"RiP Col Shames, last of the Band of Brothers" Topic

Col. Edward Shames — a World War II veteran who fought in some of the most significant battles and was the last surviving officer of the company that inspired the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers" — has died at age 99.

Shames died peacefully at his home in Virginia Beach on Friday, according to an obituary posted by the Holomon-Brown Funeral Home & Crematory. Shames was preceded in death by his wife — Ida — who died in 2019 after 73 years of marriage. He is survived by his sons Douglas and Steven, four grandchildren, and 12 great-grandchildren.

Shames was a member of the renowned "Easy Company," 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. Easy Company was the subject of Stephen Ambrose's 1992 book "Band of Brothers." The book became the inspiration for the 2001 HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers" created by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg.

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Wolfhag

We are losing all the heroes of that era---sad, but inevitable. RIP, Col Shames.

Not the last enlisted member

Shames's death leaves 97-year-old Bradford Freeman as the last surviving member of Easy Company.

RIP Sir … you are back with your Brothers of the 506th.

RIP.

I thought the series did an impressive job of dramatizing the life of a military unit, but it was unfortunate in its treatment of some individuals, and Shames was one. Norman Dike was probably another; I was shocked to discover that he had been awarded a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for the assault on Foy, and he subsequently went on to a job as the ADC for Gavin. Hard to believe he would've been picked for a job like that if he had behaved as he did in the film.

Yes, as good as it was … there was some "Hollywood license" … Not rare to find that even in many newer well done war movies.

Yep. And it works the other way, too- supposedly David Schwimmer was bantering with Richard Winters, and joked about feeling bad at what an over-the-too SOB his character was, and Winters replied, "oh, he was far worse than you ever imagined, I promise you that." Some of the ones who didn't survive to tell their side of the story to Ambrose didn't fare particularly well- Roy Cobb, for example- but it is the hardest business of all, and it doesn't necessarily make a person better.

If you take it as an attempt to portray a company, without concerning yourself with historical accuracy, you can see a lot in it that's pitch-perfect, as a portrayal of the Army. Both the serious stuff and the comical.

Very true … and it was not only in BoB, but many other fairly good war movies. E.g. The Longest Day, A Bridge Too Far, etc.

I had to do a search to see which character Shames was in BoB. I think the show only references him on one scene where he's screaming at his men with the narrator stating he wasn't a good leader. I can't recall if the book had more in depth coverage of him.

Cobb was another one that really was presented in a negative light. I'm guessing the sources used for BoB didn't think highly of him. I have Webster's book and will read that some point.

Webster's book is interesting, although a lot of the dialogue is plainly invented: he cannot have had the time to record it in the detail he repeats it in. Cobb doesn't come off particularly well, although IIRC, the detail of him killing the wounded German at Hagenau with a grenade is in both BoB (which I no longer have) and Webster's book.

The two do make interesting comparative reading- Webster's, the work of a single man, putting down his recollections maybe fifteen years after the event, is a bit different from the accounts Ambrose collected a few decades later.