The Youngest Korean War Medal of Honor Recipient Was Only 17 and Is Still MIA

On April 25, 1951, Sgt. Edward G. Bunn heard Cpl. Charles L. Gilliland's automatic rifle firing in the darkness near Tongmang-ni, Korea. Gilliland always kept his weapon clean and fine-tuned. Bunn knew when his comrade was the one firing. In a chaotic firefight against waves of Chinese troops, the 17-year-old from Yellville, Arkansas, was using his weapon to hold the line.

"If it weren't for this young man, Charles Gilliland, I wouldn't be standing here today," Bunn said decades later.

Gilliland never made it off that hill. His remains have never been recovered. More than seven decades later, the youngest Medal of Honor recipient of the Korean War is still missing in action.

Arkansas and Joining the Army

Charles Leon Gilliland was born on May 24, 1933, in the rural Colfax area of Baxter County, Arkansas. He was the eldest boy among nine children. His father, Leon Carl, scraped together a living through farming and construction. His mother, Evangeline, worked as a nurse's aide. When Gilliland was a teenager, the family relocated to Marion County and settled outside Yellville.

Gilliland spent his childhood roaming the Ozark hills with a rod or rifle, but soldiering consumed his imagination more than anything. He hoarded newspaper and magazine cutouts about the armed forces. He walked around Yellville in secondhand military fatigues and a surplus helmet. Friends tagged him "Gun Smoke" because he talked about becoming a sheriff.

"[Charles] was really engrossed in the military," boyhood friend Harold C. Mears of Yellville wrote. "It makes me think that he was destined to do what he did in Korea."

He wanted to be strong enough to serve. The family had no money for weights, so Gilliland improvised. He hoisted fieldstones and a blacksmith's anvil to build up his strength. He hauled his younger brothers and sisters around on his back to build endurance.

"He was into bodybuilding before that was a thing," his sister Pauline recalled. "He would work out, hitting a punching bag all day long, in weather so hot you could not stand it. At school, he would carry kids around on his shoulders. He didn't do it to show out, but to get stronger."

At 16, Gilliland walked into a Marine Corps recruiting station and was turned away. The recruiter advised him to go back to school. Undeterred, he begged his parents relentlessly for permission to join the military. They eventually gave in. 

On his 17th birthday, May 24, 1950, Gilliland signed his enlistment papers for the U.S. Army at Yellville. Barely a month later, North Korean forces invaded across the 38th Parallel, starting the Korean War.

Service in Korea

Gilliland went through basic training at Fort Riley, Kansas. He returned to Yellville on leave one last time before his unit deployed overseas that fall. By December 1950, the teenager was on the ground in Korea, assigned to Company I, 7th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division.

The 7th Infantry, known as the "Cottonbalers," had already seen brutal action against the enemy. The regiment covered the evacuation at Hungnam in December 1950, serving as the last American unit off Pink Beach during the Chinese Second Phase Campaign. It then moved into defensive positions north of Seoul as part of the Eighth Army's line.

Gilliland saw combat almost immediately. During one engagement, he pulled a badly wounded comrade who had lost both of his legs off the battlefield and brought him to safety. He earned a Purple Heart for injuries sustained in the fighting. He wrote his parents a letter that mentioned the rescue but said little else about conditions at the front.

By April 1951, the Chinese People's Volunteer Army was massing for its spring offensive. More than 300,000 Chinese troops prepared to strike across the western and central sectors of the front. The 7th Infantry would soon face the full onslaught of the Chinese assault.

The Night of April 24-25, 1951

On the evening of April 24, elements of the Chinese 29th Division attacked across the Hantan River and hit all three battalions of the 7th Infantry Regiment. The fighting was ferocious. Along the regimental front, Company I occupied defensive positions near Tongmang-ni when a massive Chinese force launched a coordinated assault against their perimeter.

The heaviest push came straight up a narrow path covered by Gilliland's automatic rifle. His assistant gunner was killed almost immediately. Gilliland stayed on the weapon alone, pouring fire into the enemy and stalling their advance. When two enemy soldiers slipped past his field of fire and infiltrated the sector, he jumped from his foxhole, chased them down and killed both with his pistol.

