Dr. Hyun Bong-hak

By Yang Dong-hee

The Korean movie "Gukje Sijang” (Ode to My Father) is still going strong after breaking records and drawing 13 million moviegoers across the country.

Now the second-highest grossing box-office hit in Korean cinema history, it is being exported to numerous other countries, including the U.S. and Germany.

In the movie, a young Korean interpreter begs the captain of a U.S. Navy supply ship to give Korean refugees permission to come aboard. It was December 1950, shortly before Christmas Day, and 105,000 soldiers from the U.S. Army were retreating from the northeastern port city of Heungnam in the wake of a bloody battle at Jangjin Reservoir with 120,000 troops from four infantry divisions of the Chinese Red Army.

All other inland routes leading to the south were occupied by enemy troops at that time, making Heungnam Port the only choice left for the refugees.

The interpreter, Hyun Bong-hak, who was commissioned in the ROK Marine Corps as a civilian, pled for the lives of 100,000 refugees to Maj. Gen. Edward Almond, commanding general of the 10th U.S. Army.

Maj. Gen. Almond finally made up his mind to discard over 200 tons of ammunition, 500 shells and 200 drums of oil into the sea, allowing 98,000 North Korean refugees to get aboard 193 ships from Dec. 12 through Dec. 24. The last ship, the SS Meredith Victory, a supply ship designed to carry 59 crew and passengers, managed to accommodate more than 14,000 Korean refugees.

After a jam-packed three-day voyage to the south, the refugees arrived at Geoje Island, South Gyeongsang Province, without a single casualty. On their way to the south, five new babies were born. The American soldiers named the five babies Kimchi one, two, three, four and five.

The ship arrived at Geoje on the morning of Dec. 25. The American soldiers called the successful evacuation "The Miracle of Christmas." It is still remembered as the largest number of civilians evacuated by a single ship in modern war history.

Hyun Bong-hak and Maj. Gen. Almond both shared a fondness for Maj. Gen. Almond's hometown ― Richmond, Va. Hyun (1922-2007) graduated from Hamheung High School and Yonsei University (formerly Severance) Medical School. After continuing his studies at Richmond University, he returned home in March 1950.

Later Maj. Gen. Almond recollected in his memoir that Hyun might have returned to Korea to save the lives of 98,000 North Koreans. Dr. Hyun is referred by many Koreans as the Korean version of Oskar Schindler, who many people today have become familiar with through the 1993 Steven Spielberg movie, “Schindler's List.” Schindler, a German and member of the Nazi Party, saved the lives of more than a thousand Jewish refugees during the Holocaust.

It was in the fall of 1982 that I first met Dr. Hyun. He was teaching at the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia and was also serving the Korean community as chairman of the Philip Jaishon Memorial Foundation. Philip Jaishon is the English name of Suh Jae-pil, a Korean patriot and the first Korean-American medical doctor who lived and died in northern Philadelphia. The foundation was running a small hospital named the Philip Jaishon Memorial Hospital in Koreatown.

At the time, I was the bureau chief of The Hankok Ilbo-Korea Times, the Korean-language daily newspaper for some 50,000 Koreans in the city. I had just turned 30 and he was 60, and was very nice to me and my family.

I was acquainted with his younger brother Peter, who was writing English articles and also running an international trade business at the Chosun Hotel. His two other brothers, Young-hak (dean of Ewha Womans University) and Si-hak (naval hero during the Korean War who later served as Korean ambassador to Iran, Mexico and Morocco) were also well known to Koreans before I came to the United States.

His older brother Si-hak was the commanding general of the Korea Naval Command and later served as deputy chief of staff of the ROK Navy. Adm. Hyun also saved the lives of some 60,000 Korean refugees during the war in 1951. The Ministry of Defense erected a statue of him in the front yard of the Korean Naval Academy in Jinhae.

One summer day in 1985, a Korean who said he was a long-time reader of my paper called me in a very upset tone of voice. He had participated in the public auction of household items and artifacts from a house. He said the deceased owner was Muriel Jaishon, the last remaining daughter of Dr. Suh Jae-pil. Among the items sold in the first session of the auction were many rare books, paintings and pieces of furniture.

I called Dr. Hyun and several directors of the Philip Jaishon Memorial Foundation, only to find out that the auction was decided solely by the president of the foundation and nobody else was aware of it until I called.

One Oriental painting, which was a gift from Dosan Ahn Chang-ho, a 20th-century Korean philosopher and civil rights leader, and a vase, which was a gift from King Gojong of the Joseon Kingdom (1392-1910), were among the items sold for only $20 to $30.

Stunned and upset, Dr. Hyun tried very hard to recover, or buy back, the sold items, but to no avail. Investigative reports by The Korea Times followed for several days and the second auction was cancelled. The Suh Jae-pil Foundation had to issue a statement of apology.

Then, in a bitter effort to save face, the president of the foundation filed a lawsuit against both The Korea Times and me alleging that the news stories infringed upon his honor. It took two years for Dr. Hyun and me to win the case. Dr. Hyun said, in a cool voice, that it was a very rare opportunity to see the American judiciary system at work.

I left Philadelphia in 1991 and Dr. Hyun passed away in southern New Jersey in 2007. Last December, his daughter came to Seoul and appeared on a local television show and recollected her loving father.

Upon finding and contacting the five ship-born babies, only two were identified and Kimchi 5 is still living in the port of Geoje Island working as a veterinarian. Dr. Hyun's daughter said her father missed his close friend and his pregnant wife very much. Sadly, they could not get on the ship as the baby's delivery was so imminent.

He succeeded in saving the lives of 98,000 people, but the fact that he had to leave behind his best friend and pregnant wife tormented him to the last moment of his living days.

The baby could have been Kimchi 6.

The writer, former reporter of The Korea Times, worked 10 years at the Hankook Ilbo New York and returned home to be in sports marketing and show business. He was the first managing director of Korea of the U.S.-based International Management Group.