Major Richard Winters – Easy Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne Division It was with great sadness that we learned recently of the passing of Richard Winters on 2nd January 2011. His WW2 career, spent in the service of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR), 101st Airborne Division, as the celebrated commander of the famed Company ”E” + later the 2nd Battalion of the 506th Regiment, has gone into history. The famous Stephen E. Ambrose bestseller “Band of Brothers” and the subsequent acclaimed TV series ingrained Winters in public consciousness, as a tactically astute, courageous paratroop leader, who led his units during famous operations in France, Belgium + Holland.

Winters enlisted in the army on August 25, 1941. He was selected for Officer Candidate School at Fort Benning, Georgia in April 1942, being commissioned as a second lieutenant on July 2 1942. He chose to enlist in the newly created 506^th PIR (an experimental unit, the first regiment to undertake airborne training as a formed unit). After a spell as platoon leader, Winters was made Executive Officer (XO) of Easy Company, 2^nd Battalion. Training for this new unit under its Commanding Officer, Capt. Sobel was extremely tough, with a high level of personnel wastage, but what remained of the officers + NCOs was a truly hardened core of paratroopers, physically + mentally tough to conduct large-scale operations behind enemy lines. After much acrimony, Sobel was removed as Company CO in late 1943, with Lt. Winters remaining as XO under Lt. Thomas Meehan.

After a long spell of airborne exercises in England, Winters and the 506^th leapt into combat on the morning of D-Day. Disaster struck Easy Company, with the loss of Lt. Meehan in a plane crash. Winters took command, and later in the morning, commanded an Easy company detachment in its famous assault on the German artillery battery at Brécourt Manor. The action was brilliantly successful, with Winters, being subsequently nominated for the Medal of Honor, but that was subsequently downgraded to the Distinguished Service Cross, as the quota system limited the distribution of the award to only one per division (which had already been awarded to the 101^st for another action). His final Normandy operation was to capture Carentan on 12^th June, and then beat off a determined German counter-attack the following day. Hi regimental commander, Col. Sink said in a news interview about Winters action at Carentan - “It was Lt. Winters’ personal leadership which held the crucial position in the line and tossed back the enemy with mortar + machine-gun fire. He was a fine soldier out there. His personal bravery + battle knowledge held a crucial position when the going was really tough”

After a spell of refitting in England with the 506th, Winters, now a captain, saw action again in September, jumping into southern Holland as part of Operation Market Garden. The 506^th, helped liberate Eindhoven, but were unable to prevent the Germans destroying the Wilhelmina Canal Bridge at Son. When relieved by the British XXX Corps advance, Winters led Easy Company in securing the narrow salient around Eindhoven. When the operation stalled at Arnhem, the 506^th was detailed to hold an area of land between Nijmegan and Arnhem, known as the ‘Island’. It would be there that Winters would command another famous action.

On October 5 1944, in response to a reported German infiltration on the 2^nd Battalion, 506^th flank near a crossroads on the Island, Winters took a squad from 1^st Platoon to repel it. He proceeded to take a German machine-gun, but soon after securing the position, he began taking fire from a German position opposite them. Estimating the enemy to be at least platoon size, he called for reinforcements from the rest of 1^st Platoon. He then led a bayonet charge on the German positions, under the cover of machine-gun, killing fifty of the enemy for the loss of only 1, and evicting the invaders completely from the Island. Later, it was discovered a force of at least 300 men had opposed his force of 35 men.

Shortly, afterwards Winters was promoted Battalion XO. The unit would see subsequent action in the heroic defence of Bastogne during the Bulge. The entire 101^st Airborne Division was awarded a Presidential Unit Citation, the first time an entire division was decorated with such an honour. In March 1945, he was promoted to major, and as acting commander, led the 2^nd Battalion to the end of the war in Berchtesgarden, Bavaria , having captured Hitler’s Eagle Nest above the town. He returned to America in November 1945, officially leaving the army in January 1946.  His many decorations include the DSC, Purple Heart, Presidential Unit Citation with Oakleaf Cluster, Bronze Star with Oakleaf Cluster and the Croix de Guerre with Palm.

Richard Winters remained, in spite of his many heroic feats, a very humble man. When he died in January 2011, he requested a private, unannounced funeral service, which was held on January 8, 2011.

May he rest in peace