Monday, January 05, 2009

Local Army General Witnessed Pearl Harbor Attacks

COLUMBUS, GA—On December 7, 1941, young William Caldwell experienced a moment he will never forget.

“We heard these tremendous explosions. We saw virtually nothing from where we stood until the aircraft came over,” he said.

Caldwell was stationed in Hawaii with his family. His father, William Caldwell Jr. was a colonel during World War II.

“On that morning I was awakened, I was awake already and up and dressed at 7:55 a.m. when the first fighters came over our house strafing the quadrangles where the soldiers live,” he said.

Caldwell was born in Fort Moultrie, South Carolina in 1925. He comes from a long line of soldiers. Not only was his father a soldier, his grandfather fought for the Union Army in the Civil War.

“My father was in the Army and that’s all I ever knew and I just figured I’d go into the Army whenever I got older,” he said.

One of Caldwell’s childhood dreams was to attend West Point, but he didn’t think he could get in, so he decided he wanted to enlist in the Marine Corps.

“When the telegram came telling my family and me that I was accepted into West Point and I was to report there in two days or three days, so I immediately caught a train out of El Paso and went to West Point,” he said.

Caldwell was part of the first American unit to deploy to Korea in 1950. Almost 2,000 of his fellow soldiers lost their lives in that war. It’s something that bothers him to this day.

“When you have a job to do you can’t stop to think about all the carnage that’s going about you. You have to just keep moving on. It’s not until after the fact in my case that you reflect back,” he said.

Caldwell spent much of the 1950s and 1960s overseas. He also fought in the Vietnam War.

He was promoted to brigadier general in 1968 and retired as a three star general at Fort Sam Houston. During his early days he spent time at Fort Benning, but never came back.

“Never was assigned back. I always wanted to come back to Fort Benning and live in one of those big houses on the golf course and that never happened,” he said.

Following his retirement, Caldwell and his family moved to Columbus, Georgia. It was his wife’s hometown.

Caldwell has five children. One of them is Lieutenant General William Caldwell IV. He is the commanding general of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

“I think that my legacy and the things I’m most happy with are my children and so they’re really my legacy. Every one of them as far as I’m concerned are outstanding,” he said.

Though his own kids are grown and live across the United States, the young kids he looks after now are the soldiers, and he says he admires them.

“They’re eager to do well and for that reason I just say that this Army that we have is unsurpassed in the world, “he said.

Years down the road, when someone mentions his name, he says he wants people to remember one important thing about him.

“I had a feeling and compassion and empathy with people who served under me and I was able to gather smart and capable people around me they’re the ones who really are to get any credit for what I did,” he said.

Caldwell has been living in Columbus since 1980. Tudy, his wife of 32 years passed away at the age of 54 in 1981. He’s since remarried and currently has 24 grandchildren.