Destination: My Buddies.

>On September 16 Private Strohl, who had been in the hospital since June 13, got a one-day pass from the doctors. He hitched a ride to Aldbourne, where he ran into [Captain Sobel](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/Capt_herbert_m_sobel_506e.jpg), who was ferrying baggage back to Membury. Sobel told Strohl that the company was about to go into action; Strohl said he wanted to join up and asked for a ride to the airdrome. >Sobel warned him, “You’re going to be AWOL.” Strohl responded that he did not think he would get into big trouble by choosing to go into combat with his company, so Sobel told him to hop in. >”It was a stupid thing to do,” Strohl said four decades later. “I was as weak as a pussy cat.” But he wasn’t going to let his buddies go into action without him. He got himself equipped and climbed into a C-47. >Popeye Wynn, who had been shot in the butt helping to destroy the battery at Brécourt Manor on June 6, had been operated on and was recuperating in a hospital in Wales when he was told that if he was absent from his company for more than ninety days, when he was listed fit for combat, he would be assigned to a different outfit. Wynn wanted none of that. He persuaded a sergeant who was in charge of releasing the patients to send him back to Aldbourne with light-duty papers. He arrived on September 3, threw away the papers, and rejoined the 3d platoon. >He was not fully recovered. During the flight to Holland, he stood up in the back of the stick, as he was too sore to sit. But he was there, where he wanted to be, going into combat with his buddies in Easy Company. _____________________________ **Source:** Ambrose, Stephen Edward. “Healing Wounds and Scrubbed Missions.” *Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest*. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2004. 122. Print. ______________________________ **Further Reading:** [Herbert M. Sobel, Sr.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Sobel) [Sergeant Robert 'Popeye' Wynn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Wynn_(soldier\)) [Brécourt Manor Assault](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Br%C3%A9court_Manor_Assault) [E Company, 2nd Battalion of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division / “Screaming Eagles”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E_Company,_506th_Infantry_Regiment_(United_States\))