Paul E. Baker, age 22, from Ohio, Van Wert county.
Service era: Korea
Parent: Donald Baker Sr.
School: Convoy HIgh graduate
Date of death: Saturday, September 1, 1951
Death details: On September 1, 1951, Company L, 3rd Battalion, 17th Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, attacked Hill 851, ten miles north of Chunchon, North Korea. The company was stopped just short of the top of the hill by a hail of grenades thrown by Chinese soldiers in a bunker on the hilltop. The company withdrew, and was forced to leave the bodies of several soldiers behind because of the intensity of enemy fire. Three days later, after friendly mortar fire had driven the Chinese off the hill, the men of Company L returned to Hill 851 to recover the bodies of the fallen. They were unable to locate the body of one soldier, and believed that the body had been destroyed by mortar fire.
Private First Class Paul Edward Baker, who joined the U.S. Army from Ohio, served with L Company, 3rd Battalion, 17th Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division. Witnesses reported that he was killed by enemy fire during this attack on Hill 851, but his body could not be located when the area was searched three days later. His remains were not identified among those returned to U.S. custody after the ceasefire. Today, Private First Class Baker is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
