i’m sure we can ALL (most likely) agree that during our watch of band of brothers, cobb got on our nerves.. wether it was the hypocrisy towards the replacements, or the aggression towards webster— we were irritated by him at some point.
however, i believe this was an injustice done to the real cobb by tom hanks… let’s get into it⬇️
Roy Cobb was born on the 18th june 1914 in new york, united states; he passed away in 1990 at the age of 76 in niagara, new york.
he served from 1934-1945, and his final rank was PVT as a rifleman.
unlike his unfriendly portrayal in band of brothers, cobb was actually known to be quite good natured and kind, often actually helping replacements, etc.
he had already seen a lot of combat pre easy company, he fought in northern africa, survived a torpedoed troopship, and then went on to serve as a paratrooper, while yes he was injured during the drop in normandy— he rejoined easy not so long after and fought in every battle after.
In episode 8, we see cobb and others watching the german soldier that was screaming in pain, in the show cobb just swears and then walks away, however, in real life he actually collected lots of hand grenades and threw them across the bank (whilst at high risk of being shot by germans as this was in broad daylight), ultimately ending the german soldiers suffering.
unfortunately, the incident we see at the end of episode 8 where cobb gets aggressive with webster is true so SOME degree.
-> in real life, PVT. cobb actually assaulted Lt. foley, his platoon leader, after drinking a whole bottle of schnapps (presumably because he was mentally and physically tired); this incident unfortunately lead to his discharge from easy company, he was court martialed. he did however stay with easy company for 2-3 more months, meaning he was with them until shortly after VE day, whilst his court martial papers processed.
this incident was out of character for cobb, and his comrades still described him as good natured, and none had anything particularly bad to say about him— which is why i believe the show did an injustice to the real cobb.
cobb had an extremely private life post-war, so not much information can be found on what he did after, but we do know that he unfortunately passed away from cancer in (est.) january 1990 at the age of 76– he also unfortunately cut complete ties with his military connections, and never attended an easy company reunion.
roy cobb was a great man who had a singular blip during his service, tom hanks should’ve done better and honoured him the way he did with other veterans.
1914-1990, PVT. roy cobb, rifleman.
