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podcast. We post something new every week and
you're going to find it informative. We want
to welcome to Veterans Radio today Robert M.
Edsel. He's a Award -winning author, number one
New York Times bestseller, he wrote The Monuments
Men with Brett Witter. Remember Us is the book
we're gonna talk about, American sacrifice, Dutch
freedom, and a forever promise forged in World
War II. Robert, welcome to Veterans Radio. Thank
you very much, great to be back. This is a good
read and I encourage others to go out and get
it. We'll give you enough information in this
podcast, you're gonna go, wow, I wanna know more,
because there's so much to know about this. This
is about the Netherlands, a specific region,
and how the Dutch were treated by the Nazis during
World War II, and then how they treated the Americans
who came in to liberate them. But you do it in
a method that I find very easy to read, sort
of life stories about specific individuals who
passed through here. This was a lot of work.
How did you stumble on this idea and did you
ever think it would take this long? Well, when
I first became aware of it, it was actually just
a person I wanted to go talk to. One of the Monuments
Men's nephews whose uncle was killed in combat.
He was the one American Monuments Officer killed
just a month before the war was over. accepted
an invitation to the Congressional Gold Medal
awarding, honoring all of the monuments, men
and women. And he RSVP'd yes and sent me a photograph
and said, I just got back from England and I
had a wonderful meeting with Frida. And he enclosed
this photo of this woman with this crown of white
hair. And he knew I knew her and I couldn't place
her. I had no idea who it was for three or four
days. And finally, I remembered the only Frida
I've ever heard of is this 19 year old girl.
that lived outside Maastricht who wrote Harvard
a letter in September 1945 asking for the name
and address of Walter Hutchhouse and the Monuments
Officer who was killed, asking for the name and
address of his mother because she wanted her
to know that she walked five miles to the cemetery
most days of the week to place flowers on his
grave. And it never occurred to me, I made reference
to that in the Monuments Men, but it never occurred
to me she was still alive. So she was. This is
2015 when I found this out and I said to my wife
You know, I want to make sure we go to London
a few months from now when we're headed to Europe
I'd like to meet this lady and my wife said do
you have ambitions here? And I said ambitions
like what and she said well like writing a book
and I said no She knows she knows you too. Well,
you were on the scent of something even if you
didn't know it Well, and I really didn't and
I just felt like she was probably the last person
to see how Chousen before he was killed and I
felt duty bound to talk to her. So four or five
months later I was there and she starts pulling
out these photographs of when the Germans invaded
in May 40 and then in September 44 when the Americans
liberated them and here comes this first tank
over the hill. And she said to me, do you know
about the Netherlands, about the American military
cemetery in Margaret? And I said, you mean the
Netherlands, American cemetery, because that's
what we call it today. And she said, yes. And
I said, oh, I'm aware of it. And she said, have
you been there? And I said, yes, I've been there.
So you know about the grave adoption program.
And I said, the what? And she said, the grave
adoption program. And I knew nothing about it.
And I couldn't believe I didn't. And that is
what set the chart of the course for the next
eight years. That's how long we've been working
on this. Well, I think let's go ahead and explain
what that program is right up front because my
guess is most Americans, most veterans, even
World War II survivors and their families don't
realize what is going on in these American cemeteries
that are over in Europe. where our young boys
and men died in World War II? Good question.
So there are 12 permanent World War II cemeteries
that are run by the American Battle Monuments
Commission in Europe and North Africa and in
the Pacific. And they're of course beautifully
kept. The there is one in the Netherlands called
the Netherlands American Cemetery and it's near
the town of Margraten Which is only 15 miles
from the German border from the town of Aachen
Which is where World War two in Western Europe
started because the German tanks rolled across
the border there so the Dutch were neutral during
World War one and Had declared neutrality in
World War two which Hitler observed until he
didn't and they were stunned to lose their freedom
They hadn't had to happen in a hundred years.
