Company H, then passing between Hill 91 and Observation Hill on its way to Obong-ni’s eastern approaches, received the same order from the Battalion commander. The assault on the ridge had been canceled, and Murray was concentrating his regiment along the MSR.
Throughout the Brigade advance on 5 September, the Marines were hampered by heavy rain and fog which prevented MAG-33 and VMO-6 from operating effectively. Thus the enemy was offered a rare opportunity to mount a daylight attack.[346]
[346] This section is derived from: Annex How; LtCol M. R. Olson, interv with author, 15 Jun 54; Taplett, 20 Apr 54; Muetzel, 5–6 Jan 54 (with comments by Maj J. R. Stevens); and Fenton, 8 May 54.
After Company B received orders to hold up on Hill 125, Fenton ordered his men to dig foxholes along the rain-soaked crest facing Tugok village and Finger Ridge to the west and Obong-ni Ridge to the southwest. The company commander directed the attached 1st Platoon of tanks to remain in the road cut, just to the rear of the famous bend around the forward slopes of Hill 125. Peering through the rain and fog, the Marine tankmen could see the dead, black hulls of the three T-34’s knocked out by the Brigade 2 weeks earlier.
At 1420 the sporadic sniping from the front suddenly increased to the intensity of preparatory fire, and Baker Company was pinned down on its ridgeline positions. The northern tip of Obong-ni Ridge blazed with NKPA machineguns, whose chatter was soon joined by that of automatic weapons concealed in Tugok and at the northern base of Observation Hill. A Communist antitank gun on Finger Ridge added its voice intermittently to the chorus.
Fenton’s radio went dead just as he reported the situation to Newton at his OP on the high ground to the east. As luck would have it, every other radio in the company area was inoperative because of the mud and rain; and Fenton was unable to warn the Marine tanks in the road cut that enemy armor and troops were advancing toward the road bend from the west.
As the Communist vehicles swung into the turn, a company of Red soldiers left the road and assaulted Company B’s positions by advancing up the draw on the Marines’ left front. The intense overhead fire supporting the Red Infantry enabled them to get well up the forward slopes. Meanwhile, a squad of North Koreans advanced up the draw leading from Tugok and harassed Fenton’s right front.