Southend: Korean War hero remembers on 50th anniversary

A HERO of a forgotten battle 50 years ago says he stills remembers it as if it were only yesterday. Harry Chalk was one of 650 British soldiers of the 1st Battalion Gloucestershire Regiment who fought up to 10,000 Chinese soldiers at Imjin River during the Korean War. Today Mr Chalk, who is 78 and lives in Alton Gardens in Southend, said he wished he could have joined other veterans at the commemorations in Korea to mark half a century since the great battle but that his failing health prevented him. He said: "It's strange to think it was so long ago. It doesn't seem like it to me. I remember it like it was yesterday. I still remember clearly losing a lot of mates." It was exactly 50 years ago today (Sunday) that 650 soldiers of the regiment - known as the Glosters - outnumbered and with no back up, held an entire Chinese division for three days as they poured across the Imjin River in 1951 in a surprise attack. *Full report in Monday's Evening Echo