They didn't have a resistance network. They didn't
have a black market. They were disoriented. And
when the Americans liberated this portion of
the Netherlands, this is the very Southeast portion
of the country. They were so immensely beholding
and they general Simpson's ninth army was stuck
in this area because It became clear with the
failure of market garden and the house to house
fighting in Aachen that getting to Berlin by
December 44 wasn't going to be possible. So they
Eisenhower decided to wait out the winter resupply
troops, fuel, et cetera. And the local people
asked these boys to stay in their homes, to stay
in their barns. They were. everywhere and they
enjoyed getting to know them. And when the war
was over, a lot of them didn't come back. And
the Dutch families were grieving for them like
American families were. At the end of World War
Two, there were 17 ,800 boys and a few women
buried at the cemetery. It was our largest World
War Two cemetery in Europe at the end of the
war. And as early as January 45, so still four
and a half months before the war's over, The
people in the town of Margrotton were trying
to find an answer to the question, how do you
thank your liberator when they're no longer alive
to thank? And they came up with several different
ideas, special masses and parades, and finally
settled on this idea of asking one local person
to volunteer to be an adopter to watch over the
grave of one American soldier. And that meant
going out to the cemetery on Memorial Day, Veterans
Day, birth and death day. And if they had the
names and addresses of next of kin, writing them
and sending them a photograph of the grave. And
that's how the program started. By the first
Memorial Day in May 45, 80 years ago, they had
about 300 of the 17 ,000 graves adopted. By May
46, a year later, all 17 ,800 graves were adopted.
And to this day, there are today 10 ,000. boys
and four women that are buried there because
about 8 ,000 were brought back so a higher percentage
retained there than at other cemeteries and they
have been at 100 adoption for 80 years they have
a thousand people on the waiting list to be adopters
even though the turnover is only about 30 per
year but they only have the names and addresses
of about 20 % of the American next of kin because
the army and government refused to provide it.
And that's, you know, another element and purpose
of the book, but that's, that's the adoption
program in a nutshell. And there is nothing like
it anywhere else. There are some adoptions that
occur at some of the other cemeteries, but no
one started an adoption program during the war
that has been sustained for 80 continuous years.
at 100%. It's unique by anything we can find
anywhere. And you write, and this was really
powerful, that the Dutch adoptees view this not
as a duty, but an honor. And it really is a way
for the Dutch population to thank those who gave
up their lives. I mean, you, in the book, talk
to various people who lived through this. It
really was viewed as an honor, not a duty. Absolutely
correct. I'm told by a couple of my friends in
Netherlands that when a divorce happens over
there, it's one of the more hotly contested assets
of the family because both husband and wife want
to continue to be the adopter. So, you know,
in so many ways the Dutch have become more American
than many Americans in the sense that they know
what Memorial Day is for. And it's not a three
day weekend to go to the baseball park and eat
hot dogs. I mean, that's certainly part of it.
By all means, the freedom has paid for that.
The freedom is paid to not know what Memorial
Day is for. But I feel like all of us who are
born in the United States, who have not served
in the military, our lottery ticket winners.
My dad was in, he was a Marine during World War
II in Saipan, Okinawa, Nagasaki. So he grew up
in the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma. So he paid his
dues. I haven't. I mean, I never was drafted
and selective service stopped before I had a
chance. But this is my way of doing something
I think that's meritorious to help the country
and trying to remind Americans or inform them
that Memorial Day isn't just the day to recognize
men and women who've in service who've lost their
lives to the benefit of the country, but also
to celebrate what those lives paid for, which
is our freedom. And it's not free. And what I've
done and remember us is follow the lives of 12
men from 101st Airborne, 82nd Airborne, a chaplain.
Black Grave Digger, the Black Tanker with 784th,
some of everything so that people can follow
and understand just how horrific war truly is.
We're not sugarcoating it. And then we go into
the families homes in the United States and describe
what it was like for those families dealing with
this. And not everyone in my book dies. Some
do, some don't. But their lives all kind of converge
around. where the cemetery is and for different
reasons. And then there is this transcendent
moment of the book, really the last third or
so that describes where war typically ends and
we come home and we all move on. It describes
what the Dutch have done to make sure that these
men and women's lives are never forgotten. and
they drill it into their children and their grandchildren
every day. And this cemetery is filled with life
for anyone that visits there. It's an amazing,
amazing place. Because this is swirling around,
this is a story inside a bigger story of World
War II. It swirls around different battles. dropping
paratroopers in from the air and men who get
caught and have to be rescued by, either get
shot or get rescued by the Dutch resistance.
