![]() soldiers, but health problems prevented it. He went places and met people he never would have otherwise."ĭarrell Powers met a German soldier in 2005 who had fought against him at the notoriously brutal siege of Bastogne during the winter of 1944.Īccording to his son, Wayne, he had in September been scheduled to travel to Iraq to meet with U.S. "It sure changed his life in later years. "For me and my kids, it's just amazing that our regular, sweet uncle was such a hero," said his niece, Cheryl Gilliland of Roanoke. "He gets fan mail from all over the world, and calls." "He actually hadn't talked about it, his war years, until the book came out," said his daughter-in-law, Sandy Powers. He found renewed notoriety when his military experiences were depicted on film and in the Stephen Ambrose book of the same name. Powers, who got the nickname "Shifty" playing basketball as a youngster, served three years in the Army during World War II and later worked as a machinist for Clinchfield Coal Corp. "But under different circumstances, we might have been good friends." ![]() "Of course, they were doing what they were supposed to do, and I was doing what I was supposed to do. He might've liked to fish, you know, he might've liked to hunt," Powers said. In the second-to-last episode of "Band of Brothers," an HBO miniseries that documented Easy Company's wartime exploits, Powers spoke on camera about the soldiers he fought and also hinted at the intrinsic tragedy of combat. "Between the eyes."īut Powers, of Dickenson County, who died Wednesday of natural causes at age 86, was also reflective about such matters. "Right there," he said, touching his forehead. He recalled a bitterly cold day in the Ardennes when he was able to draw down on a German sniper, sighting his target by the misty cloud of the man's breath. Powers, a United States Army paratrooper and sharpshooter, belonged to Easy Company, part of the legendary 101st Airborne Division. In a 2001 interview with The Roanoke Times, Darrell "Shifty" Powers talked about some of his experiences during World War II. Felt in merited it's own thread rather than being posted in the Obituaries thread.ĭarrell "Shifty" Powers, who died at age 86, was a hero on the battlefield and to his family.
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