The Cassino military cemetery is the resting place of German soldiers who died in southern Italy.
Cemetery description
The war cemetery is located three kilometers north of the town of Cassino on the southern foothills of Colle Marino. The cube-shaped entrance building to the extensive terraced complex is open at the top so that daylight falls on the sculpture "Mourning and Consolation" in the hall. The sculpture by sculptor Suse Müller-Diefenbach is integrated into the structural ensemble of the war cemetery. The burial plots are laid out in terraces and ellipses. Stone crosses on both sides bear the name, rank, date of birth and date of death of three of the dead. From the highest point of the cemetery, you can see the valley and the town of Cassino, which was fiercely fought over during the Second World War.
Since May 19, 2012, the "Flame of peace" sculpture has been a reminder of the peaceful coexistence of peoples. It was donated by Herta Margarete Habsburg-Lothringen, President of the Association for the Promotion of Peace.
in 2014, seven name plaques were placed in the memorial hall for 911 dead who rest in the cemetery among the unknown.
Burial
Around 20,100 soldiers are buried in the Cassino military cemetery. They fell in the battles for the beachhead in the Gulf of Salerno, during the retreat along the Adriatic coast and in the battles for the town of Cassino and the Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino.
in 1959 and 1960, the reburiers of the Volksbund recovered 20,076 bodies from countless smaller cemeteries and scattered field graves and interred them in Cassino. Although the reburiers made meticulous efforts to identify the previously unknown dead, 3,100 graves remained nameless.
History
The battle for Monte Cassino in 1944 was one of the longest of the Second World War, lasting four months. More nationalities were involved in the fighting in this region than in any other war: soldiers from over 25 nations are mentioned, including Americans, Germans, British, French, Italians, Indians, Canadians, Moroccans, New Zealanders, Maori and Poles.
In December 1955, the German-Italian War Graves Agreement agreed to create a final resting place near Cassino for German soldiers who died in the southern Italian region during the Second World War. In the south of the country, there is another site for German soldiers in Sicily near Catania, the Motta St. Anastasia war cemetery. The Cassino German military cemetery was inaugurated on May 4, 1965.
