I spent the afternoon on another visit to the Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial, about 3 miles west of the centre of Cambridge on land given by Cambridge University so that Second World War American casualties could be given a suitable resting place and be recognized for their sacrifice.
It is a truly beautiful and inspiring place and cared for perfectly.
I was looking for the graves of a flight crew sadly killed 10 days before Christmas in 1944. They had successfully bombed their target in Germany but as they returned to England, with one engine out, they ran into a thick blanket of fog and disoriented flew into a radio tower guy cable, lost the wing, and crashed very near where I live and go for walks. One man had bailed out earlier and provided details. The rest were killed in the crash.
The records of which grave is which are where they are buried are easy to find and use. My wife and I had a lovely couple of hours. Three of the flight crew are buried next to each other head to toe in the same number grave in sequential rows, and the other two are in the last main row of the cemetery, side by side. The staff were kind enough to tell me that the Navigator isn't in that Cemetery - he was taken back to be buried in Omaha.
Families of boys laid to rest there would be proud of the way their boys are taken care of there. There's not a blade of grass out of place or any too long, and the gravel paths are immaculate - raked every day.
If anybody has a boy there I would be happy to share what I know and help them find him. I'm quite close to Cambridge.
I can't compliment the staff enough. When I mentioned the name of the pilot she knew just which raid it was, details of the raid with photos, had information about all the crew, details of where they were (I knew most of that from the computer search on their site) and how to find them.
I didn't need it but for families visiting they will even arrange for a staff member (covid restrictions allowing) to go to the headstone and apply soft wet sand to the lettering so it stands out in a photo...
Very moving and I have been there several times before...