MASH on MASH
Chapter 2: The 4077th
A/N: Some of things mentioned in this chapter are based on what it was like at one of the real life MASH units in Korea.
The hometowns shown are supposed to be where the characters live in 2010.
Walter "Radar" O'Reilly
Company Clerk MASH 4077th 1951-1953
Ottumwa Iowa
One of things that always bothered me about the TV show MASH was the fact that they never had a set timeline. The TV people were always changing years. And how many Christmases episodes did they have?
The MASH shown in the movie and TV was built toward the end of 1951 when I arrived in Korea. I was the company clerk under Lieutenant Colonel Henry Blake and later Colonel Sherman Potter, both fine men.
I got to the unit in September 1951. The TV show has me there in 1950 at the start of the war but I got there in 1951.
The hospital had just moved to its location. The 4077th was the last MASH sent to Korea. They got there in November 1950 from Japan. The frontline was up in North Korea then almost to China. In those days the MASH followed the fighting so they were always packing up and moving. They never had permanent buildings. Everything was in tents.
Oh before I forget, the location of the real MASH was not Uijeonbu. That other MASH the 8055th was there. That's where that doctor who wrote the book was. Our location was near there but our village didn't have a real name.
In September 1951 the engineers started building the tin hospital you know from television. The building was actually bigger than that. Our post-op ward could hold about 100 patients. On TV it looks like they only had a dozen beds.
The compound was bigger too. I guess they had to make the compound on TV smaller so you could see everything on TV. The actual camp was spread out more. The real hospital building took up half the compound you saw on TV but the camp set up was pretty much the same. The mess tent was right across the road along with The Swamp.
John "Trapper John" McIntyre
Captain, Surgeon 1951-52
Crabapple Cove Maine
The Swamp was really the tent where the surgeons lived. It was located next to the hospital so if we were needed for an emergency somebody could get us quickly.
There really was a still in The Swamp. You see in real life hard alcohol was hard to get close to the front. The still was built to not just by Hawkeye and me but by others in the camp. You had several people who had backgrounds in chemistry and who knew how to make moonshine. We did not make gallons of the stuff. We made Just enough to make maybe a bottle of booze.
Sometimes we would add canned fruit to our moonshine and make what we called "MASH Schnapps". It was popular with the ladies.
There were other doctors at the MASH besides the surgeons. The other doctors acted as assistant surgeons when we had a lot of wounded. At other times they handled non-surgical duties like triage, post-op, sick call and other specialties. We also had a dentist all the time. In the television series the dentist disappeared but we always had one when I was there.
In all we had six to eight doctors and then we had some non medical officers attached to the unit. You never saw them mentioned on the television series or movie but they were there also.
The other doctors lived in their own tent with the dentist. The nurses lived in their own big tent. The real 4077th had at a minimum twelve nurses. On TV you only see about four nurses living together but in reality they all lived in one tent except for Major Houlihan who had her own tent that doubled as an office.
The helicopter pilots also lived at the 4077th with us. They never explained where the helicopters came from and where they went on the TV show. Well they had a detachment of four helicopters assigned to us. The helicopters had their own mechanics to get care of them. The choppers were parked on the lower chopper pad. The upper chopper pad, the one on top of the hill was kept clear.
Maxwell Q. Klinger
Sergeant, Orderly/Company Clerk 1952-53
Honolulu Hawaii
In the TV show they had me living in my own tent. I used to live with the other NCOs in one tent. When I started wearing dresses some of the other guys didn't want me living with them so the First Sergeant moved me into another tent by myself. When it became obvious that I wasn't really crazy and Colonel Blake wasn't sending me home I moved back into the NCO tent.
The 4077th had a First Sergeant. In both the movie and TV show they never showed the full staff. It looked liked Henry Blake and Radar ran the unit. Well that's not true.
The 4077th was like any other unit. Col. Blake was the Commander. Then Col. Potter took over. Major Burns was second in command then later a regular Army Major from the medical corps.
