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The Easy Company Foxholes of Bastogne


james127
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Band of Brothers is easily my favorite TV series of all time. So having a chance to visit the Bastogne perimeter and find the actual foxholes that Easy Company occupied during the winter of 1944 was quite the experience for me. There are some differences between the show and real life that I dive into as well. Enjoy!

 

 

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Old Crow 1986

Thanks for another terrific travel/history-logue.  I enjoy the tours and the running commentary.  I also appreciate how you highlight differences between artistic interpretations depicted in the movies or series and the historic ground truth.  You're never dismissive of the artistic or dramatic license that was employed in making some classic cinematic art while politely setting the record straight.  Keep up the good, respectful, and polite work!   

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Thanks for the video. What a place to visit. Sounds on the video like the woods were whispering. That would be a little eire to say the least.  

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5 hours ago, Old Crow 1986 said:

Thanks for another terrific travel/history-logue.  I enjoy the tours and the running commentary.  I also appreciate how you highlight differences between artistic interpretations depicted in the movies or series and the historic ground truth.  You're never dismissive of the artistic or dramatic license that was employed in making some classic cinematic art while politely setting the record straight.  Keep up the good, respectful, and polite work!   

Thanks! I get it that a lot of movies have to take some artistic license (although many go way overboard). If it gets people interested in history, I take that as a win. With that being said, I'd say that Band of Brothers is likely the most historically accurate film or film series ever made. You can pretty much read the book right along with the series. Thanks for the kind words!

4 hours ago, mdk0911 said:

Great work - keep it coming please!!

Thanks! Got a few more from Belgium coming. After that, I'm going to have to find a generous philanthropist to fund a return trip to get more :). The primary reason that I started doing this was to provide a resource for history teachers and students, so maybe there's an individual or organization out there that might see the value in sponsoring some future work. 

4 hours ago, M422A1 said:

Great video!  Thanks for making this!

Appreciate that. Glad that I could share a bit of it with some fellow lovers of history.

3 hours ago, MT247 said:

Thanks for the video. What a place to visit. Sounds on the video like the woods were whispering. That would be a little eire to say the least.  

They were. It was one of the most surreal places that I've ever had the privilege to visit.

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Great stuff once again, thanks for posting. I will repeat what I said in one of your earlier posts: if you are a WWII history buff, and can make it happen, go to Western Europe. 
 

If you do your research, you can even pick out obscure actions and go visit the farm house, for example, where they happened. It’s easy and pleasant to drive around the countryside and a guide is unnecessary, although I did hire two to show me around places that were difficult to get into in. I even knocked on a couple doors to see some areas on private property. The people were always nice. 
 

Thanks again for sharing your videos. 

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13 hours ago, bobgee said:

More great history, James! Thank you!

Thanks! I really appreciate that. Glad that you are liking them.

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1 hour ago, Longhorn92 said:

Great stuff once again, thanks for posting. I will repeat what I said in one of your earlier posts: if you are a WWII history buff, and can make it happen, go to Western Europe. 
 

If you do your research, you can even pick out obscure actions and go visit the farm house, for example, where they happened. It’s easy and pleasant to drive around the countryside and a guide is unnecessary, although I did hire two to show me around places that were difficult to get into in. I even knocked on a couple doors to see some areas on private property. The people were always nice. 
 

Thanks again for sharing your videos. 

Thanks! And I completely agree with what you are saying. I've got some videos coming up where I go to some spots that I don't think you'll see anywhere else on YouTube. For the most part, my goal on this trip was to do it without hitting any museums. Don't get me wrong, I love museums (which is obvious if you see the other videos on my channel) but I really wanted to see the actual locations in the wild, so to speak. 

I hope to get back over there sooner rather than later because there's a lot that I've learned and a lot that I'd like to cover. While the channel is really for anyone who loves history, the primary drive for me creating these videos is to provide a resource for history teachers and students. So maybe I'll run into somebody one of these days that would be interested in doing some philanthropic work and sponsoring a trip back over. Regardless, I enjoy doing it. Again, thanks for the kind words.

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  • 6 months later...

Awesome video!

 

I was able to visit Belleau Wood last summer, and it's still easy to find foxholes there after 101 years. Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if they hadn't been re-dug since the war. Maybe those have been, but they seem to endure pretty well "in the wild". 

 At Belleau Wood we had a great guide, Gilles Lagin, who was able to get us to some amazing places on private property (with permission!). Easily one of the best days of my life. I highly recommend setting something up with him if you make it back to France one day. Anyways, great work, thank you for sharing!

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Another great video James! I was just watching parts of those episodes of BoB yesterday on History channel. It's one thing to see it depicted on TV/movies or in photos, but another to see the actual locations the way you always present them in your videos.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 11/28/2020 at 10:44 AM, JasonT said:

Another great video James! I was just watching parts of those episodes of BoB yesterday on History channel. It's one thing to see it depicted on TV/movies or in photos, but another to see the actual locations the way you always present them in your videos.

Thanks! Glad that you enjoyed it :)

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On 11/27/2020 at 11:11 PM, patrick_usmc said:

Awesome video!

 

I was able to visit Belleau Wood last summer, and it's still easy to find foxholes there after 101 years. Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if they hadn't been re-dug since the war. Maybe those have been, but they seem to endure pretty well "in the wild". 

 At Belleau Wood we had a great guide, Gilles Lagin, who was able to get us to some amazing places on private property (with permission!). Easily one of the best days of my life. I highly recommend setting something up with him if you make it back to France one day. Anyways, great work, thank you for sharing!

Thanks for the kind words and for the heads up on Belleau Wood. Does Gilles have a website by chance?

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