US CEMETERY SON-US CEMETERY SON, The Netherlands.US CEMETERY SON, The Netherlands.http://uscemeteryson.nl/content/2012/11/us-cemetery-son-the-netherlands<p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">On Sunday the 17<sup>th</sup>&nbsp;of&nbsp;September 1944 operation Market Garden started when the allies dropped off their air landing troops on several locations in the Netherlands to conquer several bridges and held a route later called "Hell's Highway". The British ground troops already waiting&nbsp;near&nbsp;the Belgium border near Valkenswaard started their ground offensive and try to open a gap in the German lines as soon as possible to make a breakthrough from&nbsp;The&nbsp;Netherlands&nbsp;to Germany.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">On the 17<sup>th</sup> of September 1944 and the days following,&nbsp;the 101<sup>st</sup> Airborne division landed near Son by parachute and glider. The weeks following&nbsp; the 101<sup>st</sup> Airborne Division and 30<sup>th</sup> British Corps&nbsp;and supporting units had some bitter fighting. During these fights against the germans occupiers many young Americans and Brits&nbsp;got wounded or even lost their live. </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">The wounded american&nbsp;casualties were mainly transported to the Sanatorium &ldquo;Zonhove&rdquo; in the centre of the town of Son. Those who lost their live were brought to the temporarily&nbsp;US Cemetery in the fields on the northern side of Son&nbsp;near the farm called &ldquo;Waterhoef&rdquo;.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><img src="/media/n_5.jpg" alt="" width="668" height="349" /></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">The americans opened the cemetery on the 19<sup>th</sup> of September 1944. On this particular day some local&nbsp;eyewitnesses saw a group of German P.O.W. under guard of the Americans marching along the road with a shuffle and other working tools in their hand in the direction of the &ldquo;Waterhoef&rdquo; to dig the graves of the American casualties.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;" lang="EN-GB">This road&nbsp;was used from the 19<sup>th</sup> of September 1944 till 1949 as the main entrance road to the cemetery were 411 US servicemen ,48 British and 1 Canadian were buried. Less known is that their were even several hundred germans were buried from 1944 till 1946 in the back of the us cemetery.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">Most of the graves on the cemetery of the allied casualties were adopted by civilians of Son.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">The British casualties were reburied in 1947 in other cemeteries such as in the place Mierlo and Bergen op Zoom.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">Around 1948 the us government started with a program&nbsp;to return the decised&nbsp; to the US or to rebury their beloved ones on the US cemetery in Margraten in the providence of Limburg in The Netherlands. About 60% of the US servicemen&nbsp;turned back to the United States.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">In 1949 the grounds were the temporary cemetery&nbsp;had their ground was&nbsp;given back to the former owner and till this day it&rsquo;s still in use as farmland.</span></span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center">&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center">&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><img src="/media/n_7.jpg" alt="" /></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center">&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><span lang="EN-GB">Unfortunately till 2006 nothing remembered this remarkable place. But in December 2006 their was a stone marker unveiled on the crossing off the former Hell&rsquo;s Highway road between Son and St Oedenrode and the road that led to the former US Cemetery Son.</span></span></p></img></img>