The other attacking companies also had their share of fighting. Captain Fosters's Company A overran and enemy fortified position containing 12 bunkers and 30 covered fighting holes, reporting 47 North Vietnamese dead. Several hours later, Company A attacked and killed nearly 20 NVA in a firefight which ended with 6 Marines dead and 12 wounded. Late in the afternoon, Capt. Meegan's Co. L. engaged an enemy platoon. In a short, but fierce encounter Lima Company accounted for another reported 15 enemy killed, at a cost of 5 Marines dead and 11 wounded.
The combat on 8 December was so intense that some senior Marines said that it was "the fiercest fighting they had ever seen." That night Staff Sgt. Karl G. Taylor of Co. I led a rescue effort to relieve the company's lead platoon, cut off by enemy fire. After his Marines took out several of the most severely woounded, Sgt. Taylor returned with another four volunteers to reach yet another group of seriusly wounded men lying near an enemy machine gun position. Finding the position too strong, Taylor told his Marines to go back and then armed with a grenade launcher charged across the open paddy. Although wounded several times, Sgt. Taylor silenced the enemy weapon. The Sgt. was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.
On the morning of 9 December, the enemy still accupied a narrow strip of ground between the 3rd Bn., 26th Marines and the Song La Tho. It would take another push to finish the job.
After supporting arms, including the battleship New Jersey lying off the coast with its 16-inch guns, bombarded the enemy's last remaining toehold all night and most of the morning, the 3rd Bn. launcehd its final drive at 1000 on the 9th. The Marines asaulted violentlly, yet methodically, destroying and searching every bunker and fighting hole in their path. Enemy resistance was tenacious, but lacked the organization encountered earlier. Lt. Col. Robertson credited the ARVN 2nd Troop, 4th ARVN Cavalry with their APCs in providing the necessary shock action to break the final NVA resistance. It was apparent that the fighting had taken its toll on the NVA. Collapsed bunkers and scores of dead North Vietnamese gave evidence of the ferocity of the fighting. Within some bunkers, the Marines found stacks of enemy bodies. Other dead were undoubtedly buried under the rubble of their destroyed bunkers.
Company A was first to shoot its way through the NVA and reach the river. Captain Foster, the Company A commander, later wrote that his Marines chased "the enemy at a sprint into the Song La Tho...(and a) 'turkey shoot' ensued." Company H followed shortly afterward, killing a reported 9 enemy only 20 meters from the river's banks. The battalion swept through the Communist stronghold thoroughly, tabulating 130 dead NVA - some killed during the preceding day - and took 8 prisoners. Captain Meegan, the Company L commander, remembered that one of his platoons captured an enemy warrant officer who told the Marines that it took him six months to reach the Dodge City sector.
At 1800, 9 December, the 1st Marines terminated Operation Meade River. What had begun as a giant "Country Fair" had turned into a major battle pitting determined Marines in the assault against equally determined North Vietnamese soldiers defending from heavilyl fortified positions.
According to Marine sources, the immediate, tangible results of Operation Meade River included 1,023 enemy dead, 123 prisoners, and 6 ralliers. Intelligence personnel, working with South Vietnamese police, questionned 2,663 civilians, identifying 71 members of the VC political infrastructure. The attacking Marines destroyed 360 bunkers and captured 20 tons of rice. the price the Marines paid for their success was high, 108 dead and 510 wounded. The ARVN sustained 2 killed and 37 wounded.