Henk Bos

00:00:00 [Beginning of Recorded Material]

Henk Bos: My name is Henk Bos. Henk is my first name and you spell it HENK. My
surname is BOS

Interviewer: When is your birthday?

H: I was born on April the 4th in 1932.

I: So, you are still young?

H: I’m just starting. [Laughs}

I: Tell me why you are here in this Crown Plaza in Hague. Why are you here?

H: Because we were invited

00:00:30

H: By the Korean Ambassador for a lunch. He does that every year. If possible,, I
will always be here.

I: So, is it special day? Is it events or only for Korean War veterans?

H: In honor of the veterans. It’s less and less all the time because some of them
die every year.

00:01:00

I: So, about 5,300 Dutch soldiers participated in the Korean War.

H: I think it was 3,000.

I: 3,000

H: More than 3,000.

I: Yeah. It’s 5,300. That’s the record.

H: Alright.

I: Do you know how many survivors there now, in the Netherlands?

H: At this moment? I don’t know. Not everybody is a member of the Korean War
Veterans Association in Holland. I think there are still more than a hundred.

00:01:30

I: That’s why it is important to contain the direct witness.

H: Right.

I: From the veterans. Could you introduce your family when you were growing up.
Here in Netherlands, your parents and your siblings?

H: I had two sisters, elder sisters, and a younger brother. They all died
already.

I: Mm-hmm

H: Then my parents were separated.

00:02:00

H: Yeah, and so I volunteered because we were drafted at the time.

I: Yeah.

H: Yeah. Also, I had to serve for two years and I wanted to leave the Netherlands
as soon as possible. So,

I: Right. Before we go into the details of your military service, I want to ask
this question. Did you learn anything about Korea, up to your high school
days, or

00:02:30

I: Did you know where Korea was in the map?

H: At that time, no. When the war started, that was the first time I ever heard
about Korea.

I: Really.

H: Really.

I: Oh.

H: Yeah, and then of course the newspapers. There was no television yet. And the
radio, newspapers, and then I picked up a lot of information. But that was all
we did. We didn’t know.

I: We didn’t know.

H: The Second World War was ended and we knew all about the Second World War. And
our war in Indonesia.

00:03:00

H: Because the Dutch also had

I: Exactly.

H: At the war, I was too young to be drafted for Indonesia. And then I
volunteered when they asked volunteers to go and fight in Korea. I
volunteered.

I: So, Indonesia was your colony, right?

H: Yes.

I: And there was independent war there in 1948.

H: Yeah. ’45 to 49.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: Yeah.

00:03:30

I: And so, that’s why I think it was kind of difficult for Netherlands to
dispatch military in the beginning. Right?

H: Now, I don’t understand the question.

I: Oh, okay. So, let’s move on. You didn’t know anything about Korea. Did you?

H: Not much. [Laughs]

I: Not much. Did you ever think that you would go to Korea, fighting for the
country you never knew before, at the time when the Korean War broke out?

H: Because,

00:04:00

H: We got more information because the war started in 1950. We left in the last
months of ’52. So in the meantime, we learned a lot about the Korea and read.
I even read, in English, some books about Korea.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: To know about the climate and everything and the cultural things. So yeah.

00:04:30

H: That was an inspiration, again. To say okay, it’s impossible to leave that
country on it’s own. We have to help.

I: So, were you in Hague? Where were you at the time of volunteering?

H: I lived in the city, Groningen, in the northern part of the Netherlands.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: The tenement. When I volunteered, I had to go to the Hague to volunteer.

I: I see.

H: [Laughs] Then we were trained in the southern.

I: For how long?

00:05:00

H: For half a year, at least. Yeah.

I: So, when did you volunteer? Do you remember the date and the year?

H: No, I don’t remember the date.

I: What year?

H: ’52.

I: ’52.

H: Yeah.

I: What month? You don’t remember.

H: I don’t remember.

