Korean War veteran Robert Spaur gets a medal pinned to his jacket on Oct. 11 in Montesano.
Family gathered around Robert Spaur in the dining hall at Montesano Health and Rehabilitation Center, his wife, Barbara, at his side in a wheel chair.
Barbara lives at the center, and Robert visits as often as he can.
On Oct. 11, his family gathered around him — something obviously was happening, but what it might be, Spaur had no idea.
Behind Spaur, in another corner of the room, members of District 5 VFW remove medals from white strips of cardboard — their ribbons, red, white, blue and yellow. Spaur’s son, Robert Spaur Jr., explains the plan and the District 5 VFW members describe how the ceremony will proceed.
The VFW members in their regalia move forward to the front of the room. The VFW chaplain leads the group in a prayer while an employee at Montesano Health and Rehabilitation Center tries to find a flag. A small celebratory flag on a stick is produced eventually. The VFW leads the group in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Robert Spaur Sr., 87, is called forward. Under his light coat, he’s wearing a Hawaiian shirt.
Holding the Line
Spaur served in the Korean War.
The war ran from June 1950 through July 1953, a total of more than three years. Officially, the war never ended because a peace treaty was never signed. Certainly, that remains obvious today with the saber rattling between North Korea and the United States.
In the 1950s, the war kicked off with North Korea, backed by China and the former Soviet Union, invading South Korea. As the invasion progressed, the United Nations backed South Korea. The United Nations combat force was made up of soldiers from 17 countries, including the United States.
Spaur was born in 1930 on Vashon Island. His parents moved to Aberdeen and in 1949 Spaur graduated from Wishkah Valley High School.
It was in 1952 that Spaur was sent to serve his country in Korea. He was drafted — not a shocking development for Spaur.
“I just got on my high horse and took off to Seattle,” he says. “That was my duty to go. I kind of knew I was going to be drafted sooner or later — all of my buddies, 19 and 20, were being drafted. It actually wasn’t a surprise to me.”
He was stationed at Uijeongbu and was part of the Headquarters Company I Corps.
“The everyday in a combat area there, you just have to watch what you’re doing,” Spaur said. “It seems like a place where you’re not very safe. Native guys would go with you on runs where you’d haul supplies up to guys on the front lines. They knew the road better than you did.”
It was an environment with abundant danger.
“You couldn’t tell from a distance what airplane or jet was coming over,” Spaur said. “So when one would come over I’d stop the truck and jump into the ditch, but it was usually one of our jets.”
Being new to the war, Spaur relied on the other soldiers.
“You just had to be watchful and pay attention to the guy that was with you, because they knew more about what was going on than you did,” Spaur said.
During the war, Spaur’s division was instructed to hold a line as the enemy advanced.
“It was the last push that the Chinese made,” Spaur says. “We couldn’t hold it. They overran it. There were too many North Koreans and Chinese troops pushing. We had to pull up stakes from Uijeongbu and move back, and then we stopped and held the line. They were trying to push us into the sea, but they never did. From then on, we were doing some pushing of our own.”
But the loss of that line would stick with him. After the war, there was no time for medals — no worry about or desire for medals, Spaur explained. So, despite Spaur earning medals for his time served, he never knew about them and never received them.
“It was the right thing to do, being over there,” Spaur says. “A lot of people say we lost it, but I don’t see it that way. We pushed them back from where they were. Nobody ever really wins a war.”
Lingering Feelings
He was discharged in 1953. Life went on. He and his first wife had seven children. He and his second wife, Barbara, were married on Feb. 21, 1969. They’ve been married 47 years now and lived together until Barbara moved into Montesano Health and Rehabilitation Center.
One of his sons, Robert Spaur Jr., says he recalls his father living with a lingering thought about his service.
“He would always talk about how they didn’t hold the line, and he would say how he felt he had failed his country,” Robert Spaur Jr. explained.
In the last year, Spaur Jr. started taking his father to the VA hospital and he researched how to get the benefits afforded him for his service during the Korean War.
In his efforts to find his father services, Spaur Jr. sifted through paperwork where he found Robert Spaur Sr.’s DD214 form. A DD214 is a document issued by the Department of Defense when a service member is discharged. The document lists several things, like the personal information about the service member and the final rank of the service member, and any medals awarded.
There, on the DD214, Spaur Jr. learned that his father had earned several medals for his service. What followed next was a gauntlet of phone calls and research for Spaur. Jr.
“It took nine months or more to get the medals,” Spaur Jr. said. “About two months ago, he got sick and I thought we might lose him, but he’s better now. I’m happy I was able to get these medals to him before we lost him.”
“I’d Serve Again”
After the brief ceremony, Spaur Sr. and his family posed for photographs. He was congratulated and talked about his time spent in Korea. He and a member of the VFW both agreed, Korea was cold. Spaur Sr., like the other troops with him, endured the cold in a tent.
Korea is far behind him — a short moment in his life. After the service, he spent some 47 years as a meat cutter. Most of that time was spent cutting meat at Safeway.
But with North Korea in the news so often now, it’s impossible today to feel far away from Korea. When asked how he felt about the current situation with North Korea, Spaur Sr. offered a glum picture.
“It’s so different in a way now,” he said. “It’s hard to really think about. To go to war again would be a complete disaster in my way of thinking.”
However, he still holds true to his country, if worse comes to worst.
“If I was called, I’d serve again,” he said. “There’s no country like America.”
Robert Spaur Jr. was glad he was able to get the medals his father earned, and he was proud of the ceremony on Oct. 11.
“It was considered the forgotten war, and to me, it was like he was the forgotten soldier,” Spaur Jr. said after the ceremony. “I feel good about it now though.”
As for Robert Spaur Sr., he was all smiles, receiving hugs and handshakes, with the medals on his chest, pinned to the jacket over the Hawaiian shirt. The three medals he received that day were the National Defense Medal, the Korean Service Ribbon, and the Korean United Nations Medal.
“It feels pretty good,” he said of the medals. “Makes you think they finally recognize your service.”
