Excerpt from Williamson Herald feature by Carole Robinson
When Nashville native Wallace Stanley Tyson graduated from the University of Tennessee in 1952, he left with a degree in agriculture, a commission in the United States Army, and a career that would take him all over the world and service in two major wars.
Shortly after he married Dorothy Lane of Williamson County in 1953, young Tyson was sent to Korea where he joined the 2nd Infantry Div. KAMG (Korean Military Advisory Group).
Eight months later, he was transferred to the 8th Army Guard in Seoul.
After 16 months in Korea, he remained stateside where he processed immigrants in New Jersey and trained troops in Georgia and Tennessee.
In 1964 Tyson returned to the battlefield. This time it was in Vietnam with the 3rd Army, 2nd Battalion, 35th Infantry during the Gulf of Tonkin Bay Incident with North Vietnam. Upon his return he and his family were stationed in Hawaii – but it was a short stay.
The 25th Infantry Div., 3rd Brigade was deployed to the central highlands of Pleiku, South Vietnam in January 1966 with Tyson as commander of the 1st Battalion, 12th Cavalry – a component of the 1st Air Cavalry Division. The 25th Infantry Division, known as the Tropic Lightning Soldiers, fought in some of the toughest battles of the war including the 1968 and 1969 Tet offensives.
They remained in Vietnam, “until we brought the battalion colors home and the Battalion stood down in June 1972,” Tyson said. “We were the last battalion still in the jungle when it came time to stand down.”
After the war, Tyson spent a couple years in the U.S. before he and his family were sent to Germany where he commanded a brigade of about 7,000 soldiers. After 24 years in the military, the Tysons came home for good in 1976.
http://www.williamsonherald.com/features/special_sections/article_99aed5...