I: Okay, ’52, and then you had training for six.

H: You had to go for check-up at six. Physically, is he okay, right, and after
that I was accepted as a volunteer.

I: Mm-hmm

H: Then we were trained.

00:05:30
H: You had to during our training even fight the Dutch troops. They lost. We were
better.

I: Oh.

H: [Laughs}Then finally it was a relief to hear next week or next month you leave
for Korea by boat.

I: By boat.

H: Yeah.

I: Was it American boat?

H: Yeah, it was is an American transport boat.

00:06:00

I: So, how long did it take to get to Korea? How long did it take to get to
Korea?

H: Oh yeah, a few weeks.

I: A few weeks.

H: Yeah.

I: Did you have a seasick?

H: Yeah, I was seasick. Everybody was seasick. [Laughs]

I: So, must be awfully dirty in the ship. They throw up a lot, right?

H: Yeah but I, for myself, I tried to find a place at the bottom of the ship.

I: Mm-hmm. .

H: There was nobody there.

00:06:30

H: So, I was there for two or three days on my own.

I: Uh-huh.

H: They lost me. They did not know where I was. After two, three days I felt fine
and I presented myself again to the others.

I: So where did you land in Korea?

H: In Busan.

I: Busan, mm-hmm.

H: There was a Miss. Korea at the gate and everybody yelled take off [Laughs].

00:07:00
H: And the military band of course.

I: Uh-huh.

H: And it was very cold and we were in summer uniforms. So, [laughs], we almost
froze to death on the trip from Busan to the front.

I: So from Busan, where did you go?

H: We went to in the Kumhwa area.

I; Kumhwa?

H: Yeah.

00:07:30

H: In the train, it had no windows anymore. No doors, no floors, almost. It was a
terrible trip but we were singing all of the time.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: We waved and shouted to the known farmers we saw in the fields.

I: Do you still remember those scenes, right?

H: Yeah, I remember those scenes. I fell in love with Korea then, on the trip.

I: Really?

00:08:00
H: Really.

I: Tell me, to be honestly, okay. What was your image of Korea when you first saw
it? What was the image?

H: The image was what a beautiful, mountainous area because I’m from a country
that’s flat like this, right.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: I was very much impressed by all of the mountains and the first farmer.

00:08:30

H: The farmer along the trek of the train and the way he looked and we waved at
him. The way he was laboring there on the field. I like that. It was a good
feeling. We are going here and helping these people and that’s a good feeling.

I: Were you

H: It’s a very impressive country. The landscape is very impressive, still is. I
went back later and made a feature film

00:09:00
H: In Korea, called Field of Honor.

I: Huh.

H: Yeah. It had a Korean co-producer.

I: You yourself produced it?

H: Yeah, I’m a film producer.

I: Oh my goodness. So, let me, let me.

H: When I came back into journalism. Was a journalist and film critic. Then from
film critic, I became a film producer.

I: So, let me ask that question later, ok.

00:09:30

H: Yeah.

I: But, were you able to stop in Seoul or a major city, like Daegu, or like that?

H: I’ve never been to any city at all.

I: So, you just went directly from Busan to Kumhwa ?

H: And, yes. There was this other place where we had to get our Dutch gear. It
was put over there.

00:10:00

H: On the way back, I was there. I remember but I forgot the name of the city.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: The city in the Kumhwa area.

I: So, you did not see the destroyed city on the way to Kumhwa, right?

H; I haven’t seen Seoul. We haven’t seen Seoul. Directly to the front area.

I: So, what was your unit?

H: The Dutch unit was part of the 38th Infantry Regiment for the American Second

00:10:30

I: Second Division.

H: Yeah, Second Army.

I: What was your specialty?

H: For me?

I: Yeah, infantry or?

H: Infantry. I was a soldier.

I: Okay.

H: Yeah, infantry.

I: What was your rank at the time?

H: I didn’t, just a soldier.

I: Just a foot soldier.

