About State Adoptions: The Children of French Zone of Occupation in Germany: 1945 – 1952

By Yves Denéchère
English

After the Second World War, during the allied occupation of Germany, thousands of children were born to German mothers fathered by men in the allied forces. In 1946, the French authorities established a policy of abandon/adoption. The goal was to monitor the abandonment of children with French fathers by their German mothers and organize the adoption of those children in France. From nurseries in Germany to intermediary associations to adoptive families, a complete network was established in a Germany that had no government. The French authorities followed a unilateral procedure for these international adoptions. In 1949, with the creation of the Federal Republic of Germany, the situation changed. French diplomacy put an end to this policy that increasingly involved fewer and fewer children. The desire of the French leaders to prevent problems from cropping up in the future went as far as to recover the traces of this policy from German archives.

Keywords

  • France/Germany
  • 20th Century
  • occupation
  • children
  • abandonment
  • adoption
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