page_title: E Company, 506th Infantry Regiment (United States)
section_title: Operation Overlord (D-Day)
hierarchical_section_title: E Company, 506th Infantry Regiment (United States) / Missions / Operation Overlord (D-Day)
caption_attribution_description: The Memorial Plaque on the side of the last remaining wartime picket post close to RAF Upottery. It recalls the names of all those who died in transit from the airfield to France on the 5th and 7th June 1944.
context_page_description: E Company, 2nd Battalion of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division, the "Screaming Eagles, ” is a company in the United States Army. The experiences of its members during World War II are the subject of the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers based on the book of the same name by historian Stephen Ambrose.
context_section_description: For Operation Overlord, E Company's mission was to capture the entrances to and clear any obstacles around "Causeway 2", a pre-selected route off Utah Beach for the Allied forces landing from the sea a few hours later. The company departed from Upottery airbase in Devon, England, and dropped over the Cotentin Peninsula of Normandy, France in the early hours of the morning of 6 June 1944. 
  After assembling on the ground, the men of E Company disabled a battery of four German heavy guns on D-Day that threatened forces coming along Causeway 2. The town of Carentan was crucial for American soldiers to capture because it would link Omaha and Utah beaches together, providing access for armor and equipment. The Germans were aware of its strategic importance and had established significant defences. In one of Donald Malarkey's articles he stated that Lieutenant Winters made him mortar sergeant of second platoon. E Company, along with Dog and Fox companies, were walking down the road to Carentan when they came to an intersection and one or two German machine gun teams began firing on them. Mortars and tanks soon joined the fight. 
  The American soldiers all jumped into ditches for cover. Winters saw this and as Malarkey states, Winters "got hotter than I've ever seen him." It was a fast attack, at the end of which Malarkey states that he could hear moans and groans of wounded soldiers and occasional gun shots. Also at the end of the battle Winters was slightly wounded in his lower right leg by a ricocheting bullet fragment. The Germans mounted a counterattack, but 2nd battalion held onto Carentan. By the time the company was pulled off the line, they had taken 65 casualties including 22 killed in action—17 of whom, including their commanding officer and first sergeant, were killed on D-day when their plane was shot down.
caption: The Memorial plaque near RAF Upottery, Devon, UK showing the names of those who died in transit from the base to France on 5 and 7 June 1944.
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