Henri Chapelle American Cemetery and Memorial, 2005

This American cemetery and memorial coveres 57 acres and is situated directly along a road called rue du Mémorial Américain that leads to the Belgium village of Henri Chapelle. The road actually crosses the actual site that lies on the crest of a ridge affording an excellent view of the rolling Belgian countryside that once was a battlefield.

This area was liberated on September 12, 1944 by troops of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division. A temporary cemetery was established on September 28, 1944 two or three hundred yards to the north of the present site.

On the cemetery 7,989 American military dead are buried of whom most lost their lives during the “Battle of the Bulge”, the German counter-offensive in the Ardennes. It also holds Americans that fell during the advance of the U.S. armed forces into and across Germany and Americans lost in air operations over the region. Their headstones are arranged in gentle arcs sweeping across a broad green lawn that slopes gently downhill.

A long colonnade inscribed with the names of 450 missing, a simple chapel and a map room with two black granite maps of U.S. military operations form the memorial overlooking the burial area.