The memorial service left me emotionally drained. It took more than an hour for the theater to empty. The local television stations had covered the event extensively. Not surprisingly, the Easy Company veterans, particularly “Wild Bill” Guarnere, “Babe” Heffron, “Buck” Compton, and Sergeant “Buck” Taylor, attracted a lot of attention and requests for autographs. So did Hanks, who remembered Dick this way: “He was a great guy, a magnificent man, but very complicated. It’s life-changing to meet a man like that. We had a lot of tests to pass, and if that meant being taken to the woodshed here in Hershey, we visited the woodshed at times.” Hanks continued, “That visage. That look could pierce a tank.”
I could not help but think that Dick would have been embarrassed with the flashing cameras and all the commotion surrounding the service. He was a proud man, but the celebrity status didn’t suit him. He preferred the more mundane life, surrounded by his friends.
That evening Ethel hosted the Easy Company veterans and the speakers to a special dinner at Devon’s Restaurant in Hershey. Tom Hanks, Bob Hoffman, Herm Clemens, and some of Dick’s special friends were in attendance, as were Heffron, Compton, Taylor, and several other Easy Company veterans. Guarnere, who had family in town, was unable to join us. Hanks remained the perfect gentleman, posing for photographs with anyone who desired a picture. He constantly referred to me as “Colonel” and said how much he had enjoyed the service. “I have done this type of program before. It’s never easy. You did a great job!”
Hanks then related an interesting story about a conversation that he had had with Dick shortly after the premiere of the HBO miniseries. When asked by Hanks what he thought of Band of Brothers, the major informed him, “I wished that it would have been more authentic. I was hoping for an 80 percent solution.”
Hanks responded, “Look, Major, this is Hollywood. At the end of the day, we will be hailed as geniuses if we get this 12 percent right. We are going to shoot for 17 percent. And if we succeed, you need to be satisfied.”
“Fair enough,” replied Dick. And from that came genuine affection, tempered with responsibility to make the series as accurate as possible.
“The major was a complicated man,” concluded Hanks.
Bob Hoffman, who had met Hanks at the Emmys, then escorted the actor around the room to introduce him to the forty guests whom Ethel had invited for dinner. The Winters family dined in an adjacent room. Hoffman also made a point of telling me how “very grateful” he was for my remarks. I, in turn, informed him that his eulogy was the most touching and how much Dick would have enjoyed listening to his remarks.
What a splendid evening it was!
And then no sooner than it had begun, the evening was over.
As I returned to the hotel, I thought about the person I was when I had first met Dick. Professionally, I was a highly successful army officer completing his terminal assignment, a dream assignment preparing young women and men to serve as guardians of the nation. Personally, my life was a shambles. Being a single parent, my world consisted of my two children and the close-knit community of West Point, New York. As disciplined as I was after a military career, I had trouble balancing the challenges of fatherhood and my pending retirement from the U.S. Army. Dick Winters helped me overcome those challenges. As my first marriage dissolved, Dick was always there, telling me to “Hang Tough! You’ll get through it,” he would say, “just Hang Tough!” Now that he was gone, I wished that I could tell him one more time, “Thanks for your friendship, thanks for sharing your twilight years with me. It has been an amazing journey, dear friend. You are and will always be my brother.”
That evening I wondered if I had done a credible job with the memorial service. I thought about it the next morning as I returned to the cemetery at Ephrata. En route, I played my compact disc from the miniseries. Although never identified in the program, the theme from Band of Brothers is “Requiem for a Soldier.” Its haunting score and lyrics begin with a lamentation for fallen soldiers. Reminiscent of the Gettysburg Address when President Abraham Lincoln so eloquently stated, “The world will little note nor long remember what we say here,” “Requiem for a Soldier” proudly proclaims that warriors who have given their last full measure of their devotion “will live forever here in our memory.”
The lyrics seemed even more appropriate as I stood once again at the foot of Dick’s marker. I stood not so much to look, as to say something in finality to him, and perhaps to myself. As I paid my respects, my thoughts turned to an old cavalryman’s ditty called “Fiddler’s Green.” Fiddler’s Green is the mythical resting spot analogous to the Greek myth of the “Elysian Fields” where cavalry units memorialize their deceased before continuing their journey to the hereafter. And where is Fiddler’s Green? According to a mariner’s tale first printed in 1832, it lies “nine miles beyond the dwelling of his Satanic majesty.” The cavalryman’s version is slightly different. Fiddler’s Green in cavalry lore lies midway down the trail to Hell, where dead souls camp and share their wartime memories.
I again envisioned those veterans of Easy Company lifting a toast to their commander who had finally made his last jump and had just arrived on the drop zone. First Sergeant Talbert was there, as were Captain Nixon, Colonel Sink, and that trooper whose name Dick had forgotten. So was Lieutenant Meehan, Easy Company’s commanding officer on D-Day before Dick assumed command. Salve Matheson, who besides Dick had been the last surviving officer from Easy Company’s initial contingent of paratroopers, was present as well. General Matheson had died on January 8, 2005. And also present were the faces of those paratroopers whose names history has long forgotten. In recalling Dick’s words when I informed him that the publisher had accepted his memoirs and Beyond Band of Brothers would be released in February 2006, I whispered, “It is finished!”
Well, not quite. I still planned to fulfill my promise to record his conversations with his friends. Then and only then would it truly be finished.
* * *
That day has finally arrived. Conversations with Major Dick Winters was Dick’s idea. So was telling his story by seasons since that is how he viewed his life. I was privileged to join him in the autumn of his life, the time when most men and women are more introspective, as they reflect upon the people and the events that made major impacts on their own lives. Dick urged me to record our conversations that went beyond those that appeared in Beyond Band of Brothers. He wanted to amplify the insights he gained when he reread his personal letters to DeEtta Almon and his wartime journals. Most importantly, Dick Winters wanted the world to know about his friends. He was not concerned if he would someday be forgotten; he didn’t want his friends to be forgotten. “I won’t live long enough to see the book published, but I want you to tell this story,” he said. “It’s that important to me. I know that you won’t let me down.” For better or worse, I tried to keep his essential points honest—freed from the emendations and penumbras of fallible memory. I trust that I have measured up to his expectations.