Word Celebrity Blog

Darrell C. Powers


Staff Sergeant Darrell "Shifty" Powers was a non-commissioned officer with Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, in the 101st Airborne Division during World War II.

Darrell C. Powers was born in Clinchco, Dickenson County, Virginia and volunteered for the paratroopers with his good friend, Robert "Popeye" Wynn. Shifty had spent a great deal of time in the outdoors hunting game prior to joining the service. This later proved useful as many of the skills he obtained in his youth helped him as a soldier. After graduating from high school, he enlisted in the army on August 14, 1942 at Richmond, Virginia. After intensive training, Powers was assigned to the famed Easy Company 2nd Battalion 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division,


Military Service

























Shifty Powers jumped into Normandy on D-Day. His missed landing with his group in their drop zone. He eventually came in contact with Floyd Talbert and the two made their way to Easy Company. He participated in the Allied military operation Operation Market Garden in the Netherlands, and the Battle of the Bulge in Foy, Belgium.  While in Foy, a German sniper shot a member of Easy Company, and everyone took cover.  Shifty made a heroic attempt and silenced the German with his M1.  Members of his company said that Powers saved many lives that day. 

Darrell Powers was generally considered to be the best shot in Easy Company.

One of his remarkable achievements, and a testament to the extraordinary gifts his backwoods upbringing brought to Easy Company, was the story documented in the Ambrose book, "Band of Brothers", about the time in Bastogne when Shifty mentioned to his commanding officer that he noticed a tree that was not in the distant forest just the day before. The "tree" was ultimately discovered to be a camouflaged German artillery piece. It had been disguised as a tree. Were it not for Shifty's keen observations and outdoors experiences, many lives may have been lost, had that enemy weapon not been spotted from a distance of nearly a mile away and amongst a literal forest of other trees.


























Later Years

Because many men serving in the 101st lacked the minimum points required to return home, a lottery was put in place. Shifty Powers won this lottery after the rest of the company rigged it in his favor by removing their own names, and was set to return stateside. During the trip to the airfield, the vehicle that Shifty was in was involved in an accident and he was badly injured.  He spent many months recuperating in hospitals overseas while his comrades in arms arrived home long before he did.

He was honorably discharged from the Army in the postwar demobilization. After returning home Powers became a machinist for the Clinchfield Coal Corporation. He is listed as one of 20 men from Easy Company who contributed to the 2009 book "We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories from the Band of Brothers", published by Penguin/Berkley-Caliber. Shifty Powers was portrayed in the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers by Peter Youngblood Hills.

Powers died on June 17, 2009, after a bought with cancer, in Dickenson County, Virginia. He was 86.

The Roanoke Times, one of the few papers that covered Shifty’s death, wrote of an interview it had done in 2001 with the famous veteran. The article mentions Shifty’s modesty and his story about how he shot a German soldier and what he thought about it years later. The reporter maintains Shifty seemed to understand the tragedy of war in that he said this about his experience: he fought and also hinted at the intrinsic tragedy of combat."We might have had a lot in common. He might've liked to fish, you know, he might've liked to hunt," Powers said. "Of course, they were doing what they were supposed to do, and I was doing what I was supposed to do."

"But under different circumstances, we might have been good friends."

The Tri-Cities newspaper also wrote about Shifty, a few days after the heroes’ death, talking of his exploits and quoting his daughter’s remarks about her father’s service to his country.

The paper writes that “bravery – and dignity – was a constant, running thread in the life of “Shifty” Powers, both during and after his life as an Army sharpshooter in the actual “Band of
Brothers.”While in the war, the battles he fought with his Band of Brothers involved brutal combat against the Germany Army in France and Belgium.Margo Johnson, Shifty’s daughter, was quoted as saying this after her father’s death, “I loved
everything about my daddy,” Johnson said. “He never bragged about what he did in the war. And for a lot of years, he never even talked much about what he did – unless someone asked him about it.”

“But he truly was a hero to me,” Johnson said. “Just like he’d been to the people who know him as a soldier in a [mini-series].”

“Daddy had a very unique personality,” Johnson said. “He was always interested in everything. He loved reading and fishing and hunting.”

Margo said when her father talked about the war, it was funny stories, mostly about his buddies. “Some of the guys would come to visit and they’d tell funny stories but never anything about the war,” Wayne Powers said. “He never talked about it or dwelled on it.”

Neither Margo nor her brother Wayne had heard many of the stories of their young father’s life as a soldier until after the book came out. “They only told us the basics,” he said. “Nobody other than these guys know everything about it. I’m sure there are things that they did that nobody will ever know about other than these
guys.”

“I can’t recall ever seeing him real angry at anything, I can’t remember him ever saying a mean thing to anyone,” said friend and fellow service member McClung of Colorado. “He was a real Southern gentleman and kind-hearted to everyone. We were real good friends.” The other men who served with Powers during World War II remember him in the same light.




















Medals and Decorations:

Bronze Star with 1 Oak Leaf Cluster
Presidential Unit Citation with 1 Oak Leaf Cluster
Army Good Conduct Medal
American Defense Service Medal
American Campaign Medal
Bronze star
European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with 3 service stars and arrow device
World War II Victory Medal
Army of Occupation Medal
Croix de guerre with palm
French Liberation Medal



Like millions of veterans, Powers lived a simple productive life and would have slipped into history unknown if it were not for Stephen Ambrose and the story "Band of Brothers" , which was turned into an HBO mini series…

The world learned of Earl McClung and Darrell Powers and the rest of the men of the 101st Airborne’s 2nd battalion, 506th regiment, E Company. Easy Company - The Band of Brothers. Darrell Powers his own didn't didn’t get to know many things until after the 1992 Stephen Ambrose book “Band of Brothers, E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne: From Normandy to Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest.”

“I learned about another part of him,” Margo Johnson said.

The book tells of Easy Company’s history, from it’s jump into Normandy on D-Day, to its parachuting into Market Garden, its hunkering down at Bastogne and its final role at the end of the war.

“He always said they were just a very small part of the war,” Margo  Johnson said. “He doesn’t know why Steve Ambrose chose him to write about.”

But the book and subsequent television series “Band of Brothers,” which came out in 2001, gave Shifty
Powers a measure of fame. He used it as an opportunity to talk to kids at schools, Margo Johnson
said. Fans of the series also kept Powers’ mailbox full.

“I’m sure there are letters still at the post office,” she said. “He had people from all over the world come to his house. Everybody felt like they knew him.”

"But they only know the one presented in the book or series."

"They don’t know the boy who earned his nickname during his days on the Clinchco High School basketball team."

"They know, partially at least, of the fabled marksman."

"They don’t know the ex-soldier who worked as a machinist for Clinchfield Coal Co."

"They don’t know the cancer patient, still strong enough to tend two gardens."

"And they don’t know the man who would have marked his 60th wedding anniversary to wife Dorothy come October".

“'Band of Brothers’ doesn’t define my dad; it’s part of him,” Wayne Powers said. “He was so much more.”