DEPARTED HEROINE: MONUMENTS OFFICER MARY REGAN QUESSENBERRY
Boston, MA (April 8, 2010) —
Mary Regan Quessenberry 1915 - 2010 (Photo Courtesy of Robert M. Edsel Collection)
Monuments officer and U.S. Army veteran Mary Regan Quessenberry, died today, age 94. Mary was the sole living connection to the beginning of the Monuments Men efforts and the key people whose vision led to their creation. From Langdon Warner, the great scholar of Asian art and swashbuckling explorer, to Paul Sachs, the founder of the first museum studies course in America, to Mason Hammond, legendary professor of Classics at Harvard: Mary knew them all. We were so fortunate to find her and film her memories and stories while she was in good health.
Robert M. Edsel, Founder and President of the Monuments Men Foundation, presenting Mary Regan Quessenberry with the Flag of the United States that flew over the Capitol on June 6, 2007. (Photo Courtesy of Robert M. Edsel Collection)
Mary Regan Quessenberry played an important role in the post-war work of the Monuments Men, a remarkable but small group of 345 men and women from thirteen nations, many of whom were museum directors, curators, artists and architects, who together worked to protect monuments and other cultural items from the destruction of World War II. In the last year of the war they tracked, located and ultimately returned more than five million artistic and cultural treasures stolen by Hitler and the Nazis. Mary assisted with the Monuments Men efforts to return millions of works of art to the countries from which these treasures had been stolen.
Born in Boston on October 10, 1915, Mary Regan attended Radcliffe College and later received a master’s degree in Fine Art from Harvard, where her professors included Monuments Men Paul Sachs, Langdon Warner, and Mason Hammond, all key figures in my new book, The Monuments Men. The United States entered World War II in December 1941. By July 1942 Mary had given up her job as a high school art teacher and was in uniform serving with the WAAC (Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps). Over 400,000 women applied to be part of the first group of women to serve in the US military; only 450 were chosen. She would later become a recruiter for WAC (Women’s Army Corps), where one of the highlights was meeting the Churchill family when they visited Boston. Mary was sent overseas in 1943. Prior to becoming a Monuments officer, she trained with the U.S. Army 8th Air Force under General Doolittle; she was also sent to the Royal Air Force base at Medmenham as part of the Central Interpretation Unit and later, Mary received orders to report to General Carl Spaatz. At that time he commanded the 8th, 9th, and 15th Army Air Corps and led the strategic bombing campaign against Germany reporting directly to General Eisenhower. Mary became “company commander of the 550 WACs who ran Spaatz Headquarters.” For her service as company commander, Mary received a Bronze Star.
L to R: Mary Regan Quessenberry, Mary Churchill and Unknown (Photo Courtesy of NARA)
Following the Allied victory, Mary read in Stars and Stripes that officers with an art history background were needed as Monuments Men. Despite having more than enough points to return home, Mary traveled to Berlin to volunteer for service with the Monuments Men. As a Monuments officer stationed in Berlin, Mary traveled to the Munich Collecting Point, Wiesbaden Collecting Point, various repositories, and badly damaged cities. She worked with fellow Monuments Men Bancel LaFarge, Rose Valland, Charles Kuhn, Calvin Hathaway and others to restitute stolen works of art to their rightful owners. She served as a Monuments officer until 1948, when she retired as a Major after an extraordinary and accomplished military career.
Mary returned home to the United States and taught humanities at the University of Florida, and married her husband Tim Quessenberry in 1965, who preceded her. We shall miss her greatly