WWII Boots - Service, Jump, etc.

[MrBern]

You'll find plenty of sites on the SPR errors.
http://www.sproe.com/
Ive seen sites that noted little things, like th wrong number of troops in scenes after a few of them were killed .
Others complain that there werent any Flamethrowers on the beach.
Or the wrong German Units being cited when they were weeks away from Dday combat.
I've read that the US Coastguard did not drop th rangers on the beach.

I'd like to know how a sniper could change scopes in the rain & then score a headshot w/o zeroing the scope?


Its a lot of dramatic license in use. No biggie. But people shouldnt mistake it for a documentary.

Band of Brothers is even worse. Everyone thinks Ambrose wrote it & its all historical, but he didnt & its not.
Heres a site that rips apart details in BOB.
http://www.101airborneww2.com/bandofbrothers3.html

 

[SamMarlowPI]

interesting read Bern, thanks for sharing...

 

[Vladimir Berkov]

I would go so far as to say that Ambrose's involvement at all is part of the problem. Ambrose is/was far from a learned source on the war. He was good at eliciting US veteran's stories through interviews, but that was it. He was far from an unbiased or objective source.

 

[MrBern]

Oh, btw, the boots in SPR often seem to be inaccurate.

Bringing it all back to the boots & not off topic.

So when the paratrooper is pulling off his boot to prep a sock for a stickybomb...it sure doesnt look like a real jumpboot.

Some people have complained that a lot of the boots dont look like BROWN WWII boots. That might just be the film not picking up th color. OR the mud & moisture darkening the boot.

The Ranger boots made for the film were too tall, but not really noticible on film thanks to the gaiters.

I found a link w/ some SPR problems
http://www.scruffles.net/spielberg/movies/spr6.html
Q: What are some of the possible errors in the film (as noted by Normandy veterans and keen-eyed observers of the movie)?

1. When were the Ryan brothers last together? When Mrs. Ryan gets the telegram there is a photograph on a table by her front door of four men together in uniform. At the War Department scene it is noted that all four brothers were in the same company in the 29th Infantry Division but then were split up. Yet in the village when Ryan is reminiscing about his brothers with Captain Miller, he tells a story the story of Alice Jardine and says that was the last night his brothers were together. Best solution: Ryan meant that was the last time they were together at home.
The noisy patrol. When the squad first sets out to look for Private Ryan, they make a great deal of noise as Corporal Upham questions them. Rangers (or any experienced infantrymen) would never have been so careless because noise meant death. This scene was probably artistic license to help sketch the characters of the film.
The missing bodies at the top of the stairs. Private Mellish and Corporal Henderson shoot two German soldiers outside the entrance to the room they’re in. Yet when we see Corporal Upham frozen on the stairs, the bodies have vanished.
The Captain’s bars. Captain Miller had his rank painted on his helmet. Experienced combat officers (i.e. those who survived their first day of combat) obliterated all sign of rank from their person lest they attract the interest of enemy snipers. While many officers did have their rank prominently displayed on their helmet, these were generally rear echelon types who never got close to the sound of gunfire.
The wrong combat patch. Soldiers who have been in combat are allowed to wear their unit patch on their right shoulder. During the scene at the War Department, Colonel I.W. Bryce, the one-armed colonel, has a combat patch of the 2nd Infantry Division. This isn't possible because the 2nd Infantry Division did not see any combat until June 7, 1944. An obscure error. Bryce could have lost his arm in the first World War, though he looked too young to be a WWI vet. In the book based upon the script he supposedly lost his arm in combat in Sicily. (Incidentally, one of the producers of the film is Ian Bryce. Neat way to sneak your name into the show.)
The reappearing arm. The same Colonel Bryce regrows his missing left arm in General Marshall's office. Watch closely as the camera pans from General Marshall to assembled officers. Apparently the army reissued Colonel Bryce his left arm. Some think it might just be a shadow that causes this illusion.
Ghost in the squad. Just prior to the machine-gun nest attack, Miller’s squad is seen in a panoramic view with eight members. They started out with eight but Private Caparzo was killed at Neuville. The squad is haunted.
In the film, Private Ryan’s drop zone is supposedly near Neuville. The town is also depicted as occupied by paratroopers from the 101st Airborne Division. In reality Neuville was in the 82nd Airborne Division’s area, just north of the 505th Regiment’s drop zone. Private Ryan’s regiment was actually dropped 7-10 kilometers to the southeast in the vicinity of Vierville. A minor point only for the historically obsessed.
Which company is Ryan really in? When Miller first sets out to look for Ryan, the missing private is supposed to be in Baker Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment. Yet at the glider landing zone where the squad finds the deafened soldier who knows Ryan, he’s moved into Charlie Company. But the soldier could have just gotten confused as to which company Ryan was in. That would have been an easy mistake to make. Both companies were in the same battalion.
The P-51s that save the day at Ramelle don't have bomb racks.
A very obscure mistake at the glider landing zone: the squad approaches a makeshift table to look through the dog tags. The table has nothing on it in the first shot but when they get to it, Pvt. Jackson kicks a K-ration box off it. Somehow the box jumped onto the table.
For the really, really sharp eyed: the .30 caliber machine gun ammo is missing the primers.
Wrong-way poles. In the Omaha Beach scene some of the obstacles are pointed in the wrong direction. We're referring to the large wooden obstacles, not the metal tetrahedrons that the U.S. troops sheltered behind. These wooden obstacles consisted of a log roughly the size of a telephone pole with one end elevated and supported by two other logs. The raised end was supposed to face the beach. The idea was that an incoming landing craft would ride up the pole and detonate the Teller mine at the end of it. Yet in the opening beach scene, the elevated end of these poles is facing the water. Later during the Omaha Beach sequence the poles have reversed direction and are facing the proper way.

