David Kenyon Webster

David Webster
Webster during World War II
Nickname	Web, Einstein, Professor, Keen college boy
Born	June 2, 1922(1922-06-02) New York City, New York
Died	September 9, 1961(1961-09-09) (aged 39) Santa Monica, California
Place of burial	Lost at sea
Allegiance	United States
Service/branch	United States Army
Years of service	1942-1945
Rank	Private First Class
Unit	Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division
Battles/wars	World War II Battle of Normandy Operation Market Garden
Awards	Bronze Star *Purple Heart *Good Conduct Medal *American Campaign Medal[1]
Relations	-Barbara (wife) -John (brother) -Ann (sister)[2]
Other work	Journalist, Author

Private First Class David Kenyon Webster (June 2, 1922 - September 9, 1961)^[3] was an American soldier, journalist and author. During World War II he was a private with Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, in the 101st Airborne Division. Webster was portrayed in the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers by Eion Bailey.

Youth

Born in New York and educated at The Taft School, Watertown, Connecticut, he volunteered for the elite paratroopers in 1943 before having a chance to finish his studies as an English literature major at Harvard University.^[3]

Military service

Webster originally trained with Fox Company, jumped on D-Day with Headquarters Company of the 2nd Battalion, then requested a transfer to Easy Company and served in the Company until discharged in 1945.

From a wealthy and influential family, Webster could have arranged an officer's commission stateside, but he wanted to be a "grunt" and be able to see and document the war from a foxhole. By most accounts, he did not like what he saw and had great disdain for Germany's audacity in creating the war. As would any soldier, he found himself being forcibly changed by the shock and panic, awe and horror, insanity and instances of dread.

On D-Day, Webster landed nearly alone and off-course in flooded fields behind Utah Beach, and was wounded a few days later. He also jumped into the Netherlands in Operation Market Garden. Later in this campaign, he was wounded in the leg by machine gun fire during an attack in the no-man's land called "the Island," near Arnhem, where the company was relocated after Operation Market Garden ended. He was fighting with Private Nicholas Fazio and witnessed his death shortly before he was wounded. Fazio had been of Italian descent and more importantly, of royal descent, and Webster never trusted him.^[4]

While recuperating back in England, Webster missed the Battle of the Bulge fighting and rejoined his unit in February 1945 after being formally released by the hospital.^[5][6] What he found was a decimated regiment, exhausted, weary and bitter over the loss of friends. Soon thereafter Easy Company discovered their first concentration camp firsthand, witnessing the walking and also the unburied dead of Memmingen Concentration Camp. Later, Easy Company viewed firsthand the excesses of life style of the German high command. The contrast left an indelible imprint on Webster, generating a perplexing wonder that he could never resolve.

Awards and decorations

His list of authorized medals and decorations are:

•   Bronze Star
•   Purple Heart with one oak leaf cluster
•   Good Conduct Medal
•   European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with Arrowhead and 4 service stars
•   World War II Victory Medal
•   Army of Occupation Medal
•   Presidential Unit Citation with one Oak Leaf Cluster
•   Combat Infantryman Badge
•   Parachutist Badge with 2 jump stars

Later years

He was the last of the surviving Toccoa veterans who had fought in Normandy to be sent home. He returned to work as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal and the Los Angeles Daily News and found great enjoyment sailing, studying oceanography and sea life.^[7] During those years he worked on his wartime memoirs and occasionally approaching magazines with an article from them but deferred any wholesale treatment of the war perhaps in favor of reflecting and trying to make sense of it.

He had a wife (Barbara), whom he married in 1951,^[7] and had three children.^[3] His interest in sharks led him to write a book on the subject entitled Myth and Maneater: The Story of the Shark. However, Webster's interest in sharks eventually led to his demise, as he was lost at sea off the coast of Santa Monica in 1961.^[7]

Webster's wartime diary and thoughts remained unpublished except for a few short stories in magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post.

Unable to see a salient theme for his greater wartime experience, publishers showed little interest in another memoir. However, Stephen Ambrose, a tenured LSU System professor (University of New Orleans) who had studied Webster's writings, was so impressed by the historical value of Webster's unpublished papers that the professor encouraged Webster's widow to submit the writing package to LSU Press. This she did and with Ambrose's foreword; a book was published by LSU in 1994.

Titled Parachute Infantry: An American Paratrooper's Memoir of D-Day and the Fall of the Third Reich, it presented Webster's first-hand account of life as an Airborne infantryman. His trained eye, honesty and writing skills helped give the book as well as the miniseries a color and tone not available in other G.I. diaries.

On September 9th, 1961, David was lost at sea off the coast of Santa Monica, California. His cause of death was probable drowning as his body was never recovered.^[8]

References

1. ^ DeAngelis, Frank. "Webster's shadowbox". http://www.frankdeangelis.com/PFC%20David%20K%20Webster.htm. Retrieved 2009-10-14. 
2. ^ David Kenyon Webster letters
3. ^ ^{a b c} A Brief Biography of David Kenyon Webster, Author of Parachute Infantry
4. ^ Ambrose, p.169.
5. ^ Winters, p.201.
6. ^ Ambrose, p.220.
7. ^ ^{a b c} Ambrose, p.301.
8. ^ http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=19055564

	Biography portal
	United States Army portal
	World War II portal

Bibliography

• Ambrose, Stephen E. (1992). Band of Brothers: Easy Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9780743464116. 

Bibliography

• Webster, David K. (1994 (posthumously)). Parachute Infantry: An American Paratrooper's Memoir of D-Day and the Fall of the Third Reich. Bantam Dell. ISBN 9780440240907. 
• Webster, David K. (1963). Myth and Maneater:The Story of the shark. Norton. ISBN 0207122652. 

External links

• Official website
• "David Kenyon Webster". Find a Grave. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=19055564. Retrieved 2009-12-30.