Military service and capture

Trause received 17 weeks of infantry training at Fort McClellan in Alabama, before undergoing mountain warfare training in North Africa.^[1] Following the completion of his training, he traveled to Naples aboard a British troop transport to begin combat against the Italian Social Republic.^[1]

As a private first-class,^[8][9] Trause fought in the Italian Campaign, where he served as a scout in the 168th Regiment of the 34th Infantry Division.^[10][11] He participated in the Battle of Anzio and thereafter began participating in scouting operations on the Gothic Line.^[12] On the morning of September 24, 1944, Trause became separated from his fellow soldiers while on a scouting mission in the Apennine Mountains outside of Florence and hid inside of a nearby farmhouse.^[8][12][13] Later that day, Trause was ambushed by Waffen-SS soldiers and captured in the farmhouse.^[8][12] After briefly being taken to Bologna,^[8] he was subsequently transported by boxcar^[10] to Stalag VII-A, a camp for prisoners of war run by Nazi Germany, where he was held for much of the remainder of the war in Europe.^[4][2]

After his capture by the Nazis, Trause adopted the pseudonym of "Al",^{[note 1]} fearing that referring to himself as "Vito" would expose his Italian heritage and subject him to the beatings experienced by other Italian-American prisoners of war.^[2] Several days after arriving at Stalag VII-A, however, he was assigned prisoner number 139217, by which he would be referred to throughout the remainder of his imprisonment.^[2][15]

While at Stalag VII-A, Nazi Germany subjected Trause to forced labor involving the repair of railroads that had been damaged by bombs dropped by the Royal Air Force and the recovery of corpses.^[16][17] Trause often found himself working alongside Jews imprisoned within Nazi concentration camps.^[1][16] Throughout the winter of 1945, he was not provided proper footwear by his German captors, leading to one of his feet becoming swollen.^[18][2] A Jewish prisoner who worked with Trause stole shoes from a corpse, smuggled them under his coat, and delivered them to Trause.^[18][2] Trause would go on to say the stolen footwear saved him from dying or having his foot amputated; Trause believed that the Jewish prisoner's actions saved his life.^[18][2]

While detained in the German prison camp, Trause subsisted on a diet of bread and potatoes.^[10] When he was liberated by American troops on May 2, 1945,^[18] Trause weighed 131 pounds (59 kg),^[4] some 35 pounds (16 kg) less than at the time of his capture.^[17]

After his liberation from the prison camp, Trause and several of his fellow prisoners-of-war obtained Harley-Davidson motorcycles with sidecars and began to drive towards Paris. Six days later, on the day that Nazi Germany surrendered to the Allies, Trause and his comrades arrived in the French capital.^[4][12] After convalescing in Paris, Trause embarked on a troop transport in Le Havre and returned to the United States.^[19]

Service awards

For his service during World War II, Trause earned the European–African–Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with three bronze stars, the World War II Victory Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the Army Good Conduct Medal, and Combat Infantryman Badge.^{[20][18][6][21]} He was also a Purple Heart recipient.^[22]

Family life

Trause's mother died two years after Trause returned to New Jersey following the Second World War.^[36]

Trause married Theresa Iwanowski, an East Rutherford receptionist, on June 7, 1952.^[35][37] The pair moved to Clifton, New Jersey^[35] and had two daughters, Cynthia and Victoria.^{[16][20][4][5]} The family moved to Washington Township, a town in Bergen County, New Jersey, in 1967.^[16] Trause remained married to his wife until she died on August 6, 2005.^[16][38]

Community presence

In his later years, Trause became a community figure in New Jersey. He was known as the "daytime mayor" of Washington Township, the town in which he resided in Bergen County, New Jersey.^[23][39] He was also known as a Westwood Regional High School athletics super-fan^[40][41] and booster,^[42] and as a mentor both to high school students and many members of his community at large.^[43][44][45]

Death

Trause died suddenly on Halloween in 2019, after attending a party with a local senior organization.^[16][18] His daughter attributed his death to heart and lung problems.^[18] He was buried at George Washington Memorial Park in Paramus, New Jersey.^[18]

Following Trause's death, a memorial trust was established in his name to provide college scholarships for graduates of Westwood Regional High School.^[14]