Washington county Virginia

Donald Bristow Worley from Washington County Virginia.

Service era: Korea

Date of death: Thursday, July 20, 1950
Death details: On July 20, 1950, the 3rd Battalion of the U.S. 34th Infantry Regiment, 24th Infantry Division, was holding a defensive line in South Korea overlooking the Taejon Airport, northeast of the city. When enemy tanks broke through the line near the airport, U.S. troops were ordered to fall back through Taejon. The 3rd Battalion was ordered to lead the convoy out of Taejon, but ran into a series of collapsed structures and roadblocks that broke up the column. U.S. forces were unable to break through these roadblocks, and to avoid capture soldiers moved off-road and began filtering through the countryside in small groups. Corporal Donald Bristow Worley entered the U.S. Army from Virginia and served in the Heavy Mortar Company, 34th Infantry Regiment, 24th Infantry Division. He went missing in action on July 20, during the withdrawal near Taejon, though the exact details surrounding his loss are unknown. Later, his name was found written on a school blackboard in Seoul, South Korea, suggesting the possibility that CPL Worley was captured and marched north to prison camps in Seoul, and then possibly to Pyongyang. His remains were not recovered or identified among those returned to U.S. custody following the war, and he is still unaccounted for. Today, Corporal Worley is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. His name is also inscribed on the Korean War Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC, which was updated in 2022 to include the names of the fallen.

Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency