A Vet’s Story – Charles Van Keuren

The ravages of war

They’re called “The First Defenders.” The 213^th Area Support Group was the first to arrive to defend Washington D.C. during the Civil War. Four companies came from Pennsylvania at the call of President Lincoln. By the time the men reached Baltimore, part of the Confederacy; one soldier had been hurt so badly he died. Today, Charles Van Keuren Jr. embodies every bit of that spirit.

Van Keuren, with his white hair and booming voice, stands tall. He carries himself with the pride of a career military man with a grandfatherly air. His ranch house is neatly kept, not a thing out of place. The lawn is perfectly manicured. The freshly vacuumed cream colored carpet contrasts with the perfectly pleated striped green and blue shades. A spinet piano sits opposite a blue sofa. Van Keuren sits across from the sofa in a green arm chair.

His wife, Marion, sits in a wooden rocking chair next to the sofa. Her petite frame looks smaller in her oversized jogging coat. Her blue slacks fit her perfectly and her white shoes poke out from underneath. Her brown hair is kept in a neat bun.

Van Keuren was born and raised in the Bethlehem area. He is a 1949 graduate of Liberty High School. Being worried about the draft he enlisted in the National Guard while still in high school. A friend who was in the National Guard told Van Keuren’s father that his son could avoid the draft by joining the Guard. “I was truly a draft dodger,” said Van Keuren with a smile. The summer after graduation he was at Camp Perri in Ohio. Van Keuren said that he enlisted with his school mates and friends so they were all at camp together and served together. He describes the experience as being like summer camp. “We left as a unit, all hometown guys. It was just like going to Boy Scout camp, if you can compare it; all of us were in the same troop, all neighbors and friends.”

In 1950 he was assigned to active duty. He went from Bethlehem to Georgia for more training. In August of 1951 Van Keuren moved to Fort Dix, N.J. In early November, Van Keuren was station in Korea as a Sergeant with the fire control unit.

Van Keuren said his first experience in Korea was waiting in Pusan for the equipment to arrive. “All our heavy guns and trucks and generators, radar and fire control equipment came over on a freighter so we stayed at Pusan until those shipments arrived.” Van Keuren and the others were responsible for checking the equipment and making sure it was functional. He said they spent a few weeks checking the machinery.

There were four letter firing batteries and each battery A, B, C, D and a headquarters unit. Van Keuren’s unit was one of the two that went to Inchon they were in harbor defense because Inchon was an important harbor.

To work with fire control, Van Keuren was stationed on an island. His unit’s job was anti-aircraft. Van Keuren describes the operation as a chain system. Radar would tell the men where the aircrafs were and his unit would try to shoot them down. A meteorology unit would tell what the weather conditions were in case the firing would be affected. He said, “We spent nine months in Georgia learning that,” laughing that he was able to boil it down that simply. The day to day operations centered on mostly general house keeping, monitoring the weather and doing trial fires to keep the equipment in working order.

The hardest part of the war for Van Keuren was going to the mainland and seeing the orphans. He described seeing the older children forming gangs. “The things that hit me the most was the civilian populations and the ravages of war. And how decimated their lives were and the country side and particularly the children because the older kids were like pack rats and you would walk through the streets and they would be in gangs and that was the way they lived.” Van Keuren felt badly for the children, because it seemed they had no future.

Marion asked Van Keuren to tell the story of the orphan boy his unit took in. He said, “We had one little lad, he was only about 4 or 5 years old, we called him Hans. They fed him down in the headquarters section, he slept in the supply room and you know he was a cheerful kid. He was just caught up in the war.” Van Keuren said that the orphans would help with the daily house chores. They did not work in any military capacity, just helped behind the scenes.

Van Keuren was only stationed in Korea for six months. His unit did not lose anyone. He was not slugging it out in the trenches; rather he was behind the scenes keeping those on the front line safe. “I really had an experience, and fortunately, I was with friends and we were together.”

When Van Keuren returned from Korea he re-enlisted in the army. He was a local officer stationed in Kutztown. In the late 1960s most of Van Keuren’s duty was military police. During this time he also went through a lot of education. And, he was also working and starting to raise a family. In 1958 he married Marion. “Fortunately, when I was in Korea, I wasn’t married. So I didn’t have any family at home other than my parents. Unlike now, I missed out on a lot of things that these people were going through.”

When he returned from Korea, Van Keuren re-enlisted in the Army and was stationed in Kutztown. Most of Van Keuren’s duty was with the military police. His civilian job was with Pennsylvania Power & Light Co. as a manager. The job required a lot of travel, so Van Keuren still spent time away from his family. Van Keuren confesses that he missed a lot of his daughter’s childhood as a result of his military experience, a total of 26 years. In 1979, he retired from the military so he could spend more time with his son.

Marion remembers when she was pregnant with their daughter. It was late in the pregnancy and Marion thought the baby was going to come early. Van Keuren was away on training at the time. Marion went to her in-laws for help and it turned out the doctor ordered bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy. The rest of the family had to pitch in. Marion said that was the hardest time, but she understood and supported Van Keuren in his passion for the military.

Today, the historic “First Defenders” is two separate groups. One is based on the original military personnel and the other is the Honorary First Defenders, comprising business people in the area who are in the Reserves. Van Keuren says, with his familiar wide grin, “Today I am a member of both.”

Alison Stebbins is a junior at Lehigh University. Her hometown is Sea Girt, N.J.