 

[thunderw21]

Oh, btw, the boots in SPR often seem to be inaccurate.

Bringing it all back to the boots & not off topic.

So when the paratrooper is pulling off his boot to prep a sock for a stickybomb...it sure doesnt look like a real jumpboot.

Some people have complained that a lot of the boots dont look like BROWN WWII boots. That might just be the film not picking up th color. OR the mud & moisture darkening the boot.

The Ranger boots made for the film were too tall, but not really noticible on film thanks to the gaiters.

I believe the paratrooper boots were actually black jump boots that were colored brown. Why not go with authentic brown boots? Who knows, probably saved money or something to redye black boots.

 

[MrBern]

I would go so far as to say that Ambrose's involvement at all is part of the problem. Ambrose is/was far from a learned source on the war. He was good at eliciting US veteran's stories through interviews, but that was it. He was far from an unbiased or objective source.

There is an interview of Ambrose musing how Spielberg told him, 'Just tell me whats wrong & we'll change it!"
So he told him Hanks was too old to play a WWII soldier! And that all the scenes of the men chatting away in enemy territory was crazy.
So Spielberg squirmed but only changed things by making Miller a Captain.

AND there are those who are not enamored of Dale Dye's military advisal either. He's more familiar w/ Nam era terminology.

 

[MrBern]

I believe the paratrooper boots were actually black jump boots that were colored brown. Why not go with authentic brown boots? Who knows, probably saved money or something to redye black boots.

Is it really even possible to strip a black boot & re-dye it brown?
It might come out a very dark brown & so still look black on screen. It sure wouldnt come out russet.
Tho there are the aerosol cans of some sort of vinyl that basically paints a boot any color.

I suspect a lot of those boots were european surplus.
The soles looked all wrong in the scene where he's putting the boot on w/o a sock.
And really...who would go sockless at that point? There had to have been extra sox to make those bombs.

 

[MrBern]

If you want a rough approximation of the buckleboots, theres always the french versions.
SportmansGuide.com has them for $29.97
Click for Catalogue link

Heres another modern boots that looks a bit vintage
Israeli
http://www.zahal.org/gear/p3.htm

 

[SamMarlowPI]

did the pilots and officers in the B-17s also wear the A-1 flight boots? Eastman sells unissued ones...or did the officers wear some other kind?

