"Brecourt Manor assault - inconsistancies" Topic

While doing an internet search on Brecourt Manor I came across this (very old, from 2011) discussion on this forum:
link
The poster who goes by the handle "Jagdtiger" brings out some really interesting, and likely controversial, points. It seems well researched and documented. As usual, there are some replies that are less valuable (like the poster replying with the argument from authority fallacy – namely, he can't have an opinion because he didn't serve in the military).
Details can be found in the link, of course, but here are some of the main points:
The Band of Brother's book claims that the defenders of the battery were troopers from the 6th Fsj. Jagdtiger claims they were not and actually belonged to the 191st Artillery Regiment, a unit of the static 709th Division. Other sources claim they were from the 91st Airlanding Division – a Wehrmacht unit, in spite of the name they were most definitely not Fsj.
Von Der Heyde was no where near Brecourt, as claimed by Ambrose in the book.
According to Winters' DSC citation, there were US tanks involved (he gives a link for this but it didn't work for me. Note also that this erroneously calls them 88s):
The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to First Lieutenant (Infantry) Richard D. Winters (ASN: 0-1286582), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in connection with military operations against an armed enemy while serving with Company E, 2d Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, in action against enemy forces on 6 June 1944, in France. First Lieutenant Winters with seven enlisted men, advanced through intense enemy automatic weapons fire, putting out of action two guns of the battery of four 88-mm. that were shelling the beachhead. Unswerving in his determination to complete his self-appointed and extremely hazardous task, First Lieutenant Winters and his group withdrew for reinforcements. He returned with tank support and the remaining two guns were put out of action, resulting in decreased opposition to our forces landing on the beachhead. First Lieutenant Winters' heroic and determined leadership exemplify the highest traditions of the military forces of the United States and reflect great credit upon himself, the 101st Airborne Division, and the United States Army.
The report done by SLA Marshal, who interviewed Winters, says this:
That part of Company D, 506th Regiment, which had bypassed the German battery at ST GERMAIN DE VARREVILLE some time around noon and made a dash for Exit No 2, arrived at its objective at 1330. The causeway leading through HOUDIENVILLE was brought under control practically without fighting. STRAYER'S main body caught up with the advance party about 1500 hours. The column had kept the German battery entertained until CAPT R. D. WINTERS of Company E made a trip to the Beach and returned with a group of tanks from the seaborne force. The tanks brought the battery under fire and destroyed it. By 1800, Second Battalion was well organized at Exit No 2, with about 300 men on hand, including the strays from other units.

It is hard to reconcile these reports with Ambrose's writings.
I am curious what other TMPers think of all this

Been watching lots of the very new YouTube videos on Easy Company members. Ambrose got lots wrong about them so I would want to verify other sources. The Videos seem to be pretty good

I'm not particularly surprised. Some of the descriptions and acting in "Band of Brothers" may not be wholly accurate – Norman Dyke in particular. I did a little googling awhile back, and IIRC, he got a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for Foy- and was chosen to be the CG's aide after that. They don't usually put screwups in positions like that.

The book was written on the basis of accounts of a core group of men, almost forty years after the fact. It's not to be wondered at that a man who was not close to any of them doesn't come off particularly well.

Stephen Ambrose, though a great story teller who could bring a historical situation to life, was a so-so historian. None of his works should be taken as gospel truth.

Ambrose was a poor historian, plain and simple. There are scads of errors in his work. He just pulled things from other secondary sources and did zero follow-up research on it. To say nothing of the plagiarism issues (I personally know one of the cases where he settled). A friend of mine that landed on 6 June wrote a 22 page letter to Ambrose after his D-day book pointing out numerous errors. He got back a form letter saying in essence "Oh Well, no one is perfect." You want to know facts about the 101st? Read Mark Bando's books. He's forgotten more about the 101st in WW2 than Ambrose ever knew.

Yeah, printing the legend can give people some strikingly erroneous impressions about what happened- and what is and is not even possible.

