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March 4, 2011

Oroville Mercury Register
October 20, 1950
War in Korea Developing Into Police Action
By Harry Ferguson
United Press Foreign News Editor

The Korean War is about to become what it was supposed to be all the time—a police action. There will be more fighting and men on each side will continue to be killed and wounded, but the days of the big pitched battles are about over. The main task remaining for the United Nations army is to root the Communists out of the houses and alleys of the towns and ferret them out of the hills. President Truman coined the phrase “police action.” He said we were not at war but merely had gone into Korea to clean up a bad situation, just as the precinct sergeant leads some patrolmen to a house where a gunman has holed out. Just as there was no declaration of war against the Korean Reds, so there will be no peace treaty. Our hands are completely free to restore order in Korea and to try to bring about unity in a nation that has been divided by the invisible line of the 38th Parallel. (Did President Truman really coin the phrase Police Action?)

Oroville Mercury Register
December 26, 1950
Forest Crewman Rejoins Marines
John P. Olberis of Belden, U. S. Forest Service trail crewman and Marine Corps veteran, was at Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, today following his re-enlistment here into the Marine Corps. Olberis served from Dec., 1941, to Dec.,19045, in the Pacific area and was wounded twice, once at New Georgia and the second time on Okinawa. Although Olberis held the rank of corporal during his former service, he rejoined in the regular Marines, according to T-Sgt. Charles Wilson, Marine Corps recruiting officer. He joined the Corps in 1941 in Texas, but has lived in the Oroville-Quincy area since 1946.
(A very brave man, especially if he read the news.)

Oroville Mercury Register
December 26, 1950
County Men Serving Aboard Tender, Sub

John D. Coggan, fireman, United States Navy, son of Mrs. Ray Hines of Quincy Road and John Coggan of Hayward, is serving aboard the destroyer tender USS Dixie in Pacific waters, the Navy reported here today. Coggan, who is a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. A. J. Coggan of Thermalito, wrote in a letter received here a week ago that his ship was engaged in repairing other ships but did not say where this was taking place.

Thomas J. Church, seaman recruit, son of Mr. and Mrs. Clifford G. Church of Thermalito, has completed basic training recently in San Diego and is now available for further training or for assignment to a fleet unit.Merle Edwin Raimer, son of Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Raimer of Paradise, was recently advanced to torpedo man’s mate, third class, while serving aboard the submarine U. S. Sea Dog, which is operating with the Pacific fleet. Raimer entered the Navy in 1948, following graduation from Chico High School.

Oroville Mercury Register
December 26, 1950
50 years ago (1900)
…The G.A.R. (Grand Army of the Republic, Civil War) elected new officers. They were H. C. Veatch, commander; W. B. Heckart, senior vice commander; Jacob Rebscher, junior vice commander; W. H. Hayes quartermaster; J. T. Cress, officer of the day; J. H. Karsper, surgeon; F. M. Woodman, officer of the guard; and T. J. Frost chaplain.

Oroville Mercury Register
December 26, 1950

Final Warning’ Given Yanks By Peking Radio
Communists 28 Miles From Seoul
By Earnest Hoberecht
(Tokyo –U.P.) The U. S. 10th Corps and 8th Army merged into a 250,000-man fighting force on a 140-mile front across South Korea today to meet Chinese Communist forces spearing toward Seoul. ….The Chinese attacks across the frontier were accompanied by a “final warning” from the Peking radio telling American forces to get out of Korea or face the full fury of a Chinese assault. “The Chinese will fulfill their right actions: the Peking broadcast said. “We will drive them back by our might if the U.S. invaders will not withdraw from Korea and Formosa. These words are the final warning from us.”

Stu’s Notes: So now we know where the term, Police Action, came from, according to Harry Ferguson. If true, what was the President thinking? Did his advisors have their heads in the sand?(no, in Korea it was mud) Tell that to the men who fought and died there. Police Action, it was a war. Tell that to the Butte
County relatives of the men who served and died from our county. Tell that to my Friend Sam, who fought there, Oroville’s Jack Mosely, who died there. October the War was over? December our brave young men were fighting a gallant retreat to position’s south of Seoul, yes, by spring of 1951 they would fight their way back to where our young brave men stand to this day almost 60 years later. Tell that to Oroville Veterans Memorial Park Committee Member, now passed on, Marine Ed Ewalt, who fought with the Marines out of the Chosin Reservoir. Just a Police Action? Don’t tell it to me, who was only 10 years old then. It was a war. I saw it on News Reels at the State Theater and the movie “ Retreat, Hell. We’re just attacking in a different direction”.