Richard Winters, who advised him not to get too familiar with the enlisted men, as a leader should never allow himself to be in a position where he could take anything from those under him.Ĭompton participated in Operation Overlord on 6 June 1944 in Normandy, France. He got along well with the enlisted men and hung out with them more than he did with the officers. He was given the duty of assistant platoon leader of 2nd Platoon. He went through jump school at Benning, qualified, and completed training at Camp Mackall with the 515th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 17th Airborne Division.Ĭompton was then transferred to Easy Company, part of the 506th PIR in the 101st Airborne, at Aldbourne, England. However, he wanted to get to the war soon, and signed up for the Paratroopers, which was one of the two ways a member of the regimental baseball team could be transferred (the other was to attend flight training). He originally instructed flight classes, but was then assigned to the Regiment's baseball team. After graduating from OCS in 1943, he was assigned to the 176th Infantry Regiment, which was operating at Benning. When World War II broke out, Compton had been in ROTC, and after the Rose Bowl, was sent to Columbus, Georgia where he went through OCS at Fort Benning. He still played in football, and participated in the Rose Bowl in his Senior year. He late moved to baseball in his junior year, and became a catcher for the baseball team, playing alongside Jackie Robinson. Print.At UCLA, he played football most of his college years. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2004. “They Got Us Surrounded – the Poor Bastards.” Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest. ”It all happened,” Lipton summed up, “because Shifty saw a tree almost a mile away that hadn’t been there the day before.”Īmbrose, Stephen Edward. Lipton watched through his binoculars as the Germans scrambled to get out of there, salvaging what they could of their guns, helping wounded to the rear. Shells started exploding all around the German position. When he described the target he had no trouble getting approval for full battery fire, despite the short supply of artillery ammunition. He got on the radio, talking to a battery of 105mm back in Bastogne. When he arrived, he saw what Powers and Lipton had seen. Lipton put in a call for a forward artillery observer. Lipton realized that the Germans were putting an antiaircraft battery in among the trees, and had put up the tree powers spotted as part of their camouflage. Then he saw gun barrels – 88s by their appearance, as they were elevated and 88s were the basic German antiaircraft weapon as well as ground artillery piece. He saw some movement near the tree and then more movement under other trees around it. Lipton studied the spot with his binoculars. Lipton expressed some doubts, but Powers insisted it had not been there the previous day. One reason Lipton had trouble was that the object was not an isolated tree there were a number of trees along the road in that area. Looking through them, Lipton could not see anything unusual, even after Powers pinpointed the spot for him. “Sergeant,” he said, “there’s a tree up there toward Noville that wasn’t there yesterday.” Powers had no binoculars, but Lipton did. Shifty Powers came in from an OP to report to 1st Sergeant Lipton.
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