by Andrea Wales

USAG Benelux Public Affairs Office

Maastricht had broken out in a spirit of celebration just a few months before when, in September 1944, it became the first Dutch city to be liberated by the Allies during World War II. However, in the dead of winter — the coldest winter in 20 years — the American Soldiers there had a hard time mustering the holiday spirit.

Christmas Eve used to mean family and friends gathering for a church service, a festive meal and a gift exchange. Instead, the Soldiers faced a somber ride to neighboring Belgium and the front lines of the Ardennes offensive.

In the weeks before what came to be known as the Battle of the Bulge, Allied troops set up camps and used a network of man-made caves in the region to store supplies and seek refuge from Luftwaffe air raids.

However, the caves didn’t shelter them from the fear and loneliness that was especially acute with the prospect of “getting back into the war” looming large. They knew the battle was still raging and, at any moment, they could be called to fight the last convulsion of the German war machine.

Monks from nearby Beyart Monastery had a way to combat that “far away from home” feeling that the men were experiencing. The Brothers of the Immaculate Conception posted notice of a Christmas Eve midnight Mass for troops in the area.

A group of 270 Soldiers gathered together that night at De Schark Cave for a short respite from the realities of war. Historical records confirm that most of the Soldiers who participated in the 1944 Mass were from the 117th, 119th and 120th Regiments of the 30th Infantry Division, “Old Hickory,” as well as some stranded crew members from allied aircraft that had been shot down. U.S. Army chaplain Father Boleslaus J. “Bill” Dobrzynski celebrated Christmas Mass.

After centuries of being quarried for slabs of limestone, De Schark’s straight-walled corridors and man-made vaulted ceilings were reminiscent of a Gothic church, a fitting place for high Mass. Lit only by candlelight, the cream-colored walls of the underground quarry made the space brighter than one might expect for a cave. A choir of about 20 Dutch monks also helped set the mood. The Mass offered the men some moments of reflection, fellowship and prayer. The war-worn troops worshipped, then they warmed themselves with hot cocoa and coffee, and ate doughnuts before some of them headed right back to the fight. Midnight Mass has been celebrated at De Schark almost every year since. The cave was closed for repair from 2005 to 2010. The tradition was scheduled to resume Christmas Eve 2010, but blizzard conditions forced the cancellation of the event. The annual celebration of Midnight Mass in the cave resumed Christmas Eve 2011. In 2014, hundreds of American and Dutch military personnel, family members and local citizens ventured into the cave 70 years after that first Christmas Eve to hear this wartime story from a Soldier who lived it. Robert Wisler, a 19-year-old Army supply sergeant from Ohio, arrived in Maastricht in the winter of 1944 as part of the 55th Antiaircraft Artillery Brigade of the Third Army, and he celebrated his 20th birthday in the cave right after the midnight Mass finished in the early hours of Christmas Day. On Christmas Eve 2014 just before his 90th birthday, Wisler returned to share his memories and honor those of his comrades who lost their lives to liberate Europe from Nazi Germany. “They made a space on one of the walls for those attending the Mass to sign their names,” Wisler said. “A couple of days before the Mass, a few guys from our unit and I hung the American flag that’s still there.” Wisler expressed gratitude to the Brothers of the Immaculate Conception for organizing the Mass. “All of us, especially those on the front lines, were tired, cold, scared and missing our homes and families,” he said. “Growing up, my family had often gone to midnight Mass, so the Mass in this cave that night brought a feeling of comfort and helped me feel closer to those back home.” The return to the cave and the wartime memories were shared by more than 25 members of the Wisler family, to include his sons, daughters-in-law, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who all came to the Netherlands to see the place they had heard about for so long and to look for their loved one’s name written in charcoal on the dusty wall of the cave. “To see him look at the names and just hear him remember different guys and say where they were from and what they were like — if they were a ‘character’ or ‘a really nice guy’ or ‘really funny’ — gave life to those names,” granddaughter Kristen Wisler said. “It gave me a much greater appreciation for the sacrifices that were made — both of the lives that were sacrificed and of the heaviness (that) guys like my grandpa have always carried with them for those they left behind.” For the Wisler family, sharing this experience with their own personal hero was also like traveling back in time and seeing what Robert Wisler was like as a man barely out of his teens. “Being there allowed me to see him as a young man, or really just a 20-year-old boy,” Wisler’s granddaughter said, “an American Soldier who was there to do a job because it was the right thing to do.” Maj. Richard Komurek of Joint Forces Command Brunssum Public Affairs as well as Tom Budzyna and Ruud van Heel of U.S. Army Garrison Schinnen Public Affairs Office (before Schinnen was subsumed under USAG Benelux) contributed to this report.

De Schark quarry: Christmas in a cave