H: Foot soldier. They asked me if I wanted to be in administration because of my
education.

00:11:00

H: I refused. I said, I volunteered to be a soldier and not to be a pen.

I: What education did you have last time, at the time?

H: High school.

I: High school.

H: Yeah.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: That’s Dutch high school, yeah.

I: And you refused to work in the office.

H: Yeah.

I: You are an idiot. [Laughs]

H: No.

I: It’s in the war. You could be killed.

H: It’s the best period of my life.

I: Wow.

H: The war was also.

00:11:30

H: You know women are in labor and giving life and men are in war and almost it’s very
emotional. But also you’re very much aware of life. And also you save life sometimes
and in the end you saved maybe a whole nation, right. So, we gave birth in history to
it.

00:12:00

H: And I like that. I still like that. That’s also why I made a documentary series, The
Forgotten War, for Dutch television and a feature film.

I: So, tell me about the situation. It is 1952, winter in 1952.

H: Into the winter of 1953.

I: ‘3

H: So in fact, I remember more about ‘53.

I: Explain to the audience the battle situation.

00:12:30

I: In early 1953 because I know that was very intensive battles. Right?

H: Yeah.

I: To gain inch of the land.

H: Yeah, we were already in, it was in the low country, I forgot the English name for it.
You were in bunkers and

00:13:00

H: The front was moving all the time in ‘53 because they wanted to, the North Koreans
wanted to have more of South. We didn’t want to give in. So, we dug in. In nighttime,
they came. I had a Korean.

00:13:30

H: Buddy, Bukenwe. One night before the night fell he was shaking all over and I asked
him ‘Buck, what is wrong’? He said ‘No good tonight’ and he was killed that night.

I: Uh, how?

H: He, uh, by a burp gun burst.

I: Uh-huh.

H: He was riddled with bullets and he bled to death, literally.

00:14:00

H: And singing all the time.

I: Singing, uh huh.

H: Singing because we had one of my buddies, the Dutch buddies. His name was Raymon and
in Dutch there is a song “Say mon, Say mon” so we always sang “Raymon, Oh Raymon”.
Bucky, he sang that song all the time, until the moment that he was dead.

I: And you still have that vivid memory?

H: Absolutely.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: I wrote about it in an article. Yeah.

00:14:30

I: Tell me more about the kind of moment where that you feel like, I may die.

H: Du?

I: Tell me if there were any moments where you feel like you could be killed. What was
your mission, daily routines?

H: During the attacks, sitting in the bunker or being in the low flat,

00:15:00

H: As we call it. Listening posts and then the most frightening things were the enormous
bayonets of the Chinese. More than a meter long. It was sometimes men to men fighting.
It was always during the nights.

00:15:30

H: This limited vision and sometimes I remember that there were so many Chinese in and
around our bunkers that we asked for fire on our own positions. They bombarded us with
1,500 grenades and the next morning everything was all blood and flesh.

00:16:00

H: And flies sitting on it. Our commander, company commander, wanted to make a picture of
us because the night before we were with 36 soldiers and the next morning there were
22. He said another attack and I don’t have a second platoon anymore. So, he made a
picture of the remaining platoon.

00:16:30

H: If you see the picture, you think they are on a holiday. [Laughs] Everybody kneeling
in front of the camera, smiling. That was the night after that attack on Stinky Hill,
as it is called.

I: Stinky Hill.

H: Yes, so many dead and you couldn’t move them away. It was warm. It was in the heat.
So, they were decomposing and people who came up to bring food, or whatever, they all
put bandages around their faces.

00:17:00

H: They called our hill, Stinky Hill. Yeah. Sandbox Hill, I think it is in Korean.

I: What did you think about it? Do you still have nightmares, like PTSD?

