page_title: Troy H. Middleton
section_title: Military advisory roles
hierarchical_section_title: Troy H. Middleton / Return to Louisiana State University / Military advisory roles
context_page_description: Lieutenant General Troy Houston Middleton was a distinguished educator and senior officer of the United States Army who served as a corps commander in the European Theatre during World War II and later as president of Louisiana State University. He is best known for his decision to hold Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge, contrary to the recommendation of Lieutenant General George S. Patton, Jr., Commanding General of the United States Third Army.
  Enlisting in the U.S. Army in 1910, Middleton was first assigned to the 29th Infantry Regiment, where he worked as a clerk. Here he did not become an infantryman as he had hoped, but he was pressed into service playing football, a sport strongly endorsed by the army. Following two years of enlisted service, Middleton was transferred to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he was given the opportunity to compete for an officer's commission. Of the 300 individuals who were vying for a commission, 56 were selected, and four of them, including Middleton, would become general officers.
context_section_description: Though retired from the military, Middleton was soon called to serve in a variety of advisory capacities. In April 1946 he was appointed to the Doolittle Board, set up to investigate officer-enlisted men relationships, and headed by former Air Corps General James H. Doolittle.  The board made a number of recommendations, one of the more significant ones being to allow the non-commissioned officers to establish their own clubs, a recommendation supported by Bill Mauldin.  Three years later Middleton was asked to serve on the Military Education Panel of the Service Academy Board to look at the curricula of the Military and Naval Academies, and the proposed Air Force Academy as well.  Working for nine months on recommendations, Middleton stressed a more liberal education for the academies, and much of what he recommended was accepted.
  Middleton was also asked to speak to military groups on occasion, such as for commissioning exercises at Fort Benning in 1951.  As late as 1958 he was called on by the United States Military Academy to come and review the curriculum offered to the cadets, and then was called again in 1959 to do related work.
  In the spring of 1951, Middleton got a call from General J. Lawton Collins, who was now the Army Chief of Staff, asking for Middleton to take an assignment on behalf of the Army.  Middleton was compelled to say yes. There were allegations of wholesale honor code violations at the U. S. Military Academy in West Point, and Middleton was to serve on a committee to oversee the proceedings and make recommendations.  Though personally painful to Middleton, the committee's recommendation was to dismiss 82 cadets for cheating, including most of the members of the football team. A headline in a New Orleans newspaper wryly summarized the event as "Army Football Team Severely Penalized for Illegal Passing."  While this was a drastic undertaking, the committee also recommended that the same tests not be given to different groups on different days, which practice offered the cadets a big temptation to cheat.  Though this was not a pleasant assignment for Middleton, he had been selected for the task because of his reputation for fairness.  Though he had never attended West Point, in 1952 he was asked to serve the academy on its Board of Visitors, a position which he held for one three-year term.
caption: Army Chief of Staff J. Lawton Collins requested Middleton's services to look into honor code violations at West Point.
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