During that pursuit, Gilliland took a severe wound to the head. He refused medical treatment and returned to his position as the Chinese renewed their assault. He continued holding the line against waves of Chinese troops. Bunn was one of the last soldiers to see Gilliland during this time.

When the company received orders to fall back to new defensive positions, Gilliland volunteered to stay behind to cover the withdrawal. His company pulled back toward a perimeter of tanks waiting behind the hill. Medics and stretcher bearers struggled to keep up with the retreating column. 

As the regiment began falling back, Cpl. Clair Goodblood of Company D held his machine gun position, firing into the seemingly endless waves of Chinese troops. He was later found dead beside his weapon, surrounded by approximately 100 enemy dead.

Cpl. John Essebagger of Company A stood up and single-handedly charged into the oncoming Chinese assault to cover his unit’s withdrawal. He was killed in the process.

Cpl. Hiroshi "Hershey" Miyamura of Company H killed an estimated 50 Chinese soldiers with his bayonet and machine gun before he was captured. He would ultimately survive the war, but only after spending 28 months as a POW.

When Bunn reached the line of tanks, he was told Gilliland had been evacuated. Six weeks later, he learned that Gilliland never made it out.

The Medal of Honor

Gilliland was officially listed as missing in action. Bunn approached the company commander, Capt. Wm. Wichard, to detail Gilliland's heroic actions that night. 

The Army posthumously promoted Gilliland to corporal and, in 1952, recommended him for the Medal of Honor. Goodblood, Essebagger and Miyamura also earned the medal for their actions that night. The 7th Infantry Regiment alone had earned four Medals of Honor for a single night of combat.

But Army officials feared that if Chinese forces had captured Gilliland, publicizing his actions might put him at risk of retaliation. Miyamura’s award was also classified to protect him from reprisals.

The announcement was held in secret, and his military files were updated to reflect the award, though his family was kept in the dark.

After the armistice in 1953, prisoner exchanges were held along the DMZ. Miyamura was one of the thousands of POWs to return home, though Gilliland was not among them. The Army declared him dead in 1954. That December, his family received his Medal of Honor during a ceremony at the Pentagon.

Gilliland was one month shy of his 18th birthday the night he earned the Medal of Honor and went missing. He became the youngest service member to earn the award during the Korean War.

His other decorations included the Purple Heart, the Good Conduct Medal, the Army of Occupation Medal, the Korean Service Medal with three campaign stars, the Presidential Unit Citation, the Combat Infantryman Badge and the United Nations Service Medal.

Still Missing in Action

More than 7,400 Americans remain unaccounted for from the Korean War. Gilliland is among them. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency continues its work through the Korean War Identification Project, using DNA analysis, dental records, and historical research to identify recovered remains. For many families, the wait has stretched across generations.

At Layton Cemetery in Yellville, Gilliland’s headstone stands beside the graves of his parents, L. Carl and Eva M. Gilliland. The marker bears his name, birthdate, rank and the Medal of Honor designation.

In May 1997, on what would have been Gilliland's 64th birthday, the U.S. Navy christened a 954-foot strategic sealift ship in his honor at Newport News, Virginia. The USNS Gilliland was built to transport tanks, trucks and heavy equipment into combat zones.

His sister, Dale Shelton sponsored the vessel.

"You have fought the good fight, and you have given all you had to give," Shelton said at the ceremony. "You can rest now, Charles."

In 2016, 65 years after his death, friends, family and veterans gathered at Layton Cemetery for a memorial service with full military honors. His surviving siblings, Billy and Pauline, attended.

"He was very brave," Pauline said of her brother. "For a 17-year-old boy, I can't even imagine. He's my hero."

Rev. Dr. Thomas Yoder, who officiated the service, spoke about the cost of Gilliland's sacrifice and what it purchased.

"We're here to celebrate a heritage and a sure knowledge that men like Charles Gilliland felt that what we believe in was important enough to die for," Yoder said. "How can we do less?"

Today, Gilliland remains unaccounted for. However, he remains the youngest Medal of Honor Recipient of the Korean War and one of the youngest casualties in modern American military history. His sacrifice helped his comrades, including Bunn, reach safety behind a line of tanks before the Chinese were eventually pushed back.