Bob McGrath served in the United States Army, and served in the Korean War. He grew up in Butte, but has lived in Billings for more than 50 years. This is a lightly edited version of the interview. The full interview can be found online at billingsgazette.com.
Gazette: What was growing up in Butte like?
McGrath:Â "It was typical Butte, just a bunch of good people. A bunch of nationalities joined together in different neighborhoods, and they all intermingled and got along good. We had the English up in Centerville, the Irish in Walkerville, and various Serbian and all different kinds of nationalities blend together in Butte. It was a wonderful town to grow up in.
Gazette: What part of town did you grow up in?
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McGrath:Â "We lived in the middle part of Butte at one time. Then my mom and dad bought a home out in the flats, down from Butte on the flatter ground. We lived there until my Army days.
Gazette: How did you find yourself in the Army? Tell me about that.
McGrath: "Well, it was the days of the Korean War. ... They put the draft into it. I was one of 20 guys that was drafted at the time I went in. The previous classes, there were always 10 or 12 guys that were drafted and intermingled with the outlying areas in Butte and from different areas. They all joined together, they shipped us to Seattle for processing as a group, and then the guys from Butte separated into different areas, and I was left with a bunch of guys I didn't know. Then they shipped us down to Camp Roberts, California. ... We took basic training for 16 weeks. Then there was leadership school, and if you came out of there successfully, then you bump up on ranks. So, I went to eight weeks of leadership school and I made corporal when we graduated. Then, shortly after that, I was sent to a bivouac area, they were shipping young guys out of there to various places. I was shipped over to Korea just before Christmas 1952. They loaded us up on the victory ship, the Phoenix Arizona, they called it a boat. We sailed Dec. 23, 1952, to Korea and it was 18 days on the sea. It was a long time. It was an old relic ship from the Henry J. Kaiser era.
"We went to Japan for processing and they split us up again, and they put us on a ship again to take us to Korea. After we got to Korea and Inchon, it was really cold weather — I'm seeing 15-, 20-below zero. So they loaded all of us new guys, we hardly knew anyone, and we went on a LST landing ship. The water was slopping through the door and slop down. We had Army-issued cloth boots, just kind of leather boots and we were soaking wet. We landed at Inchon, and they took us to one of the piers there, and they issued us new boots. They were called 'Mickey Mouse' boots — they were these big black boots, but they were warm. I still had them until this one move that I misplaced. I was sick about that. ... We were there and a little narrow-gauge railroad took us for about 20 miles or so from Inchon to Seoul, across Korea, around the 38th parallel. There were North Koreans here and us there. We had a camp there — a bunch of tents and we did string up barbed wire surrounding it and we camped there for probably about a year.
"From that area, we moved out on the road and checked areas and checked bridges, did all the things the engineers do. I spent all the time over there at that camp. But during that episode, we were out and about with two other guys, looking at the roads and stuff like that. On the top of the hill, around Chunchon, Korea, we approached a church. It wasn't shattered or anything, but it was all broken glass and everything. So I said to the guys, 'I'd like to go in and see that. I'd like to pay a visit.' Anyway, we all walked in, and walked up and down. The two other guys wandered and did their thing. I wandered to the back and outside the back door . On the back door on the ground, there was three graves, with a headstone on each grave. I read the names on there: I got of a picture of that. I read the name of the priest, and the middle priest was named Maginn and his hometown was Butte, Montana. So immediately, I picked up on that.
"I thought, 'Here's another Butte guy.' The Communists had executed the three priests maybe a month or two before I got there. His burial was there. I always had that in my craw. Here was another guy in Butte, doing the same thing probably what I did. So, anyway, I was done with that.
"I went back, and I couldn't get it out of my mind seeing another guy from Butte laying there on the ground with a tombstone. ...
"I spent another two years and two Christmases over there. ... But that grave story always stuck with me.
Gazette: Why do you think it stuck with you?
McGrath:Â "The Butte connection for some reason. He was from Butte. I was from Butte and it just hit me. I knew guys from all over the United States (in the Army). And you hardly would run into a guy from Butte, except the guy laying in the ground. It just hit me for some reason. I really can't explain."
In this Series
Stories of Honor: Honoring US veterans across generations
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Stories of Honor: Francis E. 'Punk' Dahl: Even though there were peace talks, there wasn't much peace going on
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Stories of Honor: Donn Bruggeman: 'Gee, they must know better than this to send us to a combat zone with a rifle that was useless'
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Butte's 'Father Jimmie' stood up to Communists in Korea in 1950, at the cost of his life
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