solomon Saratoga National Cemetery in Schuylerville on Sept. 20.
Smead was among a huge group trying to cover the retreat of U.S. forces after they were surprised by an overwhelming force of Chinese soldiers. It was the middle of one of the coldest winters on record, with temperatures 20 to 30 degrees below zero. Many who survived lost limbs to frostbite.
“They became essentially trapped and surrounded by the Chinese forces,” said Frank Mcclement, director of the Saratoga County Veterans Service Agency. “They had to fight their way out of there. Many of them walked across the frozen reservoir.”
The conditions were harsh and the
Hadley
Chinese had surrounded the troops on all sides, making it just as hard to retreat as to continue forward.
“Many of them had to abandon those that were killed,” Mcclement said. “I will say that I do know at one point this whole thing was looked at, with these particular units, that it was a blunder, but upon further review, it was really, truly looked at as a heroic and massive undertaking. They actually destroyed and fought off a significant number of Chinese. They decimated entire units but they (Chinese forces) just kept coming, the numbers were stacked so deeply against them. And of course the conditions — the freezing conditions, the mud. It’s scary to think what they went through.”
Smead was part of Battery A, 57th Field Artillery Battalion, 7th Infantry Division. The division deployed near the Chosin Reservoir on Nov. 27, preparing to attack the next day, but the Chinese launched a surprise attack that night. The division expected reinforcements and its commander believed there were few Chinese left to attack, so they dug in. But the Chinese blocked the reinforcements and attacked again the next night. At the same time, it began to snow heavily and the temperature reached minus 30 degrees, with several men freezing to death in their foxholes. By the last day of November, half the division had been killed or wounded.
The division began a fighting retreat on Dec. 1, which went poorly, and by nightfall almost every officer was dead or seriously
wounded. Leaderless and under overwhelming fire, soldiers reached the edge of the reservoir and began to cross the ice alone, trying to get to the Marines who held the other side of the reservoir. More than 90 percent of the division was killed or wounded by Dec. 2, according to accounts at the National Museum of the United States Army.
Smead survived all of this, and was among the few able to help the Marines continue the retreat on Dec. 6. That’s when he fell, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.
“He was reported missing in action on Dec. 6, 1950, after his unit was attacked by enemy forces as they attempted to withdraw near the Chosin Reservoir, North Korea. Following the battle, his remains could not be recovered,” the agency said in a press release.
Smead is the second Korean War soldier from Saratoga County to be identified in recent years after being reported as missing. Army Pfc. John Martin’s remains were identified in 2018. He was also killed in the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir. Earlier this year, remains of another Capital Region resident who fought in the Korean War, 20-yearold Clifford Johnson of Valatie, were laid to rest in Schuylerville after being recently identified.
It is believed two more Saratoga County residents are still missing in action from the Korean War, said Saratoga County Historian Lauren Roberts. They are Master Sgt. Stanley Harmor and First Lt. Norman Melander, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.
A total of 16 Saratoga County residents were killed in the Korean War.