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Valley veteran lives up to Marine maxim
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READ ALL ABOUT IT: Marine veteran Richard Mitchells Sr. shows a book about the helicopters on which he was an aircraft electrician.
GREENFORD — If anyone ever proved the saying “Once a Marine, always a Marine,” it is Korean War veteran Richard A. Mitchells Sr.
Mitchells, of Greenford, served in the Marine Corps from July 17, 1950, to July 16, 1954, including a year in Korea, from August 1951 to September 1952, during the Korean War. He was an aircraft electrician with Marine Helicopter Transport Squadron 161 (HMR-161), which flew 15 Sikorsky-built helicopters, which he said were the first helicopters used primarily for combat missions.
Mitchells was stationed in two areas while in Korea, first Kangnung, then at an area called the Punch Bowl near Inchon.
“I was not [in Korea] during the Chosin Reservoir, but it was still no picnic. Winter was very cold and we were not well equipped for cold weather. But, we proved in Korea that helicopters could be used in combat situations,” Mitchells said.
At the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, nicknamed the “Frozen Chosin,” 30,000 United Nations troops, or “The Chosin Few,” faced approximately 120,000 Chinese troops.
Before the Korean War and after graduating from Chaney High School in 1949, Mitchells, whose last name then was Miglets, was a sheet-metal worker employed at A.A. Samuels Sheetmetal. He said he changed his name to Mitchells for convenience sake.
It was while he was on the job making a delivery when he, on a whim, enlisted in the Marine Corps about three weeks after the war broke out.
“I was stopped at the intersection of Front and Market streets and noticed a poster in front of the old Post Office saying ‘Join the Marine Corps.’ I parked the truck and went in and enlisted. As I was leaving, a Vindicator photographer came in to the recruiting office wanting to take a picture of a new recruit. The recruiter called me back and my picture appeared in the paper. I had to hurry up and tell my parents I had enlisted before they read about it in the paper,” Mitchells said.
Mitchells, now 77, was 19 at the time.
After graduating from boot camp at Parris Island, S.C., while he was waiting for orders, he was a drill instructor (D.I.) for a short time. After a couple of weeks, he was given a choice between remaining as a D.I. or going to aviation school. He chose the latter and ended up in Korea.
Mitchells doesn’t provide a lot of details about his war experience, except to say it really is the “forgotten war,” as some call it. People do forget. There were almost 34,000 U.S. combat deaths in three years, he said.
He did see the Bob Hope USO show a couple of times while he was in Korea. “He put on a great show. Of course, he brought a lot of cheesecake.”
From boot camp, Mitchells was sent to the Naval Air Station in Millington, Tenn., outside of Memphis, for training. After his tour in Korea, he was assigned to SWDU-3 (special weapons delivery unit) of the 3rd Marine Airwing in Opa-Locka, Fla.
“It was a secret outfit. You had to go through clearances. We were practicing with tactical nuclear weapons,” he said.
He was discharged from the Marine Corps with the rank of staff sergeant. While in the military, he was awarded several decorations, including the Korean Service Ribbon, United Nations Service Medal, Korean Presidential Citation and the Good Conduct Medal.
Mitchells has not returned to Korea since the war. “I thought about it a couple of times, but I don’t have much desire to go back,” he said.
Although he was a D.I. for only a few days, he returns annually to Parris Island for the D.I. reunion. At one of the recent reunions, he learned that his boot camp D.I. was employed at ship’s store on base. He was not there at the time, but Mitchells arranged to meet him the next year and the two had lunch and rehashed old memories.
“I found out, after all, that he was a normal person,” Mitchells said.
After he was discharged, Mitchells went back to work for A.A. Samuels, and later at Price Heating in Girard and L.J. Schuler & Sons. He then left the sheet-metal trade and worked 27 years at the Airlocke Dock Seal Division of O’Neal Awning Co., retiring in 1996.
He married the former Janet Hall of Youngstown on Dec. 31, 1952. She died in 2003. The couple had two children, Richard Jr., a geological engineer in Alaska, and a daughter, Atty. Rebecca A. Mitchells, in San Francisco.
Mitchells’ companion is Donna Anthony.
A 32nd Degree Mason, Mitchells is a member of Argus Lodge 545 F&AM in Canfield and the Scottish Rite in Youngstown. It was after he retired when he “got busy” with the Tri-State Detachment of the Marine Corps League. He is the immediate past commandant of the Tri-State Detachment and is a member of the unit’s Color Guard and Rifle Team, which participates in military funerals.
He is also a member of the Marine Corps Association, an at-large member of the American Legion, and president of the Mahoning Veterans Memorial at the Canfield Fairgrounds.
“The Marine Corps League is a special group, and in time the Marines fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan will come in. It is a very large, very close-knit association,” he said.
Mitchells said Veterans Day is important because it is the only day set aside to remember all the veterans of all the nation’s conflicts.
“Without those veterans, we would have been in deep trouble. They pulled the country together,” he said.
“I have complete sympathy and respect for anyone who been in a combat situation in any war,” Mitchells said.