After graduating from Castle Heights Military Academy midway through his 17th year, my father was not old enough to become a commissioned officer, but he was old enough to be accepted into an Army infantry training program which he completed within a few months. Shortly thereafter, in November of 1942, he was commissioned and admitted into paratrooper training at Ft. Benning, GA. He may well have been the youngest 2nd LT in the US Army. (Note – there are no military records of Dad’s service held by the US Army. Dad’s records were in a warehouse that was destroyed by a fire.)
Second Lieutenant Treppendahl was assigned to the 17th Airborne Division. It was created in April 1943 from segments of the first two Airborne divisions: the 82nd & the 101st. The commanding general of the 17th, Major General Bud Miley, was a man my father considered to be among the best humans who has ever lived. When he was 19, Dad was selected to become the company commander of a communications company. (I don’t know if this was at a battalion or regimental level – probably battalion.)
When I asked Dad to write down what his outfit did in WW II, he handed me a book entitled “The 17th Airborne History”. I currently have it in my office. Make sure when I am gone, it goes into the family archives. Dad was in the 513th Regiment of the 17th Airborne Division.
There were about 9,000 men in the division. They consisted of two groups: those who jumped out of airplanes and those who rode in gliders that were pulled behind big airplanes and then cut loose. The parachuters were considered special forces. They were volunteers who had to meet high standards to be accepted. The glider guys were draftees who often ended up being crash landed ground fodder.
Dad told me that among the qualifications one had to meet to be a parachuter was to be able to climb a rope hand over hand for 30’ without using your feet. Another was to be able to do 100 pushups in 1 minute. In my prime, I could do the pushups but never the rope climb.
The 17th was shipped overseas in July 1944. At the end of August, they went from Glasgow to Liverpool and settled at Camp Chistledon, England which is about 80 miles due west of London. The plan was for them to train and prepare for an invasion into Germany in the spring of 1945. Consequently, all their gear and clothing was designed for mild weather. Everyone knew at that point that the Germans were going to lose the war. It was just a matter of time. All allied commanders assumed that the German military would concentrate in Germany and there would be a major battle there before the Germans finally surrendered.
Hitler had a different plan. He decided to take the considerable forces that he had and use them to breakout and capture the port of Anthrept, Belgium and thereby be in a much stronger position to sue for favorable peace terms. The Germans did an exceptional job of disguising their plan and assembling their forces. On December 16, 1944, they launched a massive counterattack with 410,000 soldiers and 1,400 tanks against the western front and caught the allies completely by surprise. They punched a huge hole in the allies’ lines and went some 50 miles before the allies were able to contain them – hence “The Bulge”. Eisenhower dispatched any and all forces at his disposal to stop the German advance. Within a week, the 17th had been flown to France. By Jan 1, 1945, they were taken by trucks to Morhet, Belgium. Dad told me that they rode in trucks at night and none of the trucks had their headlights on. The lead truck’s driver knew the road by memory and each truck had special taillights that could only be seen from ground level. Each truck followed the one in front and they all arrived safely. Their division was moved to a position south of Bastogne where the key battles of the Battle of the Bulge were fought. The weather was extremely cold.
On the morning of Jan 4, the 17th along with the 101st and the 87th, attacked one of the best German panzer divisions. Dad told me that on that first day of combat, about 40 of the 120 men that he commanded in his company were either killed or seriously wounded. He told me that his radioman was relaying a message to him when he suddenly stopped talking. Dad turned in time to see the man’s headless torso still erect before it collapsed. Dad had turned 20 years old six weeks before.
Find the book and read the full story on the 17th Airborne Division. The 17th was in four different operations. The first was the one in the Ardennes where Dad’s company was so eviscerated. The third one, known as Operation Varsity, was the largest air armada ever assembled and the largest airborne drop in history. By then, I am pretty sure Dad was out of commission. He, along with many of the men in the 17th, suffered severe frostbite. Dad’s feet froze.
Dad told us the story of being in the hospital and the doctor coming and saying that he was going to have to amputate his feet because they were developing gangrene and that would kill him. Dad refused to allow them to do the operation. When I would go on hunting trips with Dad, few people could keep up with him – he could outwalk just about anyone.
Dad ended up being sent to the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs to recuperate. The story is that they fed him so well there that he gained over 50 lbs and was obese when he was released from the hospital. In short order, Dad was back in shape.
Dad obviously had earned respect from his superiors. The US Army determined that it needed to form an honor guard following the end of the war that could go out and put on an impressive martial show to civilian crowds and foreign dignitaries. Dad was chosen to form and command the US Army’s Honor Guard. He had to start from scratch. He was basically given carte blanc to choose any man in the US Army to be in his company. For those men who wanted to stay in the Army beyond the War, this was about the best possible duty imaginable. Dad’s initial challenge was choosing 120 men out of literally thousands who applied. He told me that his first criteria was that they be at least 6’ tall. From there, he had to determine if they had the right reflexes and athletic ability as well as the right character. Dad once showed me a folder full of letters from military and civilian leaders praising him and his Honor Guard for the exceptional performances that they put on. (Alas, that folder has been lost.)
Dad was promoted to Captain sometime in 1946 when he was only 21 years old. He continued to be one of the youngest officers of his rank in the entire US Army. And yet, for some reason, he decided to give up his exceptional career in the Army, return to Woodville, and go to work for his father. I suspect the advent of his first child, Jamsie Rudy, and what her future would be like being raised as an army brat, weighed heavily on his decision.
The following are some of the photos I have found from this period of Dad’s life.
Douglas C-41. The aircraft that most of the paratroopers jumped from
Flamberge, Belgium Bastogne (Battle of the Bulge)
Commander of the US Army Honor Guard in 1946
By age 21, Dad had created and now commanded the US Army Honor Guard. What an amazing life’s start for the son of a Danish immigrant from a little town in South Mississippi.