None of the above should take away from Maj Winters actions and leadership ability which seem well documented even if the caliber of the guns was listed incorrectly, etc.

Not too worried about the caliber of the guns. However misidentifying Ost troops as paratroopers and failing to mention the tanks seems like a bigger deal

I don't think anyone's saying it does. The men on the spot thought it worth a DSC, and I think that's all the statement it needs. But it is worth understanding the difference between what happened and the popularly accepted view of what happened.

I never read the book (because Ambrose), but I did see the show, which I liked very much- as a piece of entertainment. Some of the portraits of individual men are highly unflattering, though, and may or may not be fair. I looked up three (Dyke, Sobel and Strayer), and I think two of them may be various degrees of unfair. I won't repeat myself about Duke; Sobel was about what they made him out to be, and I think Strayer is probably made out to be a bit more clueless than he really was.

I can tell you I laughed out loud when I saw the line about the attack being taught at West Point, because I was there when the book put them on the map, and while I knew people were reading the book, no part of it featured in the standard curriculum.

David Webster's book is interesting reading for anyone interested in that unit, and it has a lot of thumbnail portraits that are subtly (and in some cases, significantly) different from the ones in the film (themselves based on a book compiled from conversations with men who were recalling events that were nearly fifty years in the past). Webster's book wasn't published until years after his death in 1961, but he set down his version of events comparatively soon after they happened.

It was just Ed Shames birthday, who served there. Sadly, he is now dead, but he used ot rail heavily against the book and show saying that a great many things were wrong, and people were getting credit for what others, who were killed, did. History is written by the victors, and the living, and the heavily promoted authors.

The Dyke portrait in the show seems to have been built up by a group of men who disliked him. This may or may not have been just- the jury in the orderly room is quick, but not infallible- but they were the ones alive to talk to Ambrose, and not him.

The best thing I can say about Ambrose is that one of my dad's stories made it to his book on D-Day. Of course that same story is also in a book on the 82nd

The striking difference that I have encountered in reading is that the attack dealing with the guns at Brecourt Manor took hours not minutes- "all afternoon"- I guess that included fetching the tanks. Compression for reasons of dramatic effect is fair enough but the Ambrose-Hanks version does give a very different impression.

Anything Hollywood does I see as "based on a true story" entertainment and maybe a reason to delve deeper after the movie. They need to do the minimum within budget to please the most people.

No movie is going to faithfully portray an individual's entire career and you shouldn't judge them on one or two accounts.

If they get the weapons, uniforms, and vehicles mostly correct I'm pretty much satisfied. Even first-person AARs don't always tell the entire story and match up with others who were there.

If someone is claiming to write as a historian they should document their sources. Bottom line is books are written to be sold.

Wolfhag

"If they get the weapons, uniforms, and vehicles mostly correct I'm pretty much satisfied."

Pretty much? How much do I agree? Totally, to gain my respect.

But how rare is that? Fury did OK on all three, with a nonsense story line. Longest Day was a long time back, so had to get it right (OK, a few Shermans a bit post June 44). SPR was pretty good (with another nonsense story line, but great on all three criteria, even if no SS and Tigers that early after D Day). Paris Burning tried hard but failed badly. Bridge Too Far very good in parts, but poor on vehicles and AFVs. Battle of Britain, well it was a long time ago, so the special effects were terrible, but finding Spanish aircraft to fly against the RAF worked brilliantly.

Now that was a fillum (as my Dad would have said, but a movie over the pond) with that sequence after "There's no fighter escort, help yourselves chaps". The music, the nyacatakatakatakatak that followed. Only Dunkirk captured the dogfight (actually far better one on one) but the rest was awful.

The rest was abysmal, Patton, Battle of the Bulge, etc, but I will concede I have stuck to NW Europe and ignored Tora Tora Tora and Thin Red Line

A Bridge Too Far was a very good effort, I've never seen so many real Shermans in one place, helped a lot by having some of the real participants as advisers. Like Bob it still perpetuate a lot of the made up bits from Ryan's book though.

