[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3928-3929]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1020
      DONALD FOISIE--1ST CAVALRY DIVISION SOLDIER--PATRIOT--TEXAN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Poe) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, it was June 1950 when the North 
Koreans decided they would invade their neighbors to the south, South 
Korea. The war had started--even though the world community called it a 
``police action''--but it was a war, and of course South Korea was in 
trouble. They called 911, and as it has been in history, when you call 
911, the United States answers. The Americans went to South Korea to 
protect our ally South Korea.
  In August of the same year, some Americans were occupying Hill 303. 
Most Americans have never heard of Hill 303. Let me tell you about it.
  Hill 303 was being occupied by the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry 
Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division of the United States Army. It was a 
small group because America didn't have a lot of troops in South Korea. 
We weren't ready for this war. The North Koreans, with the aid of the 
Communist Chinese later, overran the hill--and the Americans, some 
stayed, some withdrew. One of the individuals who stayed on that hill 
was a friend of mine by the name of Donald Foisie.
  Donald Foisie and his other comrades refused to give ground. The hill 
was overrun. The North Koreans took the hill. Donald Foisie and one of 
his friends hid in a rice paddy. They used bamboo canes to get air, and 
they stayed there for a long time. Unbeknownst to him, 45 other 
American soldiers had been captured by the North Koreans. And after 
they were captured, they were lined up in front of a ditch, with their 
hands tied behind their backs, and they were machine-gunned down in 
that gully. Later, the Americans retook the hill. They found Donald 
Foisie and found his murdered comrades.
  That was in August of 1950. Things haven't changed much in the 
Koreas. The North Koreans still have sights on South Korea, but that's 
another story.
  Sergeant Donald Foisie was wounded several times, and received the 
Purple Heart that day. He stayed in the United States Army until 1962. 
He came back to Atascocita, Texas--down the street from me--and he had 
several businesses. He worked for a corporation in Houston. That 
corporation was an international corporation, and from time to time 
they would fly the flag of the country that they were hosting that day. 
When Donald Foisie saw that one of those flags, on one day that he was 
working, was the Red Chinese--as he called them--Communist flag, he 
refused to go to work. He didn't believe that the Chinese flag ought to 
fly on American soil. That's the kind of guy he was.
  He spent the rest of his life letting Americans know about the Korean 
war. Last year, he was at Creekwood Middle School in Kingwood, Texas 
where the Creekwood Middle School kids honored the veterans of Hill 
303--those who were murdered--and had a memorial. He was there, along 
with many South Koreans, and Ambassador Park from South Korea and 
myself were there.
  Last year, he also attended the Memorial Day service at the veterans 
cemetery in Houston, and this is where that photograph was taken. He 
was saluting a crowd of several thousand who had given him a standing 
ovation after his story was told. You see, he looks pretty good. He's 
81 in this photograph. This week, Donald Foisie, United States Army, 
1st Cavalry Division--he's still wearing his hat--died. He will be 
buried this Friday at this same cemetery that he was standing in and 
honoring on Memorial Day.

[[Page 3929]]

  He was quite a guy. He was married to Rita for 60 years. He had three 
kids--Donna, Daniel, and David. He wrote several books. He was in the 
air-conditioning business, and he worked as a security guard when his 
knees got bad. But he spent most of his life letting America know about 
his buddies in Korea in 1950--``the forgotten war,'' as he called it. 
He wants us to remember what occurred many years ago when young 
Americans--kids--went over to lands they'd never seen and fought for 
people they had never known, all in the name of securing liberty and 
America's interest.
  So, today, we honor Sergeant Foisie and his family for his service in 
the United States Army, for being a true patriot, a true American, a 
great Texan, and a person who never gave ground.
  And that's just the way it is.

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