“That went on for a while because once I opened fire, everyone else opened up too. “I emptied one box of ammo and I said ‘alright another box,’” said Ramos. Without hesitation, Ramos opened fire with his machine gun, rapidly unleashing nearly 250 rounds into the darkness, towards what he rightfully identified as a threat. “I looked down past our barrier, and I saw a big mass in front of the barbed wire fencing,” recalled Ramos. Just as he had convinced himself it was nothing to worry about, Ramos began to hear an unusual noise just several feet ahead of him-the cutting of barbed wire, the Kansas line’s first form of defense. “We didn’t expect anyone to come our way.”

“We could hear commotion going on, but it was far away,” said Ramos. That night, the Chinese forces advanced upon the line his division was holding.

Unfortunately, Ramos never made it to his rest and recovery time. “All I needed to do was set up my machine gun and stand by until the morning,” said Ramos. “At that point, I had been there a day shy of six months,” stated Ramos.Īfter six months of continuous service while deployed, the Army was allowing selected Soldiers to take rest and recovery leave for two weeks in Japan before returning to combat in Korea. They were ordered to hunker down and prepare to hold the line, no matter the cost. Ramos and his infantry division spent four long months marching across South Korea, from Busan to Seoul, to a point known as the Kansas line. From there, combat-worn Soldiers and Marines would board ships and return home to the states. Their mission was to establish and maintain the lines used to evacuate service members to the coast of the peninsula. Ramos was assigned to the 3rd Infantry Division as a machine gunner. “We needed to make foxholes to keep from freezing to death during the night, so I took my shovel and began digging into the hard ground.”Ĭold and exhausted from chipping away at icy dirt for several hours, Ramos settled for the shallow 10-inch hole he managed to dig, and that became his bed to stay warm in. “It was so cold that the ground was frozen,” said Ramos. Douglas MacArthur, had planned for a rapid invasion of the Korean peninsula, with an end goal of having U.S. The commander-in-chief of the United Nations Command, Gen. He recalled it as “the coldest winter in 100 years.” Each hat is unique- not because of the various ribbons, words or pins attached- but because of the veteran wearing the hat and the story of their service.

The men and women who wear these hats wear them with honor as they walk amongst the servicemembers on base. A black hat, the word “VETERAN” in an eye-catching, bold yellow font and several colorful ribbons stitched to the front-it’s a typical sight on military installations.

Where do space marines keep their ammo