09 — The Archive

Opening a box of memories.

Everything here is a real photograph or document supplied by the author. Nothing has been generated, altered or staged. Where the date or location is unknown, it is left blank rather than guessed.

12 plates · select any photograph to view it full screen

Corporal Leroy Saint John Kauhini in dress uniform, smiling — LeroyChristmas Eve, 1950Hotel Street, Honolulu
A souvenir photograph taken in an arcade on Hotel Street. They all took one exactly like it that afternoon, four young men who still, in every picture, looked like they belonged at a luau instead of a war. Bill lost every copy of his. Only Leroy's survived.

Soldiers with duffel bags boarding buses beneath palm trees — Loading OutEarly 1950sOahu
Island troops with full field packs, boarding for the trip that would end on a runway at Hickam. Palm trees in the background — the last of them any of these men would see for a year.

A group of Korean children in torn, filthy clothing — What The War Produced1951Pusan
“There were like a hundred or so of them, maybe more — children, all of them, in clothes so torn and filthy you couldn't tell what color the fabric had started as… and every man in that column emptied his pockets right there in the street. It didn't feel like enough. It wasn't enough.”

Three infantry soldiers resting on a snowy hillside above a valley — The LineMarch 1951Imjin
Infantrymen of the 3rd Division above a frozen valley. This is the country Bill described as impossible to stand up in — ice the Island boys had never so much as seen a month earlier.

Soldiers gathered at night, one being decorated in the field — Awarded In The Field1951Korea
A decoration pinned on in the dark, in the middle of a line company's night. Leroy wore his Combat Infantryman Badge on his field jacket from the very morning it was issued, like he'd been waiting his whole life for the Army to admit what he already knew about himself.

Surgeons operating inside a canvas field hospital tent — Where They Took Abel1951Korea
A field surgical tent. Korean civilian litter bearers carried Abel down off Hill 717 in the dark, after Bill had held both hands against his back for hours calling for a medic.

Memorial record for Leroy Kauhini listing MIA status and awards — The RecordJune 24, 1951Hill 717
February 16, 1933 – June 24, 1951. Missing in Action. Wall of the Missing, National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. Combat Infantryman Badge. Distinguished Service Cross.

A Republic of Korea general shaking hands with William Castro — Sixty-Five Years Later2016Republic of Korea
A Republic of Korea general takes the hand of the boy from the Big Island who came ashore at Pusan in January 1951 with eight rounds in his belt and orders not to load them.

William Castro walking a receiving line of applauding young Koreans — The Receiving Line2016Republic of Korea
Young Koreans applauding as he walks past — the grandchildren of the country he was sent to at eighteen.

William Castro standing with hands pressed together, looking upward — For The Ones Who Stayed2016Republic of Korea
There is no headstone for Leroy Kauhini. There is a name carved into the Wall of the Missing above Honolulu, and there is this.

Ambassador for Peace proclamation issued to Mr. William H. Castro — Ambassador For Peace27 June 2016Republic of Korea
“We cherish in our hearts the memory of your boundless sacrifices in helping us reestablish our Free Nation.” — Minister Sung Choon Park, Patriots and Veterans Affairs, Republic of Korea.

Portrait photograph of William (Bill) Castro — The Author
William (Bill) Castro. He carried this story for the better part of seventy-five years before he set it down.

One photograph out of four survived.

Four young men in dress uniform posed in a Hotel Street arcade on Christmas Eve, 1950, in front of a souvenir backdrop. They all took one exactly like it that afternoon.

Bill lost every copy of his over a long life, in one move or another, the way you lose things without ever quite noticing the moment they went missing. Somehow only Leroy’s survived to become the one people remember.

He still has it.

Leroy’s story