H: In the beginning, when I was back in Holland, I had nightmares. I drank too much,
also, at the time. To suppress because we came back and the government said

00:17:30

H: Thank you for everything, bye-bye. That was it. So you had to see for yourself
everything. Nobody helps. At that time, I couldn’t talk. I couldn’t speak about it to
my family. So, I was on my own and I walked the nighttime. I even saw the strangest
things and that lasted almost a year. Then I said

00:18:00

H: To myself, damn put yourself together and I became a journalist and then it was over.

I: Ah.

H: Yeah.

I: So you were able to get away from it?

H: Yeah.

I: That’s amazing.

H: You have to do it yourself.

I: But, that’s a blessing. Because there are so many veterans who still have nightmares.

H: I know. I even, friends of mine from the time how always have and I told them

00:18:30

H: Don’t forget it. See all the good things in life. Be happy with every day you wake up
and you know. If you are severely wounded or if you miss a leg, or whatever, then
maybe. The only wounds I really have were inside. You can put that aside and, ok,
forget about it.

00:19:00

I: Mm-hmm.

H: Right. It was nice to be back in Korea twice. Yeah.

I: So when you survived at night

H: Yeah.

I: There are only twenty some body.

H: Twenty-two.

I: Twenty-two out of thirty-six. So you lost fourteen soldiers?

H: Yeah, wounded and dead. Yeah.

I: What were you thinking to yourself? Why am I here? Why do I fight? Why do I lose my
life here? What did you think about it?

H: Oh, I didn’t think about that. No.

00:19:30

H: What we had to do was, some of the bunkers were caved in, so we had to restore the
bunker. You have a feeling, I’m still, sure. I’m still alive. It’s okay. That will
come another time. We had to try to get rid of the corpses and things like that.

I: But it wasn’t for your country. It was a country that you didn’t know before.

00:20:00

H: During the Second World War, we were occupied by the Germans. I was very much aware of
that as a kid. The same thing happened to Korea. So, it happened to me when I was
young and that was the reason why I went to Korea. It couldn’t happen again. It
happens all the time again. Right?

I: So, when did you leave Korea?

H: I left in ‘54.

I: ‘54

H: Yeah.

00:20:30

I: So now, have you been back to Korea, since then?

H: Yeah, twice.

I: Twice, when was it?

H: It was in the ‘70’s, 1970’s.

I: Uh-huh.

H: I made a documentary about a trip of Korean veterans going back to Korea. I called it
the Forgotten Battalion. That was shown on Dutch television.

00:21:00

H: The second time when I wanted to do the feature film. And I wanted to do it in Dutch
because it was about one of the experiences I had and others.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: But I couldn’t get that financed. The only one who wanted to finance it was the
American company.

I: Mm-Hmm.

H: So, I did it in English with an American accent.

I: Who was it?

H: Everett McGill.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: He was the leading actor and Charles Lee.

00:21:30

H: I met him in Holland and a Korean businessman, who also financed American films. He
always put money in American films and he produced a film in the Netherlands. He was
uncertain about some things and he found out that I was also producing at the same
time. We met and we became friends. He was the one

00:22:00

H: Who was the intermediate for me in Korea, Charles Lee.

I: So, when was the last time that you were there?

H: That was in the early ’80’s. No, ‘85, ‘86.

I: Uh-huh.

H: I think. Yeah.

I: So, you haven’t been to Korea in 2000, right?

H: No.

I: No, but still, that’s a very important question. You didn’t know about Korea, much.

H: No.

I: You fought there until ‘53-’54. Then you went back

00:22:30

I: Seventies and Eighties.

H: Yeah.

I: Tell me the details of the before and after picture of Korea.

H: It was dazzling. I mean Korea was striving. It was. Seoul, that was the first time I
was in Seoul. It was a capital, a capital city. I met students, for instance, in the
coffee shop.

00:23:00

H: It was a new generation. It was wonderful. Unless, at nightime, it was still curfew.
From the hotel, I woke up and I heard troops walking in absolute dark through the
streets of Seoul. Because the war wasn’t over. In fact in the 80’s, because the
regime.

