Easy Company / 2nd Battalion 506th PIR / 101st Airborne Division who passed away 5 years ago, on May 22, 2017 at age 91. Frank’s wife Renee passed away only 16 days earlier, on May 6, 2017.
Frank Soboleski’s life story was featured in the 2009 book “We Who Are Alive and Remain : : Untold stories from Band of Brothers” by Marcus Brotherton.
Operation market Garden – The Battle of the Bulge Germany – Austria
On September 17, 1944, along with other replacement members, Frank parachuted into Son in Holland with Easy Company and they fought their way up to liberate Eindhoven.
Frank also participated at what later would be called The Battle of the Bulge and fought throughout Germany and was also present when Hitler’s “Eagles Nest” in Berchtesgaden (Germany) was captured. Frank, together with Easy Company, ended the war in Austria.
Easy Company became immortalized in HBO’s miniseries “Band of Brothers” and the veterans gathered for a reunion in Europe. It was very therapeutic for all of them to go back and see fields that were all blown up and now nice with cows grazing, everything nice again, and to see buildings that had been damaged had been rebuilt.
Frank suffered from severe headaches since coming under Nazi shelling during the Battle of the Bulge, but when feeling well he was described by his wife, Renee as happy, pleasant and fun to be around. He grew up as one of 14 children on a farm near International Falls – a childhood that readied him for his time in Europe. He was always in the woods as a young boy. He was 6 years old bringing home a deer. Frank wanted to become a pilot, but colorblindness halted that dream. Instead he decided to jump out of airplanes with the paratroopers. The paratroopers were an elite group of soldiers and you knew that they had your back because they were committed. He tried to join the U.S. Army at age 17, but he had to enlist until he was 18 in 1943. He jumped into combat in the Netherlands. He met up with Easy Company after the chaos of the unsuccessful Operation Market Garden, and they headed to Bastogne, Belgium, where his battalion would be under siege for 31 days. In Germany, his battalion was instructed to cross a river to capture Germans as prisoner’s of war. It turned out that Frank was the only one who knew how to swim. Frank swam across the river with the rope to bring the raft across. On the other side, a German soldier surrendered. The soldier told Frank that he watched him swim across the river and could have killed him at any time, but he wanted to surrender.
These soldiers, including Frank, were honored in Normandy France by HBO with the showing of the premier of the miniseries, “Band of Brothers” among their families, the actors in the series, and the Easy Company” soldiers. They showed the men jumping out of the airplane, and being shot while they were falling because it was antiaircraft shooting up the planes that were dropping the paratroopers. They were being killed as they were dropping. This was a very emotional event and when the lights came on everyone was silent with tears in their eyes, including Frank, who looked at me and said, “I spent all these years putting that away and it just all came back”. This gave us a better understanding of who Frank was and what he had lived through and our love for him grew deeper. Frank went on, after the war, to live a colorful life and was fun to be around. He worked his career with Boise Paper Mill. He enjoyed fishing, hunting, trapping, time at the lake cabin and hunting shack, traveling with his wife, Renee, and spending time with his family and puppies.
It was a very sad day when Frank passed away and we miss him and love him so very much.
We lost both Mom (Renee) and Frank within 16 days and this was so very hard. They were very much in love and are together now in heaven. We love you and are missing having you in our lives. We will see you again in heaven.
All our love forever, Barb and Dave Cassibo, Beth and Bob Krueger, Bonnie Harmon and Mark, grandchildren, Heidi, Janelle, Sam, Kayla, Camille and many great grandchildren
