Gen. Raymond G. Davis

Gen. Raymond G. Davis, who received the Medal of Honor for leading a storied rescue of fellow Marines besieged by Chinese troops at the Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War, died Sept. 3 in Conyers, Ga. He was 88.

Gen. Davis, a combat veteran of three wars and the assistant commandant of the Marine Corps in the early 1970s, was among the most highly decorated U.S. military officers. In 34 years of service, he received the Medal of Honor, the highest award for valor, plus the Navy Cross, the Distinguished Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Silver Star, the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart.

Gen. Davis was renowned in the Marines for his heroics at a place that came to be called Frozen Chosin, where a fighting withdrawal resonates in the history of the corps.

Soon after the Korean War began in summer 1950, Gen. Davis, a lieutenant colonel at the time, rushed to the front with a battalion he had hastily assembled at Camp Pendleton.

In the first days of December, Chinese forces were threatening to annihilate U.S. troops who had advanced far into North Korea, approaching the border with China.

Gen. Davis ' unit 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, 1st Marine Division was given the enormously challenging task of rescuing Marines who were trapped in deep snows astride a vital mountain pass.

His men embarked on an eight-mile trek past surrounding enemy forces, climbing primitive, icy trails in temperatures as low as 30 degrees below zero.

The rescuers ultimately reached an isolated company of Marines that had 80 or so men remaining, and secured a mountain opening called the Toktong Pass, enabling two other regiments to also move through it and escape.

On the morning of Dec. 4, the Marines arrived at their base camp in Hagaru-ri, the rescue mission completed. Three days later, Gen. Davis was named executive officer of the 7th Marines, and he stayed in Korea until June 1951. On Nov. 24, 1952, he received the Medal of Honor from President Truman.

Raymond Gilbert Davis was born Jan. 13, 1915, in Fitzgerald, Ga. He graduated from Georgia Tech with a degree in chemical engineering, and then was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Marines.

He commanded an anti-aircraft machine-gun battery on Guadalcanal in 1942, then served as a battalion commander in the 1st Marine Division during the 1944 invasion of another Pacific island, Peleliu. He was wounded in the knee in that campaign but refused evacuation and led his men in an attack on Japanese forces, action that brought him the Navy Cross, his service ' s second-highest award for bravery.

After his exploits in World War II and the Korean War, Gen. Davis was back in combat during the Vietnam War, taking command of the 3rd Marine Division in 1968.

In 1971, he attained four-star rank and was named the Marines ' assistant commandant. He retired a year later.

Last September, Gen. Davis was among a small group of Korean War veterans who visited mountains not far from the Chosin Reservoir where he had led the rescue more than a half-century before.

Gen. Davis is survived by his wife, Willa; two sons, Raymond Davis Jr. of Covington, Ga., and Gordon Miles Davis of Alabama; a daughter, Willa Kerr of Stockbridge; seven grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.