 My name is Herkling, and I am a soldier. Right now there are dignitaries, ambassadors, statements, politicians, and generals traveling to various battlefields throughout the United States and throughout Europe, and all are speaking about those who sacrificed. But for Sue, my wife, and me, the field here at Margrott will forever symbolize how to best memorialize soldiers. Because we will always remember our visit here last Christmas Eve. You see, we had been invited to attend the Christmas Eve Mass at the Deshark Cave Complex, a place very close to here. Many of you know of it and have been touched by a story. But for those who don't know the story of the cave, during the bloody winter of 1944, when bitter cold denied your spite from the gruesome fighting, and when bombs fell like an incessant rain on friends in full alike, young men, Dutch civilians, and American soldiers gathered in the Deshark Cave to celebrate Christmas Eve. Carved out of Stanstown by the brothers of the Bayard Monastery centuries ago, the Deshark Cave became the place where those recently liberated, those from the Netherlands, and those who had liberated them, the American soldiers, came together to celebrate Christmas Mass. And a motion as conflicted as Christmas in wartime itself was in the era of the cave. Having spent three Christmases in combat, I know the feeling. The hope of new and everlasting life balanced with the fear associated with imminent danger. On one side of the cave were the liberated Dutch people, tasting freedom for the first time in four years. But the Americans who were on the other side of the cave, who were resting after months of hard fighting starting at Normandy, had just received orders telling them they would reinforce their brothers near a place called Besnon. Those young men tempered the celebration of that Christmas Eve night with a sobriety known only to those you know that they will soon face danger. Sixty-seven years had passed since that Christmas Eve service. Sixty-seven years since 300 Americans who shared communion with their Dutch brothers signed their name on the wall of the cave in Charcoal and left to fight in the town not too far from here. Very few of them would see another Christmas. In the sixty-seven years since, the seeds of hope and joy planted by those young men and watered with their blood have been recalled by the Dutch people in that cave on Christmas Eve year after year. Sue and I learned of that story last Christmas Eve when we took communion at the Deshark cave. But before we went to Mass, we came here to the cemetery on a cold, rainy Christmas Eve afternoon before we went to Mass when most Europeans are gathering with family preparing for the Christmas celebrations not expect to see. When we entered the cemetery, we saw an elderly man carefully tending a grave right over there. We stood here and watched him in silent reflection pausing the white backdrop of the Christmas Stone. As he got up to leave, Sue and I approached him with a little bit of courage and gently asked him if the grave was the grave of authorhood of Texas in the site once a week. On this hallowed ground in the Margot, the cemetery laid 8,301 young American men. We've heard that before. An additional 1,722 are memorialized along the Court of Honor backed by the Reflection Pool. And although the American Battle Monuments Commission preserves this sacred place with diligent reverence and thank you for that, the people of Margot enlivened each of these graves through the blessings of gratitude and a living memorial. It amazed us to find that since this place was established in December 1944 the people of Margot have taken it upon me. Connection is to the soldiers buried there is an eternal gratitude. You know, when my staff heard I was coming here, one of my colonels wrote me a note about a family member buried here. His uncle, he told me, lies at Margot. Anton C. Simon, known as Beiner to his family. He was a radio operator killed by a sniper just one heartbreaking month before the war ended. This colonel then told me that a Dutch family named Rijnbouw, I'm hoping they're here in the crowd, adopted his uncle looking after his grave and even hosting his grandmother on the three visits that she paid here to Margot. He asked me if I could give the Rijnbouw thanks and the people of this town his sincere gratitude. I'm sure that the Rijnbouwts are just like that elderly man that Sue and I observed over there just last Christmas. But I would like to pass the thanks to the Rijnbouw family and the thanks of all Americans to the people of Margot who tend to our soldiers here. Yours are acts of respect and loyalty learned from fathers and mothers passed to sons and daughters. We are honored to be here with those who gave their lives, those out there. But we are also very honored to be with the people of Margot who will never forget that young American men died here so that those they didn't even know, we know for you. Sixty-seven years have brought healing. Today our young men and women, Dutch, American, British, German, Polish and many others, have joined an alliance on new battlefields where the cost of liberty is no cheaper than it was in 1940. And all of those soldiers from all of those various nations who are nations that sent forward once again to carry their torch of freedom against the darkness of tyranny remind us of our commitment to one another and those who were asked to pay that price should always be in our memory. People of Margot understand that and for that this old soldier and his wife are very grateful. Thank you all very much and God bless all of you.