Miles M. Vondra, Jr.

Gunnery Sergeant - U.S. Marine Corps

1940 - 1948 - Active Reserves 1950 - 1956

World War II & Korean War

American Samoa - Guadalcanal - Marshall Islands - China - Korea

 

                            

SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCES

Sgt. Vondra was activated 10/1940 for 12 months.  He was waiting to be discharged after 14 months when Pearl Harbor occurred.  He was sent to San Diego and then to Arizona to recruit Apache Indians for the Marines.  He was then sent to American Samoa for 23 months in guarding shipping and Australia.  When he arrived on Guadalcanal he reenlisted for four years.  Vondra was in the invasion of the Marshall Islands.  He had two years to go when the war ended and was sent to China to supervise weapon warehouses for Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek. After two years he came back to the U.S.  and became an Active Reservist. He and Pat were married in July 1950 just after the outbreak of the Korean War.  Within a month he was on his way to Korea with the Marines and landed with McArthur at Inchon and participated in seven frontal assaults when he was withdrawn to go around the peninsula to Wonson.  There he and his Marine buddies boarded trains headed for the Chosin Reservoir and one of the bloodiest and most difficult battles in Marine Corp history.  Surrounded by several Chinese and North Korean Divisions, outnumbered by over 100 to 1 The Marine Corps 1st Division fought their way to Hungnam and evacuation by the U.S. Navy.  It was snowing heavily and the temperature was 50 below zero as the Marines fought their way some 80 miles to the coast.  That group of Marines are called "The Chosin Few" and are looked upon as the bravest Marines ever to wear the uniform.  Miles was wounded in November 1950 in that epic battle and evacuated to a hospital in Japan.  He returned to the U.S. in mid 1951.  

He and his wife, Pat, lived in the Villa Homes during the winter months.

M. Vondra.jpg (59304 bytes)Miles Vondra passed away at Lexington in 1999.  He is buried in Des Plains, Illinois with full military honors.  A special Marine Corps unit was present.

 

 

 

To view picture in larger format please click on the picture. To return back to page please click on the browser back button.

Editor's Note: To more fully understand what these Marines went through, we offer the following documentation:

Time and again the Marines fought the Chinese man-to-man, hand-to-hand, night and day, while cut off from the rear and with transportation at a dead stop. In the bitterly cold, sub-zero winds of Chosin, as in steaming jungles of an earlier war, the Marines never lost their will to fight, or their capability of fighting effectively.

Heavily outnumbered, the Marines successfully defended against every attack and in turn successfully attacked the Chinese wherever they had cut off the MSR. The Marines not only fought their way out, they brought out their wounded, and most of their dead and equipment.

During their 13-day walking battle back, the 1st Marine Division suffered 718 dead, 192 missing and 3,508 wounded, plus their frostbitten casualties.  But the Chinese paid a terrible price for their involvement in the war.  Marine records say they killed 25,000 Chinese and wounded 12,500 others.

The 10 CCF divisions, which directly engaged the 1st Marine Division in Chosin, were completely used up. They never saw action again during the Korean War.  Whereas, The 1st Marine Division saw action several more times during the remainder of the war.

When the division finally got to Hungnam, they found Our Navy waiting. The 1st Division will probably never forget Admiral Fletcher at Guadalcanal, but at Hungnam our Navy boarded them all.


The fighting withdrawal of the 1st Marine Division was one of the proudest actions in the history of the entire Marine Corps.