I mean, there's a lot packed into here. One of
the things I didn't think about until I read
this is, and I'm just gonna use the initials,
GRS. Explain that to us. Well, I'm glad you asked
about that. GRS is an acronym for Grave Registration
Service and the Grave Registration Service officers
can be bookkeepers, they can be morticians, and
then there is a, then there are, they're charged,
well I'll come to that in a second, and then
of course there are quartermaster troops that
dig the graves, and in the Netherlands, That
job befell black Americans. We were more comfortable
handing a shovel to than a gun. So I ask people
because this is the question that I had. What
happens to a soldier when he's killed on the
field of battle? I mean, we think about movies
or books. So someone's killed. That's horrible.
And then you go to the next scene. We don't know.
I mean, we never described this and it's gruesome
and it's horrible. And And it's costly. And I
want, you know, we described this. I mean, it's
a it's the car wreck element of the story that
everyone should know to realize war and loss
of life is not a Game Boy. It's not a Nintendo
game or a Marvel, you know, blow up movie. It's
a very, very serious matter. And it's painful
to know about. But you need to know about it
if you're going to learn that freedom isn't free.
And if you're going to understand the remarkable
things and the humane things that the Dutch did
to try and honor these boys. So someone's killed.
General Simpson promised his boys no one would
be buried on enemy soil. They were loaded onto
trucks. They were driven to Margaret back across
the border right up until the end of the war
when it just became impossible to do that. They
were laid out. The word like a cord of wood or
that phrase is used often where the bodies are
stacked. They're brought in on trucks, the bodies
and the body parts. They're laid out. They're
taken into what's called a stripping line. It's
dangerous work because live ammunition is a concern.
In some cases, soldier may have a pin pulled
on a grenade and his hands rigor mortis or it's
frozen. So they have to remove all the ammunition.
The through the stripping line, they remove all
personal identification objects. They inventory
everything. They do an autopsy of the body or
what's left of it. One of the dog tags is placed
in the mouth. If there is a head, the other dog
tag is nailed to the cross to make sure there's
no chance for misidentification. The bodies are
carried out and laid outside on the other end
of the stripping line. The black quartermaster
troops then. have to lift up the bodies. It's
a very tactile job because there's no wood, there's
no coffins. Everyone's buried in bed sacks. So
they have to lift up the body or the parts and
lower them into the bed sacks. And then they
take them out and they're digging these graves
in horrible conditions, raining all the time,
always cold, sometimes frozen ground. And some
days they were lucky to dig a single grave in
a day. and they're trying to keep up with what's
happening in the war. And to the Dutch's credit,
when in March 1945, the battlefield casualties
were so great and the quartermaster troops couldn't
keep up with it, the call went out for local
volunteers and the townspeople of Margretten
went to their tool sheds and got their shovels
and went out there and helped dig those graves
also. Yeah, as I said, this is a piece of a story
that nobody ever tells, so I thank you for telling
it. It was very informative. Yeah, it's gruesome
at times, but it makes you face the realities
of war. One of the other things that you write
about through a lot of the stories here, in kind
of a war -torn life, and we'd expect, you know,
and certainly you write about diseases and malnutrition,
but one of the things that struck me was the
role of religion, both for the Dutch, residents
of Margadon, as well as some of the American
troops, because one of the ones you write on
is a chaplain, Pat Foulkes I think it is. Talk
to us a little bit about what struck you about
sort of the role of religion in World War II
in the Netherlands at this time. Well that's
a powerful question and I compliment you for
asking it. I think that 20 year olds don't have
an understanding of their mortality for the most
part because they're fortunate and at that life
cycle they haven't lost parents necessarily or
friends. I mean those are little time ticking
time bombs that impact all of us at different
stages of our life. But of course if you're a
combat soldier it's all around you and you're
cut off from your family. The only lifeline is
is our letters and there's no phone calls, there's
no modern -day electronics, etc. And you're in
that foxhole, and the only friends you've got
in the world are those guys dug in next to you.
