David Mills Pow


Seventeen-year-old Army private David Mills has just arrived into combat and has already adopted a philosophy that suits every soldier in every war. "You're trying to stay alive," Mills said with great emphasis from his Middletown home Monday afternoon. "That's what you're trying to do. You're not trying to be a hero, you're just trying to stay alive." But survival would be elusive for most of David's unit on a nondescript, dusty Korean hill called Outpost Harry. The orders had come a few days before David's arrival to defend Outpost Harry at all costs. There were 88 American soldiers. There were more than a thousand Chinese soldiers. "It simply means you must maintain your position and prevail," Mills said, "or die trying." April 24, 1953 is the day many in David's 3rd Infantry would do just that. For Mills, it's a date that will live in infamy. "It's seared indelibly into my psyche," he said. There was brutal combat, often hand-to-hand. Wave after wave of Chinese threw themselves at the American stronghold. David was wounded in the arms, legs and head as his bunker was eventually overrun. As he reached for a rifle to continue fighting, he felt a poking in his back and rolled over to see three Chinese soldiers above him. "I'm looking up into the barrel of a Russian submachine gun about three inches from my nose and I thought in my mind's voice, 'David, you are going to die,' " he said. In that instant, Mills said a quick prayer and the 76-year-old recalls it easily. " 'Oh God have mercy on my soul' and Dennis, a peace came over me that I have never felt before or felt the same since," he said. "I was ready to die." Mills wasn't killed. He was dragged away, dumped in a cave and eventually taken to a prisoner of war camp. Prayer was his power there, as well. "I must have said The Lord's Prayer 100 times a day," he said. Mills insists the prayers worked. The war ended three months later. David was released exactly four months after his capture and came home. He was still 17 chronologically, though much older. "I grew up in one night," he said. "I stopped being a kid and became a man." In American history, Korea is often overshadowed by World War II and Vietnam, but historians say it was significant, even if isn't seen that way by average Americans. "We lost a total of 40,000 dead or missing in action U.S. forces there," said Dale Hamby of Harrisburg University. "So, it was a very intense 3-year period with brutal combat." David was selected to represent POW's at a Saturday ceremony at the Korean War Memorial in Washington, D.C. President Obama will deliver the keynote. Mills has a Purple Heart, a POW and other medals. He also has the memories that still haunt him. "I think about Korea every day of my life," Mills said choking back tears. "And I thank God for his mercy." While many Americans are free to forget Korea, David and his fellow soldiers who fought there don't have that luxury.

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