                                                                 Sent by G.M.
THE PLAIN DEALER, Sunday, June 21, 1992  page 6-B                   

    ...........YELTSIN'S NEWS IS NO SURPRISE TO KOREAN WAR EX-POW.........
 
 By Karen Henderson
 __________________
 Plain Dealer Reporter
                       LORAIN

   The news that U.S. prisoners from Vietnam, the Korean War and World War II
 were taken to the Soviet Union and might still be alive brought hope to
 Charles Sacco.

   It also rekindled painful memories and images for the former POW. Sacco
 was held by the Chinese Communists for 27 months after being captured during
 the Korean conflict. He is active in a group trying to find out what happened
 to the thousands of soldiers who remains missing and unaccounted for from 
 past wars.

   The revelation last week by Soviet President Boris Yeltsin that some POWs
 might still be alive did not surprise Sacco, who remembers the Chinese Commun-
 ist-run prison camps of North Korea all too well. It brought him hope that
 some questions about missing servicemen may be answered.

   Sacco said he had no idea what happened to many of the men who wound up in
 the camps he say, many of which he referred to as "unmarked" because they 
 were not officially on any map. He can only wonder.

   Sacco said anyone who lived through internment would have survived near-
 starvation, illness, cold, exposure and sometimes brutal treatment. But, he
 believes people who are determined to survive can outlast terrible experiences.

   "I thik it's quite possible some are still alive," Sacco said in an inter- 
 view last week. "You had to look out for yourself or you would not survive.
 Some people just gave up and cracked. You had to be a survivor to make it."

   On Feb. 4, 1951, Pfc. Charles Sacco's division was overrun by Chinese troops
 on Han River below the 38th. parallel in Korea. For the next two months, Sacco,
 who turns 66 this week, said he and other prisoners were marched north to
 Chungsong near the Manchurian border, to what was known as Prison Camp No.1 .
 The march took two months, and many died along the way.

   "There were 750 of us at the start and only 290 of us made it to the camp,"
 the retired USS/Kobe Steel Co. employee said.

   "They would march us at night to avoid detection. We would be herded into 
 the woods during the day to sleep," he said. The trip northward took them 
 through a number of camps that were used as relay stations by the Chinese, he
 said. Sometimes camps were hastily set up by the Chinese, who forced North
 Korean villagers to leave their homes so the prisoners could be held there.

   He said the food was terrible, usually consisting of beans and occasionally
 a little fish. One camp was dubbed the Bean Camp because that was all prison-
 ers there got to eat. he lost 35 pounds on the march and contracted tubercu-
 losis. 

   Along the way, prisoners from other countries, including many from Great
 Britain, joined the march. He said they eventually were separated at their
 final destination, as were black Americans.

   During the early part of the March, he and another Lorain man attempted to
 escape. Both were recaptured, Sacco said.

   "We split up and went in separate directions," he said. Sacco said he cont-
 inued through the woods and the rough interior terrain. "Everytime I'd climb 
 a hill, there'd be another one." He eventually came to a small farm and was
 spotted by the farmer. He said he was hungry and made a motion that he wanted
 to eat. He went inside the house and sat down near a small fire in a hibachi
 to warm himself.

   "I was so weak and tired I fell asleep. I woke up when I heard the click of
 the hammers of two shots being loaded into the chamber of a gun," hd said.
 Sacco said the farmer had summoned a North Korean militiaman. He said he was 
 tied and led outside where he expected to be shot. "I was at a point I didn't
 care one way or the other," he said.

   Sacco said that fortunately for him, one of his Chinese captors arrived and
 after getting into a heated argument with the North Korean, the Chinese took
 charge of Sacco and returned him to the other prisoners.

   The Chinese, who spoke English, said on the way back, "All I can say is you
 Americans give us an awful lot of trouble," Sacco recalled. Sacco said some
 of his Chinese guards were interpreters who told Sacco they had been educated
 in U.S. universities.

   Sacco said he soon learned he was lucky to have been captured by the Chinese
 instead of the North Koreans. "The North Koreans were vicious and killed their
 prisoners," Sacco said.

   The farther north they went, he said, the more Chinese were evident. He 
 said they would see frequently lines of Chinese soldiers that were 20 miles
 long. If a bridge was bombed, he said, thousands of Chinese would move in and
 replace it with a makeshift one at night. They frequently saw Russian trucks
 in the supply convoys, he said, but he could not get close enough to see if
 they were being driven by Russians.

   Toward the end of the two-month trek northward, Sacco said they were loaded
 onto a train and moved the rest of the way to the camp.

   Though the food improved slightly in the camp and they were given warmer
 clothing, in some ways life was worse than on the march, Sacco said. He said
 walking had kept him going and there was always hope something would happen
 or he might be able to get away. One seriously wounded soldier who had been
 shot through the abdomen made it to the camp but died becaues gangrene set
 in, Sacco recalled.

   His own health deteriorated in the camp, and he was placed in a makeshift
 hospital, but received little medical attention.

   Everyone was infested with lice and had dysentery during the march and at
 the camp. Even though they were allowed to boil their water, wells and rivers
 were contaminated with human waste, he said. Many died, and groups were 
 formed for the daily duty of burying the dead.

   He said there was no way to account for those who died along the march, and
 he believed some of them might be among those listed as missing. "If someone
 could not go on, they were simply left behind," he said.

   The food and other conditions improved shortly before he was repatriated
 during a swap of prisoners. "We could always tell the peace talks were going 
 well because conditions at the camp would improve," Sacco said.

   He said they were allowed to play basketball and volleyball with their
 captors, which they used to get a little revenge. "They would play clean, and
 the Americans would knock them down with their elbows," he said.

   One day, Sacco remembers he was shaved, cleaned up and driven to the neutral
 zone. He was told he was being released, but he was not sure it was really
 going to happen until the exchange took place. Sacco, the first Ohioan to
 be repatriated, recalls being asked by a U.S. military official, "Soldier,
 what's your problem?" Sacco said he told him he believed he had tuberculosis,
 and he was separated from the rest of the prisoners. He was deloused and sent
 to a hospital.

   Sacco had come to the United States in 1949 from Canada and had enlisted in
 1950. After his release, he returned home to Guelph in Ontario to stay with
 his parents. He later returned to Lorain and got a degree from Dyke College
 in Cleveland on the GI Bill. The tuberculosis was arrested through treatment,
 Sacco said. He later married; he and his wife, Helen have three children.

   "I was always in fear," he said. Part of the fear was of being bombed by
 our planes, he said. "I kept thinking it would be awful to go through all of 
 this and then get it from my own people."

   Sacco said talking about his experiences in the camp was hard even after
 all these years. "I will do anything to make sure Korea is not a forgotten 
 war. "I think there are things that should be brought out. I think the govern-
 ment is covering up something," Sacco said. "The KGB has got to reveal those
 records (concerning U.S. prisoners ) to us," he said.

   Sacco said it was possible some of the Americans who were listed as missing
 might have chosen to stay behind. But he also believes some may still be
 waiting to be released.

                              ________________________

 Downloaded from "OUR TOP PRIORITY" POW/MIA BBS (206) 367-0479 