I: Mm-hmm.

H: Was still

00:23:30

H: At nighttime, you had curfew. Whenever you had darkness, then you didn’t see Seoul at
all. It was dark and I stood in front of the window and that also was a wonderful
feeling. Knowing that Korea was growing. The director of the film

00:24:00

H: We always, go once a month, we have a Korean dinner somewhere among the Korean
restaurants here in Holland. Because we are both in love with Korea. That’s how it is.

I: So, were you proud that you fought for that country?

H: I’m very happy that I fought for that country. Yeah. I would do it again if it was
necessary. They can’t use me anymore. I’m eighty-six. If they ask me to come and help,

00:24:30

H: I would do it.

I: Oh my goodness. You know, Korea is the eleventh largest economy in the world. Most
substantive democracy in East Asia. Out of ashes. Out of the country you saw in 1950.

H: Yeah.

I: Dutch used to be the super power in middle ages.

H: [Laughs]

I: Now, still, you are one third of the territory of South Korea but still eighteenth
ranked in world economy.

00:25:00

I: What do you think about all these things? That Korea has become like that and working
with Netherlands together.

H: Well, I think Korea is one of the world powers and the Dutch should be humble. In
Europe, nobody really gives attention to the Netherlands. I mean we are a tiny country
and we don’t really have power.

00:25:30

H: But, that’s life. Maybe our sons, we have two sons, my wife and I. They don’t want to
marry. They don’t want to have children because they don’t trust the future.

I: Uh-huh.

H: After the year that I was roaming around in the Netherlands, I became a journalist in
Utrecht. The city of Utrecht.

00:26:00

H: I was a daily news. I was also an art editor. I introduced Japanese feature films in
the Netherlands because that was never done before. And there were no Korean features
we could get but you have to make the Dutch audience a bit

00:26:30

H: More aware of Asia. So, we had to introduce Japanese movies. But, I always, I wrote a
big article ten years after the war, about the Korean War in the newspaper, a whole
page. I lost it. A lot of people knew what it meant ten years

00:27:00

H: After the war. It was still, there were a lot of veterans of course. I interviewed all
of the veterans also. My English is getting poor because I haven’t had contact with
the English or Americans for almost twenty years.

I: So, what’s the name of the documentary you made again?

00:27:30

I: Please, the name of the documentary you made again, please?

H: The Forgotten Battalion.

I: I will just make a reference. You know, so people can revisit your film. This is, I
already said, that this is for the 70th anniversary of the Korean War.

H: Yeah.

I: Do you have any special message to the Korean people and the Republic of Korea about
your service?

H: Well, I wish them a wonderful future because they deserve it.

00:28:00

H: There is hardly, I think, a population that can work that hard and make their own
future like the Koreans did and still do. So, I love them and I hope that the next
generations also will be in peace. That North Korea will never be the enemy it still
is.

00:28:30

I: Last one. I found out that there is no Korean War in the national curriculum of
history in Netherlands. So, teachers don’t teach about Korean War. So, I want to make
a committee on the Forgotten War and put people like you together to petition the
Netherlands government to add the Korean War to the national curriculum of history
education. Would you be willing to be participating in that?

00:29:00

H: Yeah, in the schools, you mean. Sure, it starts a little bit now. Right?

I: Uh-huh.

H: Yeah. This is the same thing about Indonesia and the Second World War. Children want
to know. The older generation probably don’t but the children want to know. If they
ask me, can you tell me about the war, I will. In Dutch because my Dutch is much
better than my English.

I: So, I will contact you later.

00:29:30

I: Okay, about the committee.

H: Yeah.

I: That’s what my foundation wants to do.

H: Yeah.

I: We want to make it as a curricular resources and educating our own teachers. That’s
what my foundation is doing.

H: Yeah.

I: Hosting a conference, a teacher’s conference. So when we have a plan, I will invite
you and please be there.

H: Okay, I will.