1. The American Graves Registration Service (AGRS) worked in cooperation with the ABMC after both the Great War and World War II.
2. Visitors to the cemeteries include next-of-kin of the fallen, civilian and military tour groups, expatriate Americans, and visiting American politicians.
3. Major General Thomas North served with the ABMC for nearly forty-six years and wrote an account of his service, General North's Manuscript, which has not been published. In it he discusses the extent to which American memorial efforts were in dialogue with the memorial efforts of the allies. In an early section he describes the ABMC's post-Great War thought process, “Also, the American monuments must be of such a nature and so sited as to recall the widespread use of our troops during the closing months of the war when their fighting ability and their moral effect on the tired Allied forces was of major importance; understandably, this was no longer being emphasized in Europe” (North, I-10).
4. See North 10–11. In his memoir, North shared his thoughts on architecture critics' reactions to the World War II cemeteries. He wrote, “And the Commission did feel that because a high proportion of the American visitors would be relatives of the dead, still bearing their burden of grief, many of them people of simple background, they should not be confronted with extremes in architectural design. On rare occasions avantgarde ‘experts’ have criticized the architects' creations as unimaginative, pedestrian, but do they nor reveal more inspiration by far than the dreary monotony of human files cases that have come to line our city streets in recent years?”
5. According to General North the practice of allowing epitaphs was discontinued almost immediately due to “light response” and to prevent “invidious distinctions” among the dead.