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Winters felt that Sobel had to have known what was going on. "Hell, there was no secret about it." Ranney had invited Evans to the meeting; it was all but certain Evans had told Sobel.
Indeed, by this time the whole battalion was talking about Sobel's battles, first with Winters, now with his N.C.O.s. Sink would have had to have been deaf, dumb, and blind not to have been aware. He should also have been grateful that Winters had talked the N.C.O.s out of presenting him with an ultimatum. A few days later, Sink came down to Company E, called all the noncoms together, and as Lipton recalled, "Gave us hell. He told us we had disgraced our company and that he could put every one of us in the guardhouse for years. As we were preparing for combat, he said that it could be called mutiny in the face of the enemy for which we could be shot."
Fortunately for Sink, the 101st Airborne had just established a Parachute Jumping School at the nearby village of Chilton Foliat, in order to qualify as paratroopers doctors, chaplains, communications men, forward artillery observers, and others who would be jumping on D-Day. Who better than Sobel to run a training camp?
Sink sent Sobel to Chilton Foliat and brought 1st Lt. Patrick Sweeney from Able Company to be X.O. of Easy. He made 1st Lt. Thomas Meehan of Baker the C.O. of Easy. And he brought Winters back, as leader of the 1st platoon. Sergeant Ranney was busted to private, and Harris was transferred. The Sobel era of Easy Company had come to an end.
Meehan was Sobel's opposite. Slender, fairly tall, willowy, he had common sense and competence. He was strict but fair. He had good voice command. "Under Meehan," Winters said, "we became a normal company."
Training intensified. On December 13, the company made a night jump and lost its first man, Pvt. Rudolph Dittrich of 1st platoon, due to parachute failure. Platoons and squads were being sent out on three-day problems, with different men being put in command as lieutenants and sergeants were declared out of action. "Imagine me platoon leader," Carson wrote in his diary on December 12. "No, it can't be." But it was. They were learning to be resourceful, which included learning to live off the land. This included "fishing" by tossing hand grenades into the streams and improving their diet by finding deer on the country estates that were willing to walk into a bullet in the head.
Christmas was a day off, with all the turkey a man could eat. New Year's Eve was quiet, "We just waited up for the New Year," Carson wrote. "I wonder what it shall bring, wonder how many of us will see 1945."
On January 18, Gen. Bernard Law Montgomery, commander of the 21st Army Group to which the 101st was attached, came to Chilton Foliat for an inspection. He reviewed the regiment, then told the men to break ranks and rally 'round his jeep. Climbing onto the "bonnet," he told them how good they were. "After eyeing the 506th," he said, "I pity the Germans."
The days slowly began to lengthen, meaning decent fighting weather was approaching, tension increased. Inevitably the young men thought of death. Few made their thoughts articulate, but Webster dealt with his directly. He wrote his mother, instructing her to "stop worrying about me. I joined the parachutists to fight. I intend to fight. If necessary, I shall die fighting, but don't worry about this because no war can be won without young men dying. If those things which are precious are saved only by sacrifice."