Larry Allen Abshier: Difference between revisions
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==Marriage and Death== |
==Marriage and Death== |
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No one is sure whether Abshier lived happily. One statement made by Jenkins claims that the four were put in a one-room house where they were forced to read and memorize passages by Kim Il Sung. Jenkins also claims that they were periodically beaten. |
No one is sure whether Abshier lived happily. One statement made by Jenkins claims that the four were put in a one-room house where they were forced to read and memorize passages by [[Kim Il Sung]]. Jenkins also claims that they were periodically beaten. |
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In 1978 a marriage was arranged by the North Korean government between Abshier and an Eastern European woman. He |
In 1978 a marriage was arranged by the North Korean government between Abshier and an Eastern European woman. He died in 1983. To this day the North Korean government claims Abshier and Parrish died of natural causes, though their ages of death seem premature. |
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==See also== |
==See also== |
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Revision as of 06:53, 27 May 2007
Private Larry Allen Abshier of the U.S. Army was one of four American troops to defect to North Korea.
Early Life
Very little is known about Larry Abshier's early life. He was born in 1943 in Urbana, Illinois.
Defecting
Private Abshier abandoned his post in South Korea in May of 1962 when he snuck away and crossed the DMZ into North Korea. He was, for several months, the only American in the Hermit Kingdom, until Private James Joseph Dresnok defected in August.
In the 2006 documentary movie "Crossing the Line", Dresnok recalls waking up to see a white face looking at him. "I opened my eyes. I didn’t believe myself. I shut them again. I must be dreaming. I opened them again and looked and, 'Who in the hell are you?' He says, 'I'm Abshier.' 'Abshier? I don’t know no Abshier.'"
Abshier, and the other three Americans, James Joseph Dresnok, Charles Robert Jenkins, and Jerry Wayne Parrish, starred in many propoganda films like Nameless Heroes, playing the evil Americans. Their participation in these films made them instant celebrities. Abshier and the other three became a propoganda bonanza, and pictures were leaked outside the country of the four living happily in paradise.
Marriage and Death
No one is sure whether Abshier lived happily. One statement made by Jenkins claims that the four were put in a one-room house where they were forced to read and memorize passages by Kim Il Sung. Jenkins also claims that they were periodically beaten.
In 1978 a marriage was arranged by the North Korean government between Abshier and an Eastern European woman. He died in 1983. To this day the North Korean government claims Abshier and Parrish died of natural causes, though their ages of death seem premature.
See also
List of defectors in the Korean War