New Plymouth Soldier Freed from Prison Camp in North Korea
August 26, 1953
The Mayor and the town welcome Cpl. Dale “Buster” Smith home.
Shown with his mother, Edith Smith, in front of Wherry Hardware Store.
Cpl. Dale Smith was captured three months after his arrival in Korea during the Korean War.
He was held at the Communist Prison Camp in Changcan, Korea for 33 months, after being forced to march for 16 days.
He lost all of his toes but two, due to frostbite, on that march. After 30 days furlough, he was sent to a Veterans Hospital for treatment.
Buster was quoted as saying, “During the first few months in 1951, at the camp, about 25 men died, each day.”