My friend who lives in Denver, Colorado owns a Vail ski condo(s). I visited him during the ski off season. He was renting out his one of his condos and needed to go up and have the lease signed. We left on a Friday evening and spent the night in the condo. The next morning as he was waiting to meet with the tenants he loaned me his car and invited me to drive around the area.
I had a great time pulling off on the side of the road and taking hikes up into the hills. As I was driving I saw what appeared to be a large monument and what looked like an old time ski lift. I pulled off the road and walked to the monument. It was dedicated to the U. S. Army division tenth mountain division which was formed in 1940.
The reason it was formed was because the infantry was not ready for winter warfare if they had to fight in Finland or Norway or if they had to fight in the Alps they would have to know something about how to fight in the mountains. At the time of formation they were called simply the ski troops. Some of the men who joined did so because it sounded like a glamorous idea.
Camp vale is in the Pando valley just on the Westside of the continental divide. The troops got to vale and were amazed. They did not know that type of mountain existed. The ones that had skied before were impressed with the finest skis and bindings they had ever seen.
It was a more hazardous than recreational skiing because they each carried a fifty pound pack. And the fine bindings were bear trap bindings that did not come off. If you did not know how to fall you could break a leg. It was very rugged training.
The troops lived in the mountains for weeks working in altitudes up to thirteen thousand five hundred feet. And some nights the temperature fell to twenty degrees below zero. You had to know what you were doing or you would be dead. The younger troops relied on the older men, the experienced mountain men. The older troops told the younger ones to rub their exposed extremities with bacon grease. This helped prevent frostbite.
The tenth division mountain division actually fought the German army in 1945 in the mountains of Italy. This was a key maneuver for the U. S. Forces because the Germans were in an area where the infantry could not reach them and they were taking advantage of their position to predict the U. S. Troop movements. The mountain division however was able to get into the mountainous region and engage the Germans and take them out.
The tenth mountain division suffered one of the highest casualty rate of any U. S. Division. It was a sobering experience to stand in part of the area where brave soldiers learned to survive and fight in the snowy mountaintops of world war two. I returned to meet my friend at his ski condo a little more appreciative of those brave world war two snow troops.
Author Resource:
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