1. Herbert Maxwell Sobel was an American soldier who served as a commissioned officer with Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, in the 101st Airborne Division during World War II.
13 Facts About Herbert Sobel
1. 2.
Herbert Sobel attended high school at the Culver Military Academy in Indiana, where he was a member of the swim team, and later graduated from the University of Illinois, where he studied business.
3.
In 1942, Herbert Sobel was assigned to Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment as its initial member and commanding officer.
4.
Herbert Sobel commanded Easy Company during basic training at Camp Toccoa, Georgia, during which he was promoted to captain.
5.
Some men downright hated him even to the point where Herbert Sobel's life was in danger.
6.
Herbert Sobel initiated court-martial proceedings against Winters over Winters' failure to carry out conflicting latrine inspection orders Herbert Sobel had given him.
7.
On D-Day, Herbert Sobel parachuted into Normandy with the rest of the 101st Airborne Division as commander of the 506th's service company.
8.
Immediately after landing, Herbert Sobel assembled four men and destroyed a German machine gun nest with grenades before joining the rest of the division near Carentan.
9.
Herbert Sobel spent the remainder of the war as a staff officer in the 506th, and was appointed the regiment's S-4 on March 8,1945.
10.
Herbert Sobel remained in the Army Reserve after the war, eventually retiring at the rank of lieutenant colonel.
11.
Herbert Sobel married Rose, a former military nurse from South Dakota whose Catholicism was disapproved of by Sobel's Jewish family.
12.
In 1970, Herbert Sobel shot himself in the head with a small-caliber pistol in an attempted suicide.
13.
In Marcus Brotherton's 2009 book We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories from the Band of Brothers, several Easy Company veterans offered differing views of how Herbert Sobel was portrayed in Band of Brothers.