At my last night with the Fierce Nonviolence Pilgrimage, we were visited by activist, organizer, leader, and now author Jim Thomas at Campbell Farms, the community hub and hostel we were staying at just outside of Wapato on the Yakama Reservation. Jim had just finished his book Atomic Pilgrim, which recounts his experiences on his own peace pilgrimage, following his faith, working to uncover the truth of the Hanford site, and working for nuclear disarmament.
When Jim was a young man, he embarked on a journey, traveling from the Trident Nuclear Submarine Base in Kitsap County Washington across the country by foot. Along with George Zebelka, the chaplain for the men who dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, his group traveled again by foot from Ireland to Bethleham in present-day Palestine. The journey took a year. They walked for twelve to fifteen miles a day, and at times were uncertain of where exactly they would end up.
Jim dedicated the rest of his life to working for peace. He has the honor of being the first civilian to read the fifteen thousand declassified Hanford documents, and played a role in acquiring them through the Freedom of Information Act. He traveled with the Archbishop Paul Etienne and John Wester to Hiroshima to found the interfaith Partnership for a World Without Nuclear Weapons, along with the Bishops of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
At the end of his talk with us, Jim said “So many young people have their lives disrupted by going off to war. We intentionally disrupted ours for a different purpose. Imagine if more young people went off to peace”. This summed up the experience of the young people on the Fierce Nonviolence Pilgrimage so well. It’s also why I had to depart for Korea.
When I was 12 years old, my only grandfather passed away after an unusually long battle with Alzheimer’s. The identity of my paternal grandfather and the origin of my last name was a closely-guarded secret of my late grandmother, and still unknown to me. And so my only memories of a grandfather are ones where he couldn’t remember himself or me. He was bedridden, losing his memory until there was nothing left of him. That is, all except one memory. At some point when I was a toddler, my grandfather decided to sit me down and tell me that he was in the Korean War. He gave me old bills, Korean, Japanese, and Chinese from the war. They’ve been in my possession ever since, and that’s all I remember. He wanted me to know he was there.
My grandfather spent years of his life in South Korea, but never spoke of it. I know he made the mistake of dropping out of college, hoping to work full time and buy a fancy car when he was drafted. I know he traveled on the USS General S.D. Sturgis to South Korea, and likely ported in Japan. I know he arrived in Busan, and worked on a unit assigned to repairing radios. I know he took photos, that are still in my family’s possession. I know he fed starving children through the fence line of the base, and relived parts of the war in his dementia. When he returned from the war, Eugene Jackson would bring his camera on hunting trips, saying he preferred to shoot pictures instead of living things. I know he drank heavily.
While in Korea, I showed the old bills and photos to Jin, a farmer from Hapcheon, and Dr. Shin, who was with us for our entire journey, both of whom I had grown to trust. I was told they were both rare things to have. I’ll be coordinating with Shin to see if they would be useful to historians in South Korea.
I think the absence of my grandfathers has created an absence in my life that has compelled me to seek the wisdom and company of elders, many of whom I’ve met in the peace and nuclear weapons abolition space. I didn’t grieve my grandfather when he died because I didn’t know him. But I did grieve Glen Anderson, David Hall, and Fred Miller, friends, mentors, and elders in our movement, each of them carried pieces I was missing. It’s the hardest thing I’ve had to do in this work. I feel like I can grieve him now.
I think my singular memory of my grandfather has driven me to deepen my understanding of America’s “Forgotten War”. And I think the little I’ve learned of my grandfather’s time being sent off to war led my decision to go off to peace in Korea.
Not long before my trip, by chance I met Dr. Patricia Boiko, a WPSR member active on Korea Peace issues. She had meticulously researched and retraced the steps of her father, who served in the Korean War. Our conversation validated my hopes of deepening my understanding of my grandfather’s experience.
As I looked at some of the same shores in Busan that he did, I asked myself, what did he and millions of other Americans fight for if the Korean War still hasn’t ended? What will it take to finally have peace?
Written by Sean Arent, Nuclear Weapons Abolition Program Manager, WPSR, NWANW.