Boy Soldier: Coming of Age During World War II

Memoir of McLogan. Includes a chapter on his postwar assignment to Korea. There are some interesting moments throughout. Unfortunately, McLogan includes a lot of general historical narrative from other sources so that the reader will get more of a macroscopic picture of what is going on. While some readers unfamiliar with Korea or its history may be interested, this means that we are left with relatively little in the way of his own experiences and anecdotes, especially in the postwar chapters I was most interested in. Given how hard it is to find good accounts of Korea from 1945-1950, it was thus somewhat of a disappointment.

Some of my favorite quotes from the work.

“I don't think they appreciated us burning the rice to keep war, but then, we did get rid of the Japanese overlords so their standard of living had to improve.”

“One day we went down to the town and practiced village fighting maneuvers, much to the consternation of the villagers.”

“I think it was the combination of kimchi and fecal matter which made the town smell so rank.” (Kunsan)