You know, the old adage about there's no atheist
in a foxhole. And I think that everybody's trying
to find ways to feel some sense of encouragement,
some sense of hope. I just don't think we as
human beings fully appreciate how important hope
is throughout lives and I've spent so much of
my life interviewing elderly people and a lot
of time with the Monuments Men 21 that I knew
and then so many of their family members and
I could see what happened to them when they were
late in life. They felt bad. They'd lost family
members including children. They'd lost a lot
of their friends and And then here people were
interested in them because of the of the book
or the movie. People wanted to talk to them.
They didn't get looked at like old people. And
and that hope was everything. It kept them going
and it gave them a pep to their step. So, you
know, for these 20 year olds, I think religion
was a hugely important matter because it was
something to believe in and hope for, whether
they were 100 percent in or not. It was there
just were so few options. And where the Dutch
were concerned, our key figure in the book, this
remarkable woman, Emily Michals van Kestink,
who was the wife of the mayor of Maastricht,
mother of 12. She was extremely Catholic and
very, very much a person of faith. And she always
felt like that. that belief was well -founded
and she was constantly trying to encourage people.
Our young lady in the book, Frieda, who I knew
the last eight years of her life, she would tell
the American boys who were so fearful and scared
in between battles that would come by her house,
she could talk to them because she was the same
age they were. And she would try and encourage
them and buck them up and tell them, you know,
if you accept Christ is your savior. If you if
you believe these things will all work out. And
she told me how much how good she felt seeing
the boys drive off on the truck knowing that
they were scared to death, of course, but they
had a little bit of sense of relief and a smile
on their face. So I think it's usually important.
Well, it certainly rings through this interaction
between the. the Dutch and particularly the Dutch
women here and the men as they are marching off
maybe to their deaths. I want to talk a little
bit about, and I'll let you pick who you want
to talk about, one or two of the people who are
the major characters here. There's like a dozen
of them. You know, and you mentioned you've got
African Americans, you've got Jews, you've got
Native American. A Native American and Jacob
Herman, a Chaplain. These are really interesting
characters and their life is well shared in the
pages here. Pick one that you want to highlight.
Well, I'll speak less about one so I can tell
you two so we can have kind of an alpha and omega
so you have combat veteran Robert Cole lieutenant
colonel Robert Cole who trained years earlier
with a lieutenant colonel Dwight Eisenhower at
Fort Lewis and Cole was Ike's kind of guy a take
charge lead from the front person that got stuff
done and Here they would end up seeing each other
again on June 5th on the tarmac in the UK hours
before Cole and his stick would jump out of an
airplane over Normandy on June late at night
June 5th leading to June 6 and Cole received
a Medal of Honor for his heroic I'm almost crazy
heroic performance at Carrington and near there
off the beaches. And then he was involved in
the drop on Market Garden. So he's a fascinating
figure and is really kind of a larger than life
Hollywood casting character. And then contrast
that with Jacob Herman, who we mentioned, a Native
American Lakota from South Dakota, whose family
had been relocated three times, going back to
wounded knee in 1890s and then two other times
in the 1940s. And shortly before he volunteered
because the army wanted to use the what was their
reservation as a artillery practice. And his
mother pleaded with him, don't do this, don't
volunteer. All this country's ever done is stuff
to us, not for us. But Jacob Herman, like other
Lakota, had a creed. And when the country was
attacked by Japan, then it was their responsibility
to defend the land. And he wanted to join and
he joined and became a paratrooper with the 82nd
Airborne. So I just wanted people to remember
we were a country of immigrants and a diverse
country. We are a country of immigrants in a
diverse country. I think we always will be. That
has always been a strength of the country. And
here you have two completely different. life,
it's life histories to get to this point. And
yet both these guys are serving, they're both
doing the best that they can do with the assignments
they've got. And I think people are going to
be very wedded to these characters and our two
twins who are both co pilots piloting the same
plane, which is insane, but it was allowed to
happen in 43. And you mentioned our chaplain,
who's another heroic guy that just can't get
close enough to the front and finally succeeds.
in becoming a paratrooper in the 17th Airborne
Division for the drop in varsity in March 45.
So this book, as I say, is sort of a story inside
a story of World War II, and it touches on all
kinds of things folks are gonna be familiar with
while they're learning about the things they're
not familiar with. Certainly there's a touch
of the Monuments Men. Richie Boys are touched
on in here. I found the discussion on the caves
and the murals in this section of the Netherlands
very interesting. But before we run out of time,
I want to do two things. If you pick up this
book, which I encourage you to do, it's called
Remember Us. It is on the Harper Horizon imprint.
