Eugene F . Clark Commander Eugene F . Clark , USN , was deployed ( as a Lieutenant ) to the Flying Fish Channel , leading into Inchon . Quickly surveying the area , he and two accompanying South Korean officers Lieutenant Youn Joung ( Navy ) and Colonel Ke In - Ju ( Counterintelligence ) landed Yonghung - do Island in Incheon Harbor in advance of the US forces led invasion of Inchon leading to the Battle of Inchon . Clark and his Korean officers secured the help of the people on the island and using captured junks began to run raids on the North Korean occupied islands of Taebu - do and the harbor fortress of Wolmi - do . He also ran daily mine patrols up and down the channel to ensure the invasion fleet would not be so hampered . Clark was also assisted by Commander Lee Sung Ho , the captain of one of South Korea ' s four gunboats , at the direction of Admiral Sohn Won - Yil , Chief of Naval Operations , South Korean Navy . He also armed and assisted organized resistance groups hiding out in the hills near Inchon . By doing this he was able to gain valuable information about the layout of troops in the city . The North Koreans had been slowly infiltrating men onto Yonghung - do for many days and on the night of September 14 , the day before the invasion , they struck . Lieutenant Clark and his men bravely fought off the assault by a numerically superior force of North Koreans . However , they were forced to evacuate themselves and all who assisted them to the previously secured lighthouse island of Palmi - do . A day later , at the request of Clark , a battalion of Marines was deployed to take Taebu - do and Yonghung Do . They stormed the islands with vengeance for the brave Koreans who died to help Lieutenant Clark . However , the North Koreans had already murdered over fifty people who had helped Clark and his men but refused to leave the island with them . Lieutenant Clark was awarded the Silver Star for " conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity " in obtaining " vital intelligence information " . He was also awarded the Legion of Merit . Later , in advance of the UN Forces making their way to the Yalu River , Clark , Lieutenant Youn Joung , and 150 South Korean guerillas went island hopping up the west coast of North Korea . After several fierce firefights , Clark was secure and began infiltrating agents . When they reached the Yalu , in late October , they made a shattering discovery . Large numbers of Chinese Communist troops were crossing the Yalu into North Korea . Clark fired this information off to the Far East Command in Tokyo , but they ignored it . Soon faced with a million Chi - Com " volunteers " , the UN Forces and General Matthew B . Ridgway were driven back across the 38th Parallel before being able to counterattack . Lieutenant Clark received another Silver Star for that mission . In his last mission in early 1951 , Clark escorted Brigadier General Crawford Sams , one of the Army ' s top doctors into Chi - Com held Wonsan to investigate a reported outbreak of bubonic plague . Killing the sentries , Clark ' s team penetrated a small hospital and Brig . Gen . Sams concluded that it was a brand of smallpox . For this , Eugene Clark was awarded the Navy Cross . Commander Eugene Franklin Clark retired from the United States Navy in 1966 , and lived quietly in California and Nevada with his wife Enid until his death in 1998 at 86 . He wrote this account for his Korean comrades who fought and died with him on the Flying Fish Islands . However , he never attempted to publish it at all in his lifetime . It wasn ' t until the summer of 2000 , when Thomas Fleming published an account of his exploits that the Clark family remembered the narrative he had written shortly after returning home , along with a DOD clearance to tell the story as he had experienced it . The book is titled : " The Secrets of Inchon : The Untold Story of the Most Daring Covert Mission of the Korean War " . A character whom the author admitted was loosely based on Clark , Lieutenant David R . Taylor , USNR , appears in the W . E . B . Griffin novel , " Under Fire " .