𝙲𝙷𝙰𝙿𝚃𝙴𝚁 𝟽

525 21 0
                                    

𝙳𝙴𝙲𝙴𝙼𝙱𝙴𝚁 𝟷𝟿𝟺𝟸

As Liebgott had predicted, Benning was, if possible, even more miserable than Toccoa, especially its infamous Frying Pan area, where the jump training went on. This was the regimental bivouac area, consisting of scrubby little wooden huts set on barren, sandy soil. 

But Benning was a welcome relief to the men of Easy Company in the sense that they were getting realistic training for becoming paratroopers rather than spending most of their waking hours doing physical exercises.

When they arrived, they were told that parachute school was supposed to begin with physical training in A stage, followed by B, C, and D stages, each lasting a week, but the 506th skipped A stage.

Apparently, when the 1st Battalion arrived ahead of the others, they went straight into A stage, and embarrassed the jump school sergeants who were assigned to lead the calisthenics and runs. 

The Toccoa graduates would laugh at the sergeants. On the runs they would begin running backward, challenge the sergeants to a race, ask them—after a couple of hours of exercises that left the sergeants panting—when they were going to get past the warm-up and into the real thing. 

After two days of such abuse, the sergeants told their CO that the 506th was in much better physical shape than they were, so all the following companies of the 506th started in immediately on B stage.

For a week, the company double-timed each morning to the packing sheds, where the men learned how to fold and pack their parachutes. They ran back to the Frying Pan for lunch, then spent the afternoon leaping into sawdust piles from mock doors on dummy fuselages raised 4 feet off the ground, handling parachutes on a suspended harness, or jumping off 30-foot towers in parachute harnesses suspended from a steel cable.

The following week, in C stage, the men made free and controlled jumps from the 250-foot towers. One tower had seats, shock absorbers, and chute guide wires; the others had four chutes that released when they reached the suspension arm. From these, each man made several daylight jumps and one at night.

During training, they were instructed to count 1,000, 2,000, 3,000 while jumping as they were to inflate the parachute at "3,000."

C stage also featured a wind machine, which blew a gale along the ground, moving both chute and jumper to teach the men how to control and collapse their canopies after landing. Tommy found that stage increasingly hard as the canopy, filled out by the strong winds, easily bowled him over and dragged him across the ground every time he landed wrong. It was embarrassing, but embarrassment was something he had gotten used to under Sobels constant beratement.

After a week at the towers, the enlisted men were ready for D stage, the real thing, the five jumps from a C-47 that would earn those who completed the process their parachutists' wings.

They packed their chutes the night before, checked them, then packed them again, checked them again, until past 2300. Reveille was at 0530. 

They marched to the hangers at Lawson Field, singing and shouting in anticipation. They put on their chutes, then sat on rows of benches waiting to be summoned to the C-47s.

Tommy sat next to Liebgott and Tab, fiddling with his spare chute. They sat, squinting their eyes against the sun as the Jump school Sergeant paced in front of them.

"So, do we feel like we're ready to be Army paratroopers?"

"Yes, Sergeant!"

"I hope so." he smiled at the eager faced recruits. His eyes zeroed in on one in particular, a kid who looked much too young to be sat among his burly company mates from Easy. The boys of Easy company were renowned in Bennings for their physical fitness. They were all tall and muscular, and the man seated between Private Liebgott and Sergeant Talbert was anything but. Still, upon closer inspection, the Sergeant quickly discarded any concern. The man was wild eyed, and looked as eager as the rest of them. 

Toy Soldier » Band of BrothersWhere stories live. Discover now