Finding My Phantom Father: A World War II Daughter's Quest

Abstract

Embarking on this quest involved a multi-layered approach to mystery solving. This mystery involved my father, missing in action and then declared dead at the end of World War II in Europe. Without proof of his demise, my family accepted his fate and moved forward with all questions unanswered. A formal inquiry into the question, “What is the effect of father-loss on women whose fathers were killed in war?” (Taylor, 2001) was an effort to seek commonality or disprove it. Through this research, it was discovered that there is an entire population of war-orphans whose American fathers were killed in World War II. Based on that rich and meaningful discovery, I began a search for my father's missing crash site in Germany. This article illuminates this quest, the eventual outcome, and the impact this work has on grief and loss literature; the substantive reality of war loss, the component of disenfranchised grief, and how healing from this kind of loss is defined.