The cemetery contains 799 military personnel and one civilian who died during the invasion of the Netherlands by the Germans in May 1940.

Immediately after the surrender of the Netherlands, a cemetery was laid out at the Grebbeberg for both Dutch and German dead.

Until 1 January 1952 the cemetery was maintained by the Ministry of Defence, which at that date, transferred it to the Netherlands War Graves Foundation [nl].

The cemetery has a special significance because it is located exactly at the point in the Netherlands where the fiercest fighting took place during the Second World War.

After the fighting (and the Dutch capitulation) the German occupiers ordered a search for victims from both sides to have them properly buried.