In the Hell of War, Compassion Blossomed
In 1950, Pete Smith was one of the many abandoned Korean children in a war-torn country until an American military police unit adopted him. He's not alone. Thousands of orphans were saved - it was the American way.
Pete Smith was only three years old when he was plucked out of a ditch by a U.S. Army sergeant in the city of Pyongyang. It was 1950, the beginning of the Korean War. Pete was alone and half-naked, shivering from the cold, so the sergeant put the toddler inside a duffel bag and drove him to the Army compound.
For five years, Pete was the youngest member of the 728th Military Police A Company stationed in Yongdung Po until he was adopted by another sergeant and taken to his new home in Arroyo Grande, Calif. where he had an all-American upbringing.
Pete, who turns 61 this month, thought that was the end of the story - his own "happily ever after" complete with a strapping hero named John Wesley Smith as a father. But in 2004, Pete attended the 728th's reunion in Springfield, Missouri for the first time and met a group of his other American GI "dads" who helped raise him at the compound.
It's a story that still takes Pete's breath away when he talks about it. Two hundred and sixty six soldiers, many who were barely 18 years old, took on the tremendous responsibility of taking care of an orphan.
"There were so many kids over there. Displaced kids and kids without food. It makes you think why? Why does this story happen?" said Pete from his San Antonio, Texas home.
Finding his 'Fathers'
At the reunion in 2004, Aubrey Smith, 78, spotted Pete amidst the crowd of veterans in the Springfield hotel conference room and remembered the child he took care of from September 1951 to the end of 1952. As the 728th's mess sergeant, Aubrey made sure young Pete cleared his plate at every meal. They had already spoken on the phone in the months leading up to the reunion, but in Springfield they saw each other again for the first time since leaving Korea.
Aubrey showed Pete a dog-eared picture taken of the two of them in 1951. In the black and white photo, four-year-old Pete is saluting the camera. Kneeling at Pete's side is Aubrey in his 20s, his eyes hidden in the shadows.
Pete has no recollection of this photo being taken. In fact, up until the reunion he thought he was a child of South Korea who wandered onto the Yongdung Po compound and enchanted his future father, but there was more to the story.
"There were six to seven individuals who remembered me and had pictures of me. It was really enlightening," said Pete.
They told him stories about the past he couldn't remember and didn't know. It's likely Pete is from North Korea. He has vague recollections of crowds of Koreans walking on the roads, likely refugees who would scatter and hide in the ditches when American planes flew overhead, said Aubrey.
"That's where we think Pete may have gotten separated from his family," he said.
No one knows the identity of the sergeant who originally picked Pete up from the ditch. The men tried to place Pete in an orphanage, but they were all overflowing with children like Pete - innocent casualties of war. So the men of the 728 MP decided to raise Pete themselves, and since the Army prohibited the housing of "indigenous" individuals, they simply taught Pete to hide.
It became an unofficial rule that whoever assumed the title of mess sergeant would also inherit Pete.
"Pete was kind of passed down to me," said Aubrey with a laugh. "I'm just like any other American soldier. We like kids. We always felt sorry for the kids in the combat zone."
At Yongdung Po, little Pete spent his days shadowing the soldiers during poker games and minding his own chores. He was given a small American pocket dictionary to learn new words and the troop would quiz him on American presidents and states.
"He really loved the American soldiers. He did what he thought he needed to do and he wanted to be one of us," said Aubrey.
Somewhere along the way, the duty of caring for Pete was transferred to the supply sergeant. In 1954, Sgt. John Wesley Smith came to Yongdung Po and met the troop's unofficial adoptee who began slumbering in the supply room.
"... I think that's where [John] fell in love with him," said Aubrey.
Pete remembers John telling him about his adoption, his new home in California and his new mom, Thelma. Before they left Korea in August 1955, the men of the 728 MP pooled their money and gave the boy they helped raise $650 - big money for soldiers who were making less than $100 a month.
"I felt tremendous gratitude," said Pete about finally realizing the truth about the men who saved his life. "They're all my fathers whether they accept it or not."
A Compassionate Army
"American servicemen had to be taught to aim a gun and shoot at the enemy. They did not have to be taught to pick up a crying child," said Dr. George Drake, a Korean War veteran who has done extensive research on American servicemen's humanitarian efforts.
During the Korean War, American GIs saved the lives of over 10,000 Korean children and helped sustain over 54,000 in more than 400 orphanages, said Drake, who runs a Web site dedicated to Korean War children and their heroes.
In war, bits of atrocities grab headlines, but the real story are the acts of compassion that go virtually unrecognized, he said.
He's been working tirelessly over the years to celebrate the caring spirit of American soldiers through photo exhibits and speaking engagements. He even poured $50,000 of his own money to build a shrine to these American heroes in Bellingham, Wash.
The Korean War Children's Memorial in Big Rock Garden Park was dedicated in July 2003.
"These are stories that every mother of a serviceman or any person should be proud of," said Drake.
Jack Jackson, a desk sergeant for the 728 MP A Company from 1952-55 also knew Pete at Yongdung Po. He said Pete wasn't alone. Many Korean children flocked to the compound to find jobs in exchange for food and gifts. Most had their family to go home to, but Pete and another orphan named Tony did not.
"It was here that we pooled money, which was almost nonexistent [except for] 50 cents here and there. We managed to get Tony a new outfit," said Jackson. "All of the kids within the compound had a Christmas party ... But for us, it was more important that they receive the gifts - simple as they were - oranges, apples [and] color crayons."
Questions that Remain Unanswered
"I have lived a pretty interesting life," said Pete, who began writing his autobiography after he retired from the Army in 1992 after 22 years of service.
His new dad, who didn't have any other children, gave Pete everything: the last name Smith, his own birth date of Aug. 15 and a new life.
Pete grew up in the booming agricultural city of Arroyo Grande as the only Korean in a neighborhood of many Japanese Americans. During the summers, Pete worked for the JA-owned Pismo Oceanic Vegetable Exchange (POVE) and played baseball with the POVE Packers, a Babe Ruth league of mostly Sansei boys who won championships almost every year.
"[Pete] lived just a block or so away from us," said Kaz Ikeda, the Packers' coach in the 1960s. "He was a nice young man. As a pitcher he was really aggressive. He never gave me any problems and he always played hard."
With the Army, Pete was able to return to Korea several times, but he barely has any recollection of his homeland. He has no memory of his biological parents.
"Sometimes I fabricate things. I keep thinking I have an older brother, but maybe that's something wishful. In Korea, people came and asked me if I wanted to locate my parents. I didn't know where to begin and how to begin. I didn't want to create a problem I couldn't control. If 100 people said that they were my relatives, what could I do? I kept that door closed," said Pete.
Up until recently, Pete's life had been shrouded in mystery. John didn't talk much about his time in Korea, said Pete's wife Barbara, a Sansei working for the U.S. Department of Defense.
"I don't remember his father talking about the [728 MP] or the reunions," said Barbara. "There were a lot of blanks that he couldn't fill in until later."
Now Pete attends every 728 MP reunion - including the one this past June in Columbus, Georgia - with his own family.
"Growing up, we didn't really talk about it too much. I knew my grandfather, but I didn't know a lot of the details," said Daniel Smith, 29. "When I went to the reunion I had an in-depth look at it. I can see how much my dad meant to them at that time. It was a rough time for them.
"He was kind of a mascot. They took their minds off the way things were and took care of him ... it helped them forget about their surroundings," Daniel added.
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