The World War II Lorraine American
Cemetery and Memorial is located three quarters a mile north of the town
of St. Avold (Moselle), France on Highway N-33. St. Avold, which is
twenty eight miles east of Metz and seventeen miles southwest of
Saarbrucken.
The cemetery, one hundred and thirteen acres in extent, contains 10,489
American Military Dead, the largest number in our military cemeteries of
World War II Dead in Europe. Most of the Dead here were killed in
driving the German forces from the fortress city of Metz toward the
Siegfried Line and the Rhine River. Initially, there were over
16,000 Americans interred in the St. Avold region, mostly from the U.S.
Seventh Army's Infantry and Armored Divisions and its Cavalry Groups.
My father was in the 7th Army, 15th Infantry, 3rd Division, Company
M. He was a machine gunner and was killed on April 12, 1945 in a
village in Germany near Schweinfurt. He was first buried in a
temporary grave in Germany and then after the war he and the bodies of
10,488 other men were buried here in France.
It was my honor to visit this grave once in my life time on the 50th
anniversary of my father's death. My wife Margie made the suggestion
that we place on his grave a dozen red
roses and a few more besides representing others in our family - to remember the day when I was born
and he had pre-
arranged to have a dozen red roses delivered to my mother and I on July
8th, 1945. The extra roses were placed to signify the honor his my
two sons, Matthew and Karl and their families and my wife Margie.
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