Cherrie’s hunt for her Marine daddy
More than 70 years after he left New Zealand, a Blenheim woman is searching for her birth father.
Retired school teacher Cherrie McGlashan said she had renewed motivation to try to find what happened to her father, a United States Marine stationed at Paekakariki during World War II, following a chance meeting with a woman while on holiday in the US.
But with only the name of her father, and no photograph, to go by she understood her quest could end in vain.
Her birth father would be in his 90s, and possibly passed away, which made the search difficult, she said.
Between 1942 and 1944, more than 15,000 American soldiers were stationed north of Wellington, and about 5000 US Marines were based at three camps on the Kapiti Coast.
Kapiti US Marines Trust secretary Allison Webber said the group dealt with up to two queries a month for people searching for relatives who served in the Marines during World War II.
Photographs, rank and marine division, US state place of birth, and Kapiti camp names all helped, she said.
The names of Wellington families who hosted the men was also useful.
‘‘A lot of the men only stayed six weeks before being transferred, and they were here for either rest and recuperation, or between being sent on to fight at Tarawa or Guadalcanal,’’ she said.
‘‘Unfortunately we don’t have a composite list of all the Marines who stayed here.’’
McGlashan estimated her father would have been in his early 20s when he met her mother who was 18.
A chance encounter with an American woman during a holiday cruise off Alaska several years ago sparked more interest to discover who her father was, she said.
‘‘During the cruise an older woman came up to me and said I bore a very strong resemblance to her family.
‘‘We got talking and I told her my background but told her we couldn’t be related because I was from New Zealand.
‘‘Then she said her grandfather had been a US Marine based in Wellington during the war.
McGlashan said she was born in 1945 at Karitane Hospital in Wellington after her birth father had left New Zealand and never got the chance to meet him.
‘‘It’s always been a sensitive subject in our family. My birth for a long time was a family secret but as time has passed it has become less a subject to not talk about.
‘‘I was the result of a romance between my mother and a US Marine.
‘‘Before she died my birth mother told me his name was ‘Snowy’ Anderson.
‘‘She said he was tall, fair and intelligent but nothing else.
‘‘I’ve never been able to find anything more about him because my birth certificate doesn’t have any of his details.’’
At six months old she was adopted by a couple and spent her childhood living on the West Coast.
‘‘There were so many babies from American fathers up for adoption it was hard to place them all in homes.
‘‘The Karitane Hospital matron told my birth mother, Sylvia, that I had to go somewhere before I started crawling.’’
‘‘I was lucky I was adopted by a wonderful couple who were always very honest with me and told me they were my adoptive parents.
‘‘We lived near Kaniere on the West Coast and I can say I had the happiest childhood I could think of. ‘‘I consider them parents.’’ as my
Her adoptive father named her ‘‘Cherrie’’ after the spring cherry blossoms which grew on the farm, she said.
McGlashan herself adopted a child in the late 1970s and it was then that she was encouraged to search for her own father, and make contact with her birth mother.
Her birth certificate only revealed the name of her mother, and not her father’s name.
‘‘It was easy to find my mother’s details after the law was changed and I was allowed access to the birth certificate.
‘‘It was a private adoption and I found out my mother had originally come from Invercargill,’’ McGlashan said.
The law change allowed her to track down her birth mother with whom she had had no contact with since she was six months old.
‘‘My mother was not really interested in making a connection again but I was able to meet her before she died which pleased I did.
‘‘Finding my real father has never been an issue until recently as I have got older.
‘‘Everyone wants where they are from.
‘‘For many years I’ve thought I must belong somewhere.’’
A memorial service will be held on May 29 at Queen Elizabeth Park 2, Paekakariki to remember the Marines contribution to the Kapiti area. I was to know