Abductee: Choi Hong-sik
Recorded Date: June 19th, 2006


Profile of Abductee

Name: Choi Hong-sik (male)
Year of Birth: 1912
Place of Birth: Haeju, South Korea
Last Address: 122-47 Gongdeok-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul, South Korea
Date of abduction: Late June of 1950 (age 38)
Place of abduction: Home
Occupation: Police officer at the National Police Hqs.
Dependants: Mother, Wife, 1 Younger Sister, 2 Younger Brothers, 1 Son, 1 Daughter
Appearance/Personality: Tall, Handsome/ Manly




Profile of Testifier

Name: Choi Kwang-suk (born in 1937)
Relations: Son
Type of Witness: Indirect witness



Summary of the Abduction

- The abductee was a police officer at the time of abduction.
- Right after the Korean War broke out, he was arrested by 5~6 of Internal Affairs Agency officers and leftist neighboring residents.
- Since the abduction, no information about the abductee was heard at all.


Detail of the Abduction

Q. How was the situation of your family when your father was abducted?

I do not know much about my father. It was unfortunate for me to lose my father before I reached an age when I could understand the stories of my family and his wisdom on life. When I was 13 years old, only about two weeks after I had started middle school, the Korean War broke out. It took only 3 days for the North Korean Army to take over Seoul. A few days after, my father was abducted by an officer from the Internal Affairs Agency and a few local communists in the neighborhood.
At the time of abduction, my father was a 38-year-old police officer at the National Police Headquarters. I am not sure how my father became a police officer under the Japanese Occupancy. I can only guess that he chose to become a police officer as a means to make a living after graduating Sunrin Commercial High School. As the oldest son, my father had heavy responsibility of supporting his family. With no income coming in, however, wealth started to decline and my father had no choice but to give up going to a college and make money to support the family instead.

Q. Why didn’t you evacuate Seoul when the Korean War broke out?

My father wanted to cross the Han River to join the National Police Headquarters, which had retreated to Suwon right before Seoul had fallen into the hands of the North Korean Army. He and I sought shelter at his cousin’s house in Youngchun, Seodaemun-gu in Seoul. He tirelessly tried to find ways to escape Seoul, and one day he walked to near Bugahyeon-dong where several of his coworkers were living before going further to Seogang. But they told him that the roads to Seogang had already been closed. Disappointed, my father returned to our house in Gongdeok-dong. And within just few hours, he got arrested at home.

Q. Can you describe the situation when your father was abducted, in detail?

I didn’t see the scene of abduction with my own eyes. There was an air-raid shelter in the basement of my house that was made during the World War II. I was in the basement to hide the uniform and pistol of my father there. While I was in the basement, some officers from Internal Affairs Agency and local leftists came into the house. I was afraid to be searched and could not get out of the basement, and I was only able to hear unclear buzzing sounds of several people talking. After I got out of the basement, my father was gone. According to my uncle, my father’s younger brother, 5~6 of people came in and took my father telling my family that they would ask him some things and then release him soon. No violence, no force they inflicted. That was it. We didn’t see my father since then.


Reason behind the Abduction

Q. Why do you think he was abducted?
He was a police officer and public officers were the main target of the abduction.


News after the Abduction

Q. Do you know where they took him to?

I think the police was keeping their eyes on the house waiting for my father. We do not know where they took him. I can only guess that it was the Mapo police station as it was the closest one from our home.

Q. Did you make an effort to return him?

A couple of days later, my grandmother and I started to visit my father’s friends and acquaintances in Bugahyeon-dong to ask them to sign a petition to save his life. As many as 100 people signed it, and we submitted the signed petition to the Mapo police station, which had already changed into the Internal Police Station. It is still surprising that so many people stepped up for his life at a time when everyone held their breath under the Communist forces. I cannot thank them enough. And also I could realize that my father was a respectable man.

Q. Did you hear anything about him after he was taken?

Nothing, we heard about him. After my father was abducted, Internal Affairs Agency officers and the leftists in the neighborhood often came to search our house. Or, more correctly saying, they searched for valuable things to take. Several medals my grandmother’s father had received in the late Chosun Dynasty were robbed, too. I think there was a ruby embedded at the center of the medals. I saw exactly the same medals on a shop display when our family fled to Daegu during the 1.4 Retreat, although I wondered if they were the very medals we were robbed of.
They stole our family treasure, yet we could say nothing. We were afraid of their ruthless behaviors and worried that my two uncles and an aunt would be dragged into the so-called “voluntary army”. So we sneaked out of the house one night and fled with only a few rice balls in hand to the house of my other aunt in Pyeong-taek. We stayed there until Seoul was recaptured on September 28, although we did not have enough food. Anyway, it was really hard to survive day by day at that time.