When he does talk about that period of his life, you can see the pain and sadness in his eyes. It is not easy, particularly for a 70-year-old man who would rather tell a good joke or talk about the good times he has had with his many friends over the years.

If somebody else does not bring up the subject, you would never know the hell the Desloge native survived and overcame.

United Nations forces had pushed deep into North Korea by late October of 1950 and as the First Cavalry moved into Unsan, Stegall saw North Korean soldiers "coming in by the hundreds to surrender."

There was little doubt among American troops that the war would soon be over. His battalion commander had even scheduled a formation to announce when the unit would go back to Japan.

The combat was over soon for the Desloge native and thousands of others, but not in the way they had envisioned. He was with a group sent out to set up guns, a mission they thought would be one of their last before heading home. Instead, it was the day Stegall and hundreds of others found out the hard way that Communist China had entered the war.

"The Chinese were on the move," Stegall said. His commander notified the regimental command post that there were about 20,000 Chinese in the hills, but regiment "laughed".

"At midnight, they hit us," Stegall said of the hordes of Chinese soldiers on attack. "Those bugles . . ."

"We dug a big circle for a trench," Stegall recalls of the small unit's attempt to hold off the Chinese onslaught. Two days later "we got the word we were on our own so we bugged out that night."

Stegall, a radio operator, was with a group of about 12 or 14 other soldiers when he was captured trying to cross a field. He saw one of his best buddies die, hit by what appeared to be a mortar shell.

Had it not been for a captain, all he can remember is Capt. McClain, Stegall would have suffered the same fate. He was prepared to cross the field with "Mick", but the captain said it would be safer if they split up.

It was in the field where they were captured, and where the Chinese held them overnight. They brought in more and more prisoners. The next day they moved North Korean civilians out of their homes and crammed U.N. prisoners of war into them, as many as they could crowd in.

"They marched us at night," Stegall said of the movement of prisoners to the north. As soon as it got dark the trek would begin and would not halt until daylight. They had to cross a mountain.

Stragglers were beaten, struck with the butts of rifles, Stegall knows. He also heard from other prisoners that some were shot, but he did not see that happen.

The wounded prisoners were carried on makeshift litters by their fellow soldiers. He described it as probably the worst part of his imprisonment because there was no mercy shown to prisoners by the Communist Chinese.

While they spent a night in a school house, American planes dropped incendiary bombs on part of the town.

They arrived at Pyoktong, a small town on the Yalu River that separates North Korea from Communist China, in late January. The troops again moved civilians out of their homes and moved the prisoners of war in. Stegall was crammed into a room hardly more than eight square feet with 13 other prisoners.

That first winter the temperature got down to 22 degrees below zero. The Yalu River froze over and Stegall said the Chinese were seen driving across it.

"They said it was the coldest winter on record over there," Stegall notes, and it took a toll on the prisoners. Eight of the 14 in Stegall's group died that first winter.

Initially it was the cold and the food and the lack of medical care that made it rough on the prisoners. There wasn't enough food and what they did get mostly was grain that was like chicken feed. It was poorly prepared.

The captors were not prepared to provide for the prisoners. What little meat they got had maggots and worms, Stegall said. They did not have medical facilities and what little care that was provided in the early part of captivity came from captured American doctors who had little or no medical supplies or equipment.

After the first winter things got a little better, Stegall said, or maybe the prisoners got more accustomed to their situation. Few prisoners died in his camp. When the peace talks began conditions improved even more. A hospital was set up in a Chinese temple, they got better food and they made a central kitchen for its preparation by American prisoners. Rice was substituted for the chicken-feed type grain.

In the summer they were allowed to play basketball and even swim in the Yalu River. Stegall has a photograph of him and the late Sgt. Bob Brooks of Farmington in the river. Brooks wrote a book about his Korean War encounters, including his stay in the same POW camp in which Stegall was held.

Stegall met another St. Francois County man on more than one occasion at the POW camp. It was in a familiar setting, too, as "Duck" Farmer from Flat River would come in with a basketball team from another POW unit for games at Pyoktong.

It was only days after Stegall first went into combat in Korea that he suffered what he describes as "a minor wound". He caught some shrapnel in the side and was shipped back to a hospital for several days. After being captured, his medical encounters were not as pleasant.

Stegall came down with appendicitis while in the POW camp and later had a round with dysentery that almost cost him his life. His weight dropped to about 65 or 70 pounds, according to fellow prisoners who gave him little chance to survive.

Survival in the POW camps, like in combat, was a team effort. Prisoners had to look out for each other. He recalls many who helped him, and also that he did his best to help others.

There were a few -- and he stressed, "very few" -- prisoners who did steal food but Stegall's tolerant character observed they were also only trying to survive.

"It was a struggle just to survive," Stegall declared.

During the first year there were intensive propaganda lectures given by a Chinese officer the prisoners came to call "the screaming skull". His name was Comrade Lem. Much of the indoctrination was about how the Americans started the war and the "imperialist Americans". He preached the communist doctrine in an old theater with a dirt floor.

Though they continued throughout his imprisonment, Stegall said the lectures became less frequent in the second and third years.

In his camp, those Americans who gave in to the propaganda were called "progressives" by their captors. Some simply broke under the pressure, Stegall said, and some gave in to get better treatment. When it came time for the return of prisoners, 21 Americans from Stegall's camp stayed behind. He understands some of them did eventually return to the U.S.

"To this day, I hate that word comrade," Stegall will tell you. He heard it so much from the communists that the good meaning has all gone away and he will not use it in reference to a friend or fellow serviceman.

On the morning of July 27, 1952, the prisoners were told they should all be in the home camp for "an important announcement" at 2 p.m. Strangely enough, Stegall said, "I remember the date because it was Jim Edgar's birthday." Edgar is a good friend with whom Stegall had grown up in Desloge.

As the appointed hour rolled around, it was "the screaming skull" who told the prisoners, "the news you have been waiting for . . . the war is over." They put us on trucks and hauled us out.

When told there would be an announcement, it did not take long for prisoners to figure out what it would be. The Chinese media with many cameras began showing up in the camp.

Hauled by truck to Freedom Village, Stegall was released on Aug. 9, 1953. Twenty days later he landed in San Francisco and, after being processed quickly in a warehouse at The Presidio, he was on an airplane flying to St. Louis. He admits it was undoubtedly one of the happiest days of his life.

If you want to hear the worst about someone, don't talk to Jack Stegall. He is not the kind of person who has bad things to say about people. He is a positive kind of guy who loves to tell a joke, talk sports and tell funny tales about his friends.

For years, he was one of the most popular basketball referees in the region and respected to the point he called many state tournament games. He gave up that endeavor not because he tired of it, but because he did not want to go on to a point where he could not do a good job.