 

[Jovan]

AND there are those who are not enamored of Dale Dye's military advisal either. He's more familiar w/ Nam era terminology.

There were often times I felt SPR and BoB felt too, well, modern. I didn't quite know what it was until I found out he had been the military advisor on Platoon and had only participated in the Vietnam war. It seems to explain the anachronistic hand signals in particular.

 

[MrBern]

They did use hand signals back then
http://www.hardscrabblefarm.com/ww2/hand_signals.htm

I'm not sure which ones were misused or mistakenly applied from the wrong era.
Some terminology was reversed.
I think "lock&load" was used ,but read that in WWII it was usually "load&lock."
But I'm no expert on that detail.
Tho I do believe SPR jumbled the DDay challenge "Flash-Thunder"

Fun films to watch, just dont take them as gospel. BAnd of Brothers was a lot more detail oriented that SPR, but they still changed lots of things.
I still think its odd, that Guth is scene briefly in the interviews. But much of what he did was attributed to Webster. I suppose it was easier to combine them as they were both translators. But why depict the guy going off on a combat mission to grab prisoners, when his own published memoirs show he manned the machinegun on the american side of the river? He didnt cross over for the mission. Why change history? I could see how littl jokes & anecdotes were rewritten to give other characters somethign to do...but why concoct & fabricate. The movie suggests he was resented for beign away so long & now he volunteers for a mission to relieve another man. Didnt happen.

Anyway, back to boots.

 

[Jovan]

I know they did, but as it says on that BoB website, many veterans were utterly confused by some of them.

 

[bikini-girl]

Hi, this my frist comment in your fantastic forum!

Compliments, very nice and creative solution. Thanks for the post.

Regards,
Jessica

 

[Fletch]

The ATF Type 1s are my go-to winter walking boot at present. I have size 10D (really about 11E). I'm a 10 1/2D and wear TempurPedic insoles and heavy sox with them, and they're comfy and so far holding up well - tho I'll need to dubb or mink oil them again soon to keep out the wet.

 

[cowboy76]

The service boots from WWII Impressions are supposed to be well made and very comfortable also. I have a pair of the russet rough out boots of theirs and they held up for years,..they're shot now though!! I killed 'em!

 

[Zemke Fan]

ATF Roughouts...

Anyone know if the roughouts were worn in the AAF? I presume so, but would like to use them in my AAF field uniform impression. -- Col. Z.

 

[DutchIndo]

I was lucky years ago to have found an a original pair in my size. There they were forlorn and forgotten in a cool Surplus store. I wore them once like 20 years ago at a Battle. They were un-issued because they were 12.5 EE an unusual size for back then.

 

[Creeping Past]

Italian repro WWII boots

Apologies for veering towards Europe...

Has anyone bought boots from Italian Front? I'm thinking of getting a pair of their mountain boot. I'm always wary of buying without recommendations, so any comments on this seller would be useful.

 

[BellyTank]

IFG Boots

IFG is NOT highly recommended.

If you read some of the reenactor forums/comments, you'll see a mass of comments about hundreds or even thousands of dollars spent with no goods received.

US based, Civil War Boots make an Italian boot and the Italian based vendor, Satoria Equipe are also offering them.

The gear on the IFG site looks fantastic BUT.

I once contacted him about having some goods made-money up front and 6 months plus waiting time. No thanks.


B
T

 

[Fletch]

There were often times I felt SPR and BoB felt too, well, modern. I didn't quite know what it was until I found out [Dye] had been the military advisor on Platoon and had only participated in the Vietnam war. It seems to explain the anachronistic hand signals in particular.

Dye runs a bootcamp for actors - he did for Pearl Harbor as well - and what they get is a taste of Vietnam era Marine training. It probably makes the performances feel more authentically military to a contemporary audience, which needs to be catered to.