Episode : 01/10

Titel : Currahee

Director : Phil Alden Robinsons

Basic training

Between 1942 and 1944, men of Easy Company 506 PIR of the 101st Airborne Division are training at Toccoa in Georgia under the command of First Lieutenant Herbert Sobel. The training was for some soldiers harder than combat (Sobel had made a march of about 192 km between Toccoa and Atlanta).
During training with barbed wire, soldiers had to crawl on the ground and gunners fired live bullets over their heads, they should be very careful if they did not want to risk being killed before they met a German soldier on a battlefield in Europe.

Note: the training songs of the soldiers of the Easy had the same melody than the one in Band of Brothers but not exactly the same words.

Easy Company is sent to England short before the Normandy landings to continue in Europe its training, being as part of "operation Overlord". Herbert Sobel was a very practical leader dedicated to the Army and more precisely during basic trainings but not really impressive on the field and his superiors have quickly realized this. Sobel became captain, but just before the "big jump" of D-Day, Tuesday June 6, 1944, he his sent in a regiment in England where doctors, surgeons, chaplains, engineers ... are trained to reinforce and replace the airborne troops after the shock of D-Day in the different units.

The men of Easy Company felt relieved after this sudden departure, not only because Sobels was very hard with them and that they had to make hard trainings but also because they feared for their lives if had led his company of D-Day on the battlefield. Moreover, non-commissioned officers (NCOs) of the Easy in England wrote a report indicating that they refused to serve in the Easy until Sobel was replaced at the head of this company.

It was during training and through different tests that a person impressed the company by its professionalism: Richard Dick Winters, a young lieutenant. Winters was informed of the mutiny by the NCOs and tried in vain to prevent them from taking that position. These men have risked the death penalty for mutiny, because at the dawn of such an offensive in Europe, nothing should interfere with the preparation of the Allies.

After the departure of Sobel, Winters is the second in command of the Easy Company, thanks to his control in various situations and also through his popularity within the company. The command of the Easy will be transfered to First Lieutenant Thomas Meehan, a popular young officer.

June 4, 1944

The departure of the Company is ordered: the Easy will be parachuted over Normandy during operation Overlord south of Sainte-Mère-Eglise and aims at destroying enemy communications systems and capturing the main hubs in the area, avoinding German reinforcements heading for the landing beach named Utah, northeast of Carentan. The take-off of the aircrafts is scheduled for late afternoon.

A few hours before boarding, the whole operation Overlord is canceled, it is postponed to the next day, on Tuesday, June 6. Reason: a major storm is raging in Normandy and the English Channel, strong as it has never been in years. All paratroopers and amphibious units are blocked in England, but this is for a few hours only.

June 5, 1944

This time, it is the right one: a slight improvement in the weather over the Channel and the order can be given again. The men have received drugs against air sickness and also "crickets", two strips of metal which, twisting, emits a "clic clac" sound. U.S. soldiers, when being alone and when hearing a noise close to their position, would use their cricket and make one "clic clac ". The answer to this "clic clac" would be only two "clic clac", otherwise the noise comes from an enemy movement and in this case, it is better to fire in the right direction. Thus, many American soldiers could join their friends and reform groups when they were lost.

Another way to know the identity of the person who is close is to say thunder. The correct answer had to be flash. The latter is, however, few discreet and this kind of password was changed every three days, excepted for flash-thunder which was used only on D-Day.

At the end of the first episode, you can read a part of the General Eisenhower message, the famous "Ike's Great Crusade Message".