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Are there any Medal of Honor recipients buried at Margraten?
Executive summary
The Netherlands American Cemetery at Margraten is the final resting place of roughly 8,290 U.S. World War II service members and—according to multiple local and cemetery-focused sites—includes six Medal of Honor recipients among those buried there [1] [2]. Official U.S. government lists (American Battle Monuments Commission) are referenced by these projects for names and counts; available sources corroborate the “six” figure but do not list all individual names in the snippets provided here [1] [2].
1. Margraten is a large U.S. WWII cemetery — and local sites say six Medal of Honor recipients are buried there
The Netherlands American Cemetery (Margraten) contains roughly 8,290–8,291 burials and about 1,722 names on the Walls of the Missing; Dutch projects and the cemetery’s interpretive sites explicitly state that six Medal of Honor recipients are among those interred at Margraten [1] [2]. These counts and the “six” figure appear consistently across local and memorial websites that document the cemetery and its commemorative projects [1] [2].
2. Which primary sources are being used, and what they do and don’t show
The Dutch sites that report the “six” Medal of Honor recipients cite the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) and the Fields of Honor/Margraten projects as sources for lists and personal pages [1] [3]. The snippets provided here show that the ABMC is the U.S. government agency that maintains Margraten and is pointed to for names and further verification, but the specific ABMC pages or the ABMC’s roster of those six recipients are not included in these search-result snippets [1] [3]. Therefore, while secondary sources repeat “six,” the ABMC citation is referenced rather than reproduced in full in the material given [1] [3].
3. Examples from encyclopedic reporting that name some Medal of Honor recipients connected to Margraten
Wikipedia’s article on the Netherlands American Cemetery names certain Medal of Honor recipients associated with Margraten in its text snippets — for example Lt. Col. Robert G. Cole, Pfc. Willy F. James Jr., and Pvt. George J. Peters are mentioned in the cemetery article [4]. The Wikipedia entry thus supplies individual names that tie Medal of Honor recipients to Margraten, supporting the broader claim that decorated soldiers are buried there, but the snippet does not explicitly enumerate all six recipients or connect each unambiguously to a Margraten gravesite within the provided excerpt [4].
4. Context: why this matters to Dutch remembrance and ongoing projects
Dutch historical projects such as “The Faces of Margraten” and local oral-history initiatives emphasize the cemetery’s role in Netherlands liberation memory and volunteer care for graves; those same projects highlight the presence of Medal of Honor recipients among the buried as part of the cemetery’s significance [3] [1]. The “Black Liberators” and other research programs have also re-examined identities and stories of those buried there, showing local interest in who is interred and how they are commemorated [4].
5. Limitations and gaps in the available reporting
The sources provided here consistently state the number “six” for Medal of Honor recipients buried at Margraten, but the snippets do not produce a single, full official roster from ABMC or a consolidated list of all six names within the materials shown [1] [2] [3]. Available sources do not mention a complete, cited list of the six recipients in the snippets you gave; they point readers to the ABMC for comprehensive lists [1] [3].
6. How to confirm the exact names and grave locations (next steps)
For definitive verification and grave-locator information, consult the American Battle Monuments Commission’s official Margraten cemetery pages and database (these are referenced by the local projects), or the Congressional Medal of Honor Society recipient database for cross-checking individual names and burial places [1] [5]. The Dutch projects and Wikipedia point toward those primary sources as the authoritative records for names and burial locations [1] [4].
Summary conclusion: Multiple cemetery and local-history sources state that six Medal of Honor recipients are buried at Margraten and name at least some individuals connected to that claim [1] [2] [4]. The provided excerpts do not include a complete, primary-source list of all six names; consult the American Battle Monuments Commission and the Congressional Medal of Honor Society for full, authoritative verification [1] [5].