Lee Patterson: Wounded on Pork Chop Hill

By Matthew M. Peek, Military Collection Archivist, State Archives of North Carolina

Lee Austin Patterson was born on December 20, 1930, in Harnett County, N.C. His family were farmers, and Lee grew up helping on the farm. Patterson attended Boonville Trail High School and graduated from there in May 1949. He went to Sanford, N.C., to work at a furniture factory after high school, working there for about a year. Lee Patterson enlisted in the U.S. Army on October 17, 1950, at Fort Bragg, N.C., in Fayetteville, N.C., with his three friends and family members Lathan Norton (cousin), Joe O’Quinn, and Tom Miles. Originally, Patterson wanted to go into the U.S. Air Force, but the length of service contract was three years for the Air Force. It was only a two-year service period for the Army, so he chose to enlist with that branch of service. Only two of the four friends passed the physical examination and enlisted in the Army.

KOR 13.B1.F1.6: Photograph of Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C., wearing his full Army uniform, kneeling down close to the photographer outside of a barracks at Camp Polk, Louisiana, in late 1950 while he was going through basic training in the U.S. Army. Patterson was training in preparation for service in the Korean War, and assigned to Company G, 180th Infantry, at Camp Polk (1950).

Patterson was sent for processing into the Army to Fort Jackson, S.C., where he stayed for two weeks. Between October and December 1950, he was sent for basic training for six weeks at Camp Polk, Louisiana. Patterson was the twenty-first person selected from his company out of twenty-one required from each company at Camp Polk, to be selected to be sent to Korea by the Army. His Christmas break was shortened. After meeting up in Raleigh, N.C., with other Army soldiers being sent to Korea, the men traveled together to Camp Stoneman, California, by train for processing in preparation for overseas service. Patterson traveled to Japan first aboard the troop ship USS General A. E. Anderson (AP-111).

KOR 13.B1.F2.2: Snapshot of Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C. (right), and an unidentified U.S. Army soldier wearing a M-1 helmet, pictured in-country in Korea in 1951 during the Korean War. The men are seen posing outside in the camp area of their unit in a valley. Tents are pictured in the background. Photograph taken while the men were serving in the 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, U.S. Army (1951) [picture made by one of Patterson’s friends, and printed in Japan during one of the soldier’s Army rest and recuperation furloughs].

KOR 13.B1.F3.4: Snapshot of Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C., shirtless, sitting down on a rock writing a letter to his girlfriend Mary Sue O’Quinn back in Harnett County, while Patterson was in-country in Korea in 1951 during the Korean War. Photograph taken while Patterson was serving as a member of the 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, U.S. Army. Caption on back of photograph reads: “I was writing you. Lots of love” (1951) [picture made by one of Patterson’s friends, and printed in Japan during one of the soldier’s Army rest and recuperation furloughs].

After getting more training in Japan, Patterson arrived in Puson, South Korea, in April 1951. He served during the Korean War in A Company, 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, U.S. Army, with the rank of Private First Class. He spent six months on the front lines in Korea. On September 5, 1951, Patterson was injured by a North Korean land mine that he stepped on on Pork Chop Hill in Chorwon, North Korea. This happened while he was clearing the U.S. Army land mines and booby traps from around a hill they were stationed at, clearing them as they moved out in order to protect American and South Korean forces moving back through the area from forward combat. Patterson arrived back in the United States from Korea in December 1951, having traveled on the troop transport ship the USAT General Edgar T. Collins (AP-147).

KOR 13.B1.F2.13: Blurry snapshot of U.S. Army soldiers with the 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, and local Koreans, appearing to be moving large rocks [possibly for barriers or to improve the road] in-country in Korea in 1951 during the Korean War. Photograph taken while the soldiers were serving with Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C., in the 31st Infantry Regiment (1951) [picture made by one of Patterson’s friends, and printed in Japan during one of the soldier’s Army rest and recuperation furloughs].

KOR 13.B1.F4.5: Blurry snapshot of Korean laborers, who were working with the U.S. Army at an unidentified location in Korea in 1951 during the Korean War. Photograph taken while Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C., was serving as a member of the 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, U.S. Army. Caption on back of photograph reads: “Korean Labors, ‘not Pursuers [or ‘Prisoners’]” (1951) [picture made by one of Patterson’s friends, and printed in Japan during one of the soldier’s Army rest and recuperation furloughs].

After the war in January 1952, Patterson became an instructor at Fort Jackson, S.C., for the U.S. Army in camouflage and concealment techniques. He had never been involved in such techniques in the field prior to serving as an instructor, but received instructor training to teach the Army recruits. After he got out of active service, Patterson served for an additional five years in the active Army Reserves. He left U.S. Army service with the rank of Corporal. Following his military service, Patterson worked as a barber after attending barber’s school in 1954. Patterson married Mary Sue O’Quinn in June 1953 in Harnett County, N.C. At the time of this interview, Patterson was living in Sanford, N.C.

KOR 13.B1.F7.13: Photograph of PFC Lee A. Patterson of Harnett County, N.C., sitting down inside an unidentified building in Osaka, Japan, around December 1951, just before he left to return to the United States from Korea during the Korean War. Patterson was serving in the 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, U.S. Army. Caption on back of photograph reads: “With all my love” [circa December 1951].

You can learn more about Patterson’s life and service by listening to a veteran’s oral history interview conducted with him in February 2017 by the State Archives of North Carolina. You can also view all of the photographs in the Lee A. Patterson Papers (KOR 13) [housed in the Korean War Papers of the Military Collection at the State Archives of North Carolina] on the State Archives’ Flickr page here.