Summary of Dick Winters & Cole C. Kingseed's Beyond Band of Brothers

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 The dream of every soldier is to find peace, but it is far easier to find quiet than it is to find peace. Peace must come from within yourself.
#2 I was born in 1918 in Pennsylvania. My family moved to Ephrata when I was young, and then to Lancaster when I was eight years old. I was scared to go to school, but I eventually adjusted to my changing environment.
#3 I graduated from Lancaster Boys High School in 1937, and matriculated to Franklin Marshall College, where I studied harder than I had ever studied in high school. I graduated tops in the business school and earned a bachelor’s degree in science and economics in 1941.
#4 The American army was totally unprepared for the war that it was about to embark on. The six-day week gave way to a seven-day workweek, which gave me the opportunity to observe some of the officers more closely. Most of the officers had come directly from the Reserve Officer Training Corps.

Sujets

• Military

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669376170
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Dick Winters & Cole C. Kingseed's Beyond Band of Brothers
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3 Insights from Chapter 4
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The dream of every soldier is to find peace, but it is far easier to find quiet than it is to find peace. Peace must come from within yourself.

#2

I was born in 1918 in Pennsylvania. My family moved to Ephrata when I was young, and then to Lancaster when I was eight years old. I was scared to go to school, but I eventually adjusted to my changing environment.

#3

I graduated from Lancaster Boys High School in 1937, and matriculated to Franklin Marshall College, where I studied harder than I had ever studied in high school. I graduated tops in the business school and earned a bachelor’s degree in science and economics in 1941.

#4

The American army was totally unprepared for the war that it was about to embark on. The six-day week gave way to a seven-day workweek, which gave me the opportunity to observe some of the officers more closely. Most of the officers had come directly from the Reserve Officer Training Corps.

#5

I was selected to be an officer candidate, and I was sent to Fort Benning in Georgia to attend the preparatory course. I was very fortunate to be selected, as most commanders were picking noncommissioned officers who had considerably more experience than I did.

#6

I had always taken my parents’ advice, but this time I was determined to trust my own judgment. The more I looked at the paratroopers, the more I was inclined to join them as soon as I graduated from OCS.

#7

OCS was a thirteen-week marathon in the Georgia swamps, and I was not sorry to be finished with it. I had been thinking about lugs, cams, operating rods, gas-operated, and recoil-operated firing mechanisms for the entire course.

#8

My overall impression of the course was that it had been fairly easy. I had enjoyed the experience, and I was now a commissioned officer. However, I was still extremely despondent about where I would be sent next.

#9

I was honorably discharged from the US Army at the convenience of the government in order to accept a formal commission as a second lieutenant. I was then assigned to the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, at Camp Toombs, Georgia. I hated to leave Camp Croft, but I had no choice.

#10

I was assigned to the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, which was originally known as Camp Toombs. The 506th was the first regiment to train civilian recruits into an elite airborne unit. Sink was the commanding officer, and he made it clear that he intended for the 506th to be the best damned unit in the U. S. Army.

#11

I was assigned to Easy Company, 2d Battalion, 506th PIR. When Easy Company formed in July 1942, it listed 8 officers and 132 enlisted men in its table of organization and equipment. The company included three rifle platoons and a headquarters section.

#12

The training program was designed to last thirteen weeks. The majority of the initial weeks consisted in getting the men in good physical condition. The training never stopped, and it became more rigorous with each passing day.

#13

Training at Toccoa was intense. Each company in the regiment became proficient in close order drill, marching back and forth and practicing the manual of arms with their individual weapons.

#14

The training at Toccoa was extremely demanding, and the men who could not handle it were quickly shipped out. The survivors just endured.

#15

Easy Company’s junior officers found they could not emulate the image of Captain Sobel and live with themselves. He was not just unfair, but also mean. He would find five or six dirty stacking swivels or weapon slings in a row, and then he would switch to finding three or four soldiers with dirty ears.

#16

Herbert Sobel was a difficult officer to serve under, and he treated everyone with equal disdain. He was constantly raving about how the Japanese would get you, and his catchphrase, Hi-Yo Silver, led to widespread snickering behind his back.

#17

The officers in Easy Company were annoyed with Sobel’s emphasis on strict discipline, but they also felt that he did not lead by example. They felt that he was dedicated to doing everything by the book, but he seemed to possess tunnel vision.

#18

The relationship between Captain Sobel and the other officers in Easy Company was strictly professional. He was a satisfactory training officer, but he was not a leader of troops. He was ill-suited for the outdoor life required for the leader of an elite infantry unit.

#19

The first group of officers to be airborne qualified at Toccoa. The training was still as demanding as ever, and the pilots had to dive the plane to reach flying speed. To land the plane, the pilot had to turn left or right as the wing extended over the edge of the slope.

#20

The decathlon test was conducted by Colonel Sink to eliminate unsuitable men from the regiment. The men who received the highest scores in Easy Company in the physical competition were Burt Christenson, Gordon Carson, George Rainer, Carwood Lipton, and Robert Van Klinken.

#21

The most grueling exercise Easy Company endured was the field march to Atlanta, a distance of 118 miles, during the period December 1 to December 4, 1942. The march was conducted during unusually severe weather conditions with full field equipment less rolls. Only twelve men failed to complete the march.

#22

After four days of hiking, the three companies arrived in Atlanta. The march was the subject of every newspaper and radio broadcast. The mayor of Atlanta and other dignitaries greeted the soldiers and gave them a key to the city.

#23

The 506th PIR was trained to be ready to go to a combat theater of operations. The first week at Benning was dedicated to physical training, but the entire 506th PIR was in better shape than the Regular Army cadre who conducted the physical conditioning.

#24

After the jump, the 506th PIR was sent to Georgia to take up new quarters in the swamps on the Alabama side of Fort Benning. The troops now had more spacious accommodations, as they had fifteen men to a barracks instead of the twenty to twenty-four men in the barracks during the Fort Benning phase of training.

#25

In 1943, the training was more advanced than previous camps, and it centered on platoon and company training. The men complained about never sleeping in the one-story, heated barracks with mattresses.

#26

The men’s concerns about their commander’s ability to make rational decisions under pressure were understandable. While at Mackall, the company conducted a field exercise in which Easy Company established a defensive perimeter in the woods.