If you want real vehicles, you need to go back to the films made in the 1940s and early 50s, They Were not Divided, Theirs was the Glory, It Happened Here etc. Functioning Tigers, Panthers, Jagdpanthers etc, they even just set the original Tiger II in Oosterbeek on fire again as Noone had got around to scrapping it. The Way Ahead rather oddly used real Pz III as knocked out ones, but Valentines when they were in motion, I assume the former were broken down. Also the only film I've seen a functioning Covenanter in.

Key errors in the BOB TV show and I presume the book are:-

The defenders were not FJ – but Luftlande and performed poorly.

The assault on the guns took hours not minutes.

I think that is accepted generally now.

Ambrose was not a historian. He was a collector of reminiscences who filled in any gaps with what suited his narrative.

Nobody's perfect.

Hollywood makes movies for the masses to make $$ and satisfy their investors. They are not going to spend millions of dollars to get the exact model of running WWII tanks, vehicles, and mechanics hauled to the filming sites to satisfy what is probably less than 1% of their audience (namely us). Most people won't be aware or know the difference. You need to lower your expectations.

Ukraine, Poland and Russia are making some very convincing WWII movies that are pretty historically accurate. Russia can get a dozen or more real T-34/85s in a battle scene all at once. Also KV-1s, SUs, and other vehicles, even aircraft. Even their CGI is outstanding.

I think Hollywood wants to portray the Americans beating up on those evil SS Nazis and not poorly trained Eastern Europeans and POWs pressed into service. If it were historically accurate it would probably get poor reviews.

Someone should call Steven Speilberg and Tom Hanks and tell him you want to be their consultant on their next movie so he does not f--- it up again.

Wolfhag

More scenes to complain about:
link

Wolfhag

They seem to have picked up on Duke, nice to see someone trying to correct the record.

However bad these were they are still streets ahead of Ridley Scott's fantasy Napoleon!

Yes, and there are a lot of elements of the show that do have an authentic feeling- it's great, if not taken as literal history. As I said above, the write up on the whole story didn't start until almost fifty years after the events in it, and I suspect Ambrose spoke mostly with a circle of men whose views of one another were fairly congenial.

It's not completely unfair, but it does bear comparison with what Webster wrote up, ten or so years afterwards. Webster includes a lot of conversations that are probably fictional, but his memory of specific events is often very different (Speirs did not hold a pistol in the mouth of the GI who murdered an E company man- but he did smash his face with a rifle butt before handing him over unconscious to the MPs, in Webster's retelling of the story). Webster had his own agenda, and his own pet hates, but he didn't remember everything in the same way, and his accounts form an interesting point of comparison. Nixon, in Webster's telling, seems about like he was played (very well, by Ron Livingston) in the series; Spiers, by contrast, comes off as the loosest of loose cannons.

What I think is unforgivable is how some real characters were portrayed negatively. Speilberg could have had a disclaimer at the end of the movie to indicate what really happened to some of the members of Easy Company who went on to have outstanding careers.

If he wanted to portray a member of Easy Company in a negative and unhistoric light he should have used an NPC and not the real person.

Imagine if he had done that with one of your relatives.

Here is more detail on Sobel: YouTube link

The Brecourt Manor engagement seems like a good scenario for someone to do that portrays it more historically.

Wolfhag

Yes, if I were one of Roy Cobb's children, I would not be too happy with his cinematic portrayal (although the one time I do remember picking up the book, I turned to the section on the cross-river raid, which Webster also describes, and IIRC, both Webster and Ambrose describe Cobb killing a wounded German with a grenade).

They did talk at the end of the series about where many of them went, although I'm not sure how accurate those stories really were. "Inspired by a true story" is usually the way Hollywood says, "we made up a lot of stuff."

Ransom Stoddard: You're not going to use the story, Mr. Scott?

Maxwell Scott: No, sir. This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.

Famous line from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Think it sort of applies here :)