Read up on the Amish. Each child I believe at age 18 is given the opportunity to live outside the community and decide on their own if they wish to stay in the Amish community
They'd married him off at 16, and he brought his wife with him. She liked it fine "outside".
His ambition was to complete his enlistment and go to college.
You are exactly right. They even did a reality show about some of them. Not sure how that turned out.
I'm not read up on the Amish folks, and grew up with similar background(32 years ago); most likely that is not the case. I'll have to double check on that, however.