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Volksdeutsche: Survivors Of Impossible Circumstance

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AUSTRALIAN STORY: My father was a veteran of the second world war. He fought in the battle for Berlin and survived the terror of the Halbe Pocket. Taken prisoner by the Russians, tortured, starved and released, he escaped the iron curtain and made his way to Australia with an assumed name and under contract as a Displaced Person. The 'war' that he endured was an eternal search for a belonging, for an identity, for a soul, for those were the things that he had lost, and those were the things that he WOULD fight for. In founding a new family, the death of my mother dealt a grave blow. Burdened with a newborn, a one and two year old, he was resolute in reclaiming his existence as a person of worth on this earth. He died in January 2017, a tortured soul, a forgotten soldier. In life he had been displaced but found a new life, a new identity, and a new home in Australia. In death his soul remains displaced, for no government will afford him his redemption through a recognition of his right to legitimacy. Ransomed into service for the Waffen SS, a Nazi, he forfeited his soul in exchange for the lives of his Volksdeutsch family. My father was born in Poland, fought for Germany and belongs in Australia. He will forever remain in my heart, a champion of sacrifice, a testament to the fabric of the human spirit, and yet an enigma to those who are unable to understand.