Sell, Larry Eugene
Army Sergeant
Larry Eugene Sell from Caldwell County Whitnel, North Carolina .
Parents: Fleetwood Sell
Service era: Korea
Date of death: Unknown
Death details: By mid-November 1950, U.S. and Allied forces had advanced to within approximately sixty miles of the Yalu River, the border between North Korea and China. On November 25, approximately 300,000 Chinese Communist Forces (CCF) “volunteers” suddenly and fiercely counterattacked after crossing the Yalu. The 2nd Infantry Division, located the farthest north of units at the Chongchon River, could not halt the CCF advance and was ordered to withdraw to defensive positions at Sunchon in the South Pyongan province of North Korea. As the division pulled back from Kunu-ri toward Sunchon, it conducted an intense rearguard action while fighting to break through well-defended roadblocks set up by CCF infiltrators. The withdrawal was not complete until December 1, and the 2nd Infantry Division suffered extremely heavy casualties in the process. Sergeant First Class Larry Eugene Sell joined the U.S. Army from North Carolina and was a member of the Medical Company, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division. On December 1, 1950, he was wounded and captured by enemy forces near Kunu-ri as his unit made its fighting withdrawal. Sergeant First Class Sell died soon after his capture in December of 1950, as a result of his prior wounds. He was not identified among remains returned to U.S. custody after the conflict’s ceasefire, and he is still unaccounted-for. Today, Sergeant First Class Sell is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Statesville Daily Record (1951)