Combat· Korean War
Majon-ni (Apache Pass)
Inland from Wonsan, the 3d Battalion, 1st Marines was posted to the mountain crossroads village of Majon-ni to block the routes between the coast and the interior and to interdict guerrilla movement.
The position sat astride a defile the Marines came to call "Ambush Alley," where the winding mountain road through the pass made every convoy vulnerable to attack. The Marines fortified a perimeter around the village, patrolled the surrounding heights and the dangerous road, and beat off probes against their position while taking large numbers of prisoners from the bypassed enemy filtering through the area. A Korean Marine battalion was sent up to reinforce the mission. The Majon-ni stand was a holding action far from the main effort, but it secured a key inland chokepoint and gave the Marines early, hard lessons in the ambush warfare that would define the road-bound fighting ahead.
Record no. 884