Hilary Kaiser

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In 1944 and 1945, hundreds of thousands of American soldiers took part in the Liberation of France. Some 6500 Franco-American marriages would later take place, and many of the women would cross the Atlantic to join their husbands, thus following the example of their compatriots who had wed 'doughboys' after World War I. From the very beginning, such flirtations provoked the irritation of conservatives in France and of puritanical Americans. The former feared the debauchery of their young women, the latter the subversion of their boys. As for marriages, many difficulties first had to be overcome. Fearing an expensive inflow of war brides, who would benefit from free transportation to the U.S. and later acquire American citizenship, the U.S. army and Washington put up obstacles. Many Americans also had a very sceptical attitude towards the integration of these brides, since French women had the reputation of being frivolous, difficult to handle and coquettes.This book, a collection of oral histories, tells the story of French war brides and their GI husbands by following the destinies of fifteen French war brides - three from World War I and twelve from World War II. All of these women encountered cultural shock as they discovered an opulent and open society which was, however, materialistic and racially segregated. Many of their GI husbands had been traumatised by the war. But the women survived. Although about half of the marriages ended in divorce, only about a hundred and fifty of the women returned to France. Most of them, in their own way, lived the American Dream. Today these women are both French and American. They reflect the image of a successful betrothal between two cultures.