Iowa Soldier Recalls POW Ordeal in Korea

Posted by Pat Kinney on Friday, September 7, 2018

Cecil Phipps never forgets his niece’s birthday.

On Aug. 28, his niece turned 65. It was also the 65th anniversary of his liberation. He served 33 months as a prisoner of the Chinese Communists in the Korean War.

Phipps, 88, of Fort Dodge and his wife Joyce will be at the Sullivan Brothers Iowa Veterans Museum in Waterloo Sept. 14 when the museum honors Korean War POWs, both those who returned and those who did not.

Phipps served in K Co., 35th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army’s 25th Infantry Division. He was captured Nov. 28, 1950 at the battle of Parmon Wyon, North Korea. He weighed 195 pounds when he was captured. When he was released, Aug. 28, 1953, he weighed 75 pounds. He and fellow prisoners lived on a diet of boiled unseasoned millet and were ill-equipped to face the harsh Korean winters.

“I have arthritis really bad, and the doctor said that’s probably what caused it – the weather, and the treatment and the lack of proper food,” Phipps said. “Every joint in my body has arthritis. My fingers and toes were frostbit. I don’t have any feeling in my toes.”

Also, “Everybody had lice,” Phipps said. “You couldn’t get away from them. Laying, sleeping next to some one that had lice. That was probably one of the things that got me down (in weight and health) so bad. The lice were sucking blood out of me.”

He saw prisoners die. “This one shack I was in, this Chinese guy could speak English. Three words – ‘How many dead?’ Every morning he’d come around, open the door – ‘How many dead?’ Usually there would be two or three that had died during the night. They were still laying there. …They died from starvation and lack of medicine.” More than 40 percent of all American Korean War POWs died in captivity.

“And then we’d have to go on burial details,” Phipps said. The weakened prisoners would hack out shallow graves in the frozen ground for their comrades. “They said later on a lot of these bodies washed out, washed on down into the reservoir and floated to wherever they dumped into the sea.” He was among the prisoners liberated in exchanges at Pammunjom after an armistice.

“I think about it a lot,” Phipps said of his captivity. “I’m glad I made it out of there alive. A lot of guys didn’t. A lot of them are banged up worse than I was… When the GI officer got on the truck” to take them to Pammunjom, he said, “I was really happy. Overjoyed, actually.”

The Sept. 14 event will recognize both American Korean War POWs from Iowa who died in captivity and those who returned. The Museum invites Korean War POWs and immediate family members to tell their stories and be recognized. Please contact Pat Kinney, the Grout's Korean War Content Development Specialist, at (319) 234-6357 or Pat.Kinney@gmdistrict.org.

The Sept. 14 program begins at 11am at the Sullivan Brother Iowa Veterans Museum Lobby and is open to the public.