Who’s “General Dean”? Well, for those who know the Korean War, General Dean was its highest ranking POW. He was captured in August of 1950 after wandering the Korean countryside for over 30 days, trying to regain the UN lines in Daegu. He then spent the next three years in North Korean hands, witnessing the war from the other side.
With the help of a writer, Dean put together a book about his ordeal almost immediately after his release (published in 1954), and Osan’s library just happened to have it. I decided to pick it up and give it a look, and it honestly hasn’t been a bad book. Dean’s memory and attention to detail make for quite the story. And the thing I found perhaps most interesting — the story as he tells it really humanizes the “enemy.” Of course he encountered the jerks that you’ll find anywhere, but generally, Dean was treated quite well for the duration of his imprisonment. And he does a good job talking about the people he met and the way the North worked behind the lines. I could really see people when I read about his interactions, and I felt I gained an understanding of what they were going through and how the war looked from their side. It was fascinating.
I’m sure this would be a hard book to find in print any more. Amazon has it for about $900 — $46 in paperback. You might be able to find it if you scoured the used book stores of America. I wouldn’t go out of my way for it, but if you ever find it, it’s worth the read.