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Pvt. Bradford Freeman went back to the farm. In 1990 Winters wrote him, saying that he often came South to see Walter Gordon and would like to stop by sometime to see Freeman's farm. Freeman replied: "It would be a great honor for you to come to see us in Mississippi. We have a good shade to sit in in the Summer and have a good heater for Winter. About all that I do is garden and cut hay for cows in summer and feed in Winter. Fish and hunt the rest of the time. We have the Tombigbee water way close and I watch the barges go up and down the river. Sending you a picture of the house and cows. I have a good place on the front porch to sit. Here's hoping that you will come down sometime."
Winters did. They had a good visit. He asked Freeman to write an account of what he did after the war, for this book. Freeman concluded: "What I wrote don't look like much but I have had a real good time and wouldn't trade with no one."
Maj. Richard Winters also wrote an account of his life after the war: "On separation from the service on November 29, 1945, Lewis Nixon invited me to come to New York City and meet his parents. His father offered me a job and I became personnel manager for the Nixon Nitration Works, Nixon, New Jersey. While working, I took advantage of the G.I. Bill and took courses in business and personnel management at Rutgers University. In 1950 I was promoted to General Manager of Nixon Nitration Works.
"I married Ethel Estoppey in 1948. We have two children. Tim has an M.A. in English from Penn State and Jill a B.A. from Albright College.
"I was recalled to the army for the Korean War. At Fort Dix, New Jersey, I was put on the staff as regimental plans and training officer. After discharge, I returned to Pennsylvania, to farm and to sell animal health products and vitamin premixes to the feed companies. In 1951 I bought a farm along the foothills of the Blue Mountain鈥攕even miles east of Indiantown Gap. That's where I find that peace and quiet that I promised myself on D-Day."
This is typical Winters understatement. He lives modestly, on his farm and in a small town house in Hershey, but he is a wealthy man who achieved success by creating and marketing a new, revolutionary cattle food and other animal food products.
He is also the gentlest of men. In July 1990, when he finished telling me about practically wiping out an entire German rifle company on the dike in Holland on October 5, 1944, we went for a walk down to his pond. A flock of perhaps thirty Canadian geese took off; one goose stayed behind, honking plaintively at the others. Winters explained that the bird had a broken wing.
I remarked that he ought to get out a rifle and shoot the goose before a fox got her. "Freeze her up for Thanksgiving dinner."
He gave me an astonished glance. "I couldn't do that!" he said, horrified at the thought.
He is incapable of a violent action, he never raises his voice, he is contemptuous of exaggeration, self-puffery, or posturing. He has achieved exactly what he wanted in life, that peace and quiet he promised himself as he lay down to catch some sleep on the night of June 6-7, 1944, and the continuing love and respect of the men he commanded in Easy Company in World War II.