The First Sergeant was the senior enlisted for the company. He was the top soldier. He took care of the enlisted men in camp. If we screwed up then the First Sergeant dealt with us. He was the reason I was on KP on the time.
The kitchen was in a hut behind the mess tent. Eventually the mess tent became a building. It was a building when Colonel Potter took over. I don't know why the TV people showed the kitchen in a building but left the mess tent well a tent.
Igor Straminsky
Private Cook 1952-53
Chicago Illinois
I was one of the cooks at the 4077th. The Army actually taught me how to cook can you believe that?
In the TV show they portrayed me as an all purpose private that did all the dirty jobs in camp. The truth is I was one of three cooks assigned to the 4077th. We had a Staff Sergeant in charge and another private. We also had a bunch of Korean locals who worked with us.
The cooks were tasked with cooking three meals a day breakfast, lunch and dinner. We also made sandwiches for the people on duty in post-op during the night. In between meals our time was spent preparing for the next one so I was always busy. I never had time to dig new latrines or do other dirty jobs. I guess everyone remembered me working at the chow hall and told the TV writers that so I came to represent the hard working enlisted men.
After the hospital was finished the engineers built a mess hall. It wasn't much of a building. It had thin plywood walls with screen windows. In the winter we covered up the windows with plywood to keep the cold out.
The inside of the building had long tables and benches just like on the TV show. In the winter time it was the warmest building in camp besides the hospital.
You remember that episode where they were bowling in the mess tent? We actually did that with the tables.
Walter O'Reilly
We had a PX at the 4077th. You never saw that on the TV show. People had to get razor blades and tooth brushes from somewhere. It was in a tent next to the officer's club. It didn't sell a whole lot of stuff, just the basics. It sold razor blades, soap and stuff like that. You could buy candy bars and cokes there but you had there early.
The PX got resupplied about once a month. On that day there would be a line of people waiting to get in. The Hershey bars went quick. So did the Lucky Strike cigarettes. Sometimes the Sergeant that ran the PX would bring a case of grape Nehi for me.
Maxwell Klinger
The TV show devoted a whole episode to the how the officer's club was born and how the enlisted men were at first banned from getting in.
On MASH they had the O-club being built because Hawkeye and Trapper saved the life of some General's son. At first the enlisted men are banned from the club but by the end we G.I.s get in.
In reality it was the First Sergeant who got the enlisted men in. Col. Blake was going to have a club built anyway but he had trouble getting the engineers to build one. After the doctors saved the life of that General's son well the General called up the engineers and made things happen.
Anyway us enlisted men felt we were being cheated. We worked with the doctors and nurses everyday in the hospital and now they got a new club and all we had was Rosie's Bar across the road outside of camp. At Rosie's Bar Soldiers were getting into fights and getting arrested by the MPs (Military Police).
The First Sergeant told Henry Blake that he wanted the enlisted men to have a club so he could keep an eye on them in camp. Also the club wasn't going to make enough money on just the doctors and nurses. So Henry Blake let the enlisted have the club on some nights. Later on he just let everyone drink together. Sherman Potter kept that policy in effect when he took command.
Rosie's Bar was located just outside the camp just like on TV. There was a little village built around it. The people who lived there all worked for the camp in some way. The laundry lady had her place there and the kitchen workers lived there.
There were a few prostitutes that worked out of Rosie's Bar. The TV folks never went into detail about that but they were there. Our doctors would give the girls regular check-ups. The Army tried to get rid of the girls but they kept coming back so we made sure they were clean. As a result the girls at Rosie's became popular in our sector.
The Officer's Club didn't hurt Rosie's business. People still went there to get away from camp for a little bit. Rosie also sold food so if you were still hungry you could go there at get something to eat. Most of the food she sold came from the kitchen anyway.
Walter O'Reilly
Everyone thinks that the 4077th was out in the woods somewhere by itself. The hospital had neighbors all around. There were other units stationed near us. They were support units for the infantry up on the frontline.
There were engineers and maintenance units all around us. We also had a long range artillery unit near us. When they fired their big guns you thought it was an earthquake or something.