Make sure you read the epilogue. Don't stop when
the book stops, keep reading. This may be the
best epilogue I've ever read and Robert really
kind of helped close out some open issues about
80 years later, where are things? And in that
regards, I want you to talk about the Forever
Promise Project. The Forever Promise Project
is reflective of my commitment. This is why I
write the books that I've written. It's not to
write books. It's not my favorite thing to do.
My favorite thing is to tell some great stories
and to try and change the world and make it a
little bit better. We've done some amazing things
through the Monuments Men and Women Foundation
to make everyone aware of what the United States
did during World War II to preserve cultural
heritage. We set the standard for it. We made
sure these men and women were honored. We have
gotten the army to reconstitute Monuments officers
through the Army Monuments Officer Training Program,
AMOT. So a lot of amazing things. And that was
the intent of writing the book was to get a film
made so that we could start changing this part
of the world. I mean, small increments, but at
least I'm paying my share of dues for the lottery
ticket of having born in the United States. So
what's the purpose with with Remember Us? The
answer is the Dutch have all 10 ,000 adopters.
for all 10 ,000 men and the four women that are
buried there, 8 ,300 people buried and 1 ,700
names on walls of the missing. But they only
have 20 % of the name and addresses of the American
next of kin. And they want to talk, they want
to be in touch with the other 8 ,000 Americans.
that they're watching over that they don't have
family connections for. In some cases, these
families have photographs or unfinished letters
that the family members have never seen, but
they don't have anyone to send it to. So the
Monuments Men and Women Foundations entered into
a joint venture with the Dutch Foundation for
Adopting Graves. And we're calling it the Forever
Promise Project because when the government refused
to provide this information, Our mother of 12,
Emily, traveled to the United States and for
five weeks lived with different family every
night that had somebody buried overseas. She
went to American Legion and BFW halls and talked
to people and to everyone. She said, leave your
boys with us. We'll watch over them like our
own forever, a forever promise. And they have
done that. So that's why we call it forever promise.
If you go to the forever promise dot org website,
We have a searchable database of all 10 ,000
men and the four women that are buried in the
Netherlands. And we're asking people to go there
and see, do I have a relative that's there? And
if so, there's a short questionnaire that pops
up, and I mean really short. What's your connection
to the person? Are you aware there's a grave
adoption program? Are you in touch with your
adopter? If you're not, would you like to be?
Will you give us permission to share your contact
information with our colleagues in the Netherlands
so that we can, in a football sense, move the
ball from the 20 -yard line on the other end
of the field all the way down to the end zone
on the opposite end and get in touch and match
up all 10 ,000 adopters with as close to 100
% as we can get with the 10 ,000 American family
members. That's the objective. We should do it.
It's the call to action. And I will talk about
this till I'm put in a grave, but I can't, you
know, I need the help of the American public
to help us help the Dutch do what they've been
doing for 80 years. No, that's what I say. You've
got to read to the end. You got to get to this.
This is really an important book that you've
written here, Robert Hetzel with Brutt Witter.
You've educated us on things we didn't know and
reminded us of some of the costs associated with
liberating Europe. And let's see if we can't
get more folks to reach out. for the Forever
Promise project and link up some more of those
names and we certainly are appreciative of this
book and what the Dutch are doing. I suspect
this book will get translated into Dutch and
you're going to be a hero and sought after as
a speaker in the Netherlands. Well, we've already
gotten it translated into Dutch because I wanted
to make sure the elderly people there that don't
speak English can read their own story and their
own language. Perfect. closing comment more for
all we've gotten done with Monuments Men and
we've gotten done a lot nothing's more important
than our freedom and that's what this books about
and without our freedom none of the other stuff
matters so this is you know this is where the
where the the knife's edge is right now around
the world is freedom and having that freedom
and this is a as I said a call to action for
everybody so go to forever promise org and help
us out and by all means get the book because
it'll help you understand how this situation
evolved and this high point of humanity for what
the Dutch have done and continue to do. Well,
I want to thank you for taking time to talk to
Veterans Radio today. Thank you very much. We
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