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The 7th Infantry Division, which had gone ashore hard on the marines' heels and was now on their right flank, had sent a small armored force slashing southward under Major I. A. Edwards of Tulsa, Okla. to seize Suwon and its airfield, and to block any Reds coming north to Seoul's defense along that road. Suwon and its airfield were secured. Carrier planes began using the airstrip. The 7th's task force pushed on south to Osan—along the old road of defeat and retreat that the first U.S. battalions committed in Korea had taken nearly three months before.
Plug Pulled. On Walton Walker's southeastern front, the enemy fought at first as though they had not heard of the Inchon landings. Trying to break out of the Taegu corner, the 1st Cavalry Division was stalled for six days. At Yongsan, the 2nd Infantry had a tough time even to reach the Naktong, and at several points along the river U.S. assault boats were badly shot up. On the south-coast flank, Negro troops of the 25th Division recaptured formidable "Battle Mountain" for something like the tenth time, and probably the last time in this war.
Finally, however, Walker's men got four bridgeheads across the Naktong, and all at once someone seemed to have pulled the plug. The rampaging doughfeet outflanked Chinju, reached Hyopchung and Songju, bore down on the important communications hub of Kumchong (see map). The most sensational advances were racked up by the ist Cavalry, which raced 55 miles in three days. After taking Sangju, troops of this crack outfit fanned out north to Hamchang, east to Poun, and south toward
Kumchong, where the 24th Infantry was meeting resistance. On the fourth day the cavalrymen pushed on to Chochiwon and Chongju, bypassing Taejon.
Laundry on Bushes. General Walker insisted there was no general rout, but a fairly orderly retreat with a few rearguards left to fight and die. At some points the North Koreans fought until overrun in their foxholes; at others, they took off so fast that the pursuers found Red laundry still hanging on bushes.
Where the Reds were forced to pull back in daylight, Allied airplanes took their toll, and some roads were littered with enemy dead, smashed oxcarts and other debris of war.
North Korean divisions were disappearing from view in the southeast. Before they could reach Seoul, the X Corps' Major General Edward Almond redoubled his efforts to take the city. Colonel Puller's regiment crossed the Han from Yongdung and the 7th Infantry made another crossing farther upstream. In a hail of enemy small-arms fire that blew periscopes and wireless antennae from Pershing tanks, the marines blasted slowly through the main thoroughfares of Seoul, rooting out enemy nests one by one and occupying some of the sandbagged buildings themselves. In the heart of the city, they reached Duksoo Palace in which Korea's kings once lived. After South Mountain, dominating the city, had been stormed and a Red armored counterattack smashed, MacArthur considered that the city was "tactically secured," although street fighting still continued. MacArthur was pleased that the victory had been won with a minimum of air and artillery damage to Seoul.