Pictured above is Korean War Veteran Bob Soller at the Korean War Memorial mural wall in Washington, D.C. in May. The largest image etched on to the wall next to him is believed to be a photo of Soller as a young man in Korea.
(Photo submitted)
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Yvonne Vermillion has spent years dreaming of taking her father to the Korean War Memorial in Washington, D.C. She finally did, only to be greeted with an unexpected surprise.
Her father, Bob Soller, is a Korean War Veteran.
On Memorial Day, Vermillion, along with other family members, took, her father to the mural wall in D.C. When they got there they saw what they believe is her father’s face among the images etched on the wall.
“There was a picture of him on the wall,” Vermillion said. “They pulled a bunch of images from the archives, so I can’t guarantee it’s him, but it looks like it.”
According to the Korean War Veterans Memorial website, more than 2,400 photographs were pulled from the National Archives for the mural wall. There is no identification of who is in the photographs, only that they were in the Korean War. But Soller’s family had seen photos of him when he was younger and immediately recognized his face.
“They thought this picture looked like me,” Soller said, pointing between a photo of him as a young man in Korea and the face on the mural wall.
While there is no way to confirm, the resemblance between photos of young Soller and the face etched on the wall is uncanny. The thousands of photographs on the wall and the other portions of the memorial — including the statues, Pool of Remembrance and United Nations Wall — are meant to commemorate those who served in the Korean War.
The war cost more than 30,000 American lives during its three-year duration. Throughout the war, there were a handful of battles that proved significant to the outcome, one of those being the Battle of Pork Chop Hill, a place Soller is familiar with.
In 1952, was sent to Korea to serve in a mass unit on Pork Chop Hill. However, the story doesn’t start there. Soller had been drafted earlier, but deferred after finding out his wife, Mary Jo Ann, was pregnant. Unfortunately, Mary Jo Ann suffered a miscarriage and Soller had to leave. In a twist of events, Mary Jo Ann became pregnant again before he left.
While Soller was gone, his wife gave birth and the news was brought overseas to inform Soller; however, things didn’t go as planned.
“On July 5, the Red Cross was over there to tell my dad, but they found another guy with a similar last name and told him,” Vermillion said.
It would take another week and a letter from his wife before the happy news officially reached the deployed soldier.
The birth of his son was arguably one of the only happy things to happen to him during his deployment. Soller was stationed in Korea in 1954 where he described the area as exhausting and hilly.
“He said it was just hill after hill, it was never ending,” Vermillion said.
Although Soller made it home in ’54, he was fighting an uphill battle his entire deployment. The first night there, Soller came within a few inches of death while trying to sleep.
“The first night in Korea, at the 38th parallel, I asked ‘where do you sleep?’” Soller said.
When the other men responded they slept in the cramped and smelly bunker, Soller thought he had a brilliant idea. He would instead sleep in an ambulance where there were extra cots. The others warned him that around 11 p.m. is when enemy forces would usually shell them.
“About 11 you could hear one of them exploded and right above my head there was a hole this big,” Soller said while making a shape about the size of a football. “I slept in the bunker after that.”
His experiences in Korea were vast and long. He was still deployed for about a year after the war had ended, staying behind to help take care of things while men of higher rank were sent home. Eventually, Soller was the highest-ranking man in the area as a staff sergeant. He was in charge of medical and mess hall inspections.
Soller returned home in the late summer of 1954, where he was able to see his son, Jimmy, who was more than a year old, for the first time.
Soller promptly began working and helping raise his family, which eventually grew to 13 children.
“He came home on Friday and had to start work on Monday, no vacation after serving 19 months,” Vermillion said. “That’s typical Bob Soller.”
The admiration Vermillion has for her father is something she was surprised and also happy to see from others when they made their way to the wall in May.
“People walked up and shook his hand and thanked him,” Vermillion said. “Seeing the wreath from people who had lived in Korea and were thanking him made me emotional.”
Vermillion was also grateful for the Vietnam Veterans who she said never received the kind of gratitude her father did, but still came up and thanked him for his service.
While the two could talk about their experiences — Vermillion’s at the wall with her father and Soller’s in Korea — they were just happy to have finally made it to the Memorial after thinking they might not have the chance.
“Everybody seemed to be real appreciative,” Soller said. “I’m glad I saw it.”