American War Hero · Korean War · Notice Nearby

Wikimedia Commons — File:James_E_Johnson.jpg (U.S. Marine Corps / federal government work, Public domain); https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:James_E_Johnson.jpg

James E. Johnson

January 1, 1926 – unaccounted for since December 2, 1950

Born Pocatello, Idaho

Loss location: Hill 1542 / Yudam-ni withdrawal route, Chosin Reservoir, North Korea (loss location)

Sergeant, Battery L, 4th Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division; provisional Company J rifleman during Yudam-ni withdrawal, Chosin Reservoir, December 2, 1950

Missing in action — DPAA lists Sgt. James Edmund Johnson as Unaccounted For (Deferred), profile a0Jt0000002meuNEAQ (verified 2026-09-22). Killed December 2, 1950 during the attack on Hill 1542 while covering the Marine withdrawal from Yudam-ni at the Chosin Reservoir; remains not recovered. Posthumous Medal of Honor. Memorialized on the Courts of the Missing, National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, and on the Korean War Veterans Memorial Wall. An Arlington memorial marker is remembrance, not a recovery of remains. Deferred is an analytic category, not a recovered grave.

James Edmund Johnson was born in Pocatello, Idaho, on New Year's Day 1926 and went into the Marine Corps from that state. By late 1950 he was a sergeant in Battery L, 4th Battalion, 11th Marines — an artilleryman with the 1st Marine Division when the Chinese offensive closed on the Chosin Reservoir.

During the withdrawal from Yudam-ni, Chinese troops on Hill 1542 were firing down on the road that was the only way out. Artillerymen were formed into a provisional rifle company — Company J — and thrown into the attack on that hill. The Medal of Honor citation records Johnson holding his ground when the company was forced back, covering the wounded and the withdrawal until he was last seen fighting. Remains were not recovered.

DPAA profile a0Jt0000002meuNEAQ still lists him Unaccounted For, analytical category Deferred. He is on the Courts of the Missing in Honolulu and on the Korean War Veterans Memorial Wall. A memorial marker at Arlington is not a grave from Hill 1542. This page will not invent a Chosin recovery the public ledger has not closed.

Publication: NN-HERO-1950-015
Content hash: 6923ecb5 49a81552 90ec1edd 3eb8f88e 99443e1a 161c606c 2ff3b17e 31c99d96

Base stores the content hash, publication number, memorial id, and timestamp — not the full obituary text. The complete memorial remains on Notice Nearby. This is not a legal affidavit.