CAMP BONIFAS — Eighth Army and United Nations Command held a memorial ceremony May 14, at Camp Bonifas, South Korea in honor of Cpt. Arthur Bonifas and Lt. Mark Barrett who were brutally murdered with an axe Aug. 18, 1976 by North Korean soldiers while trimming a tree in the Joint Security Area that was blocking the view of United Nations Observers. The incident drew global attention and has come to be known as the "Axe Murder Incident" due to the brutal way that Bonifas and Barrett were murdered.
Three days following the attack on Aug. 21, 1976, the United Nations, the U.S. and South Korea launched "Operation Paul Bunyan", one of the largest displays of military firepower in history, involving aviation, naval, infantry, armor and special forces operations to not only trim the tree, but to cut it down to intimidate North Korea into backing down. In the end they decided to leave a stump of the tree to serve as a reminder to members of the US-ROK Alliance of the events that took place that day.
In attendance at the memorial ceremony were Cpt. Bonfas' wife, Marcia Bonifas (Left), their daughter Beth Bonifas (Middle), and their grandson Andrew Bonifas (Right). In honor of his sacrifice, Cpt. Bonifas was posthumously promoted to the rank of Major and Camp Kitty Hawk, as it was known previously, was renamed Camp Bonifas. The traditional Memorial Ceremony is held on August 18 each year, but due to personal reasons the Bonifas family will be unable to attend so an earlier ceremony was scheduled in tribute to their sacrifice.
