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“It isn’t his body I want. It’s his soul.” ~ Delia Gardiner of Old Town, Maine, mother of TEC5 Clovis C. Gardiner, who gave his life on January 20, 1945, in the pursuit of liberty.

They rest in a distant land they fought to liberate 80 years ago; their lives ended by war and their stories silenced by time. There would be no welcome home celebrations for the 54 Maine WWII service members who are interred or commemorated at the sprawling 57-acre American military cemetery in Belgium called Henri-Chapelle. From Maine’s rocky coast along the Atlantic Ocean to its highest peak of Mount Katahdin and from towns in between, these men answered their country’s call. They left everything familiar to fight in a faraway land. They hugged their parents, siblings, spouses, and children goodbye. They missed their families. They dreamt of reunions. They wept. They suffered. They mourned. They sacrificed. They freed a continent. They liberated generations and now their voices speak once again in The Dirigo Men of Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery: Stories of Maine’s WWII Service Members.