'Didn't even know about her' 
 
 "I'm 79 and at 79 to find out you have a 71-year-old sister," she said. Less than two weeks after making a last-ditch attempt to find her biological father, a Belgian woman says a Canadian family has given her the piece of her identity she's been missing all her life. Hellyer would later marry and have five children, before enlisting as a soldier in 1939 and heading off to Europe. "I'm an elderly woman, I know what went on in the war and it's to be expected," she said. In an interview from her home in Eeklo, Belgium, Heene told CBC News she was sure Herbert Hellyer was indeed her father. Florence Heene, 71, had only a few photos and the knowledge her father was a Canadian soldier named "Herbert" stationed in Ghent, Belgium, during the Second World War to go on when she posted a plea for information on Facebook earlier this month. Her mother never wanted to talk about the relationship and didn't reveal her father's last name, Heene said. Mother wouldn't reveal Herbert's last name 
 
 Their relationship ended when he left to fight elsewhere and she married the man who became Heene's stepfather. Although her stepfather raised Heene as his own, and she had a happy family life with her brother and sister, Heene desperately wanted to know more about her personal history. The reunion, however, was not a happy one. This was the only clear picture Florence Heene had of the man she believes is her biological father, a picture that matches with one held by a B.C. If you have any information of any leads whatsoever, please contact me. So it’s probable that Florence’s father survived the war, returned home to Canada, was discharged and built a life here with family and friends and neighbours and co-workers, any of whom might recognize the photo of Herbert. All in all, that’s a pretty amazing job of information gathering in just a couple of days. Janes said she doesn't have many memories of her father, but those she does have are not pleasant.
– For 71 years, "we didn't even know about her. I'm getting tears now just thinking about it," says Thelma Janes of Canada, days after discovering she has a Belgian sister. Janes' father, Herbert Louis Hellyer, married and had five children in British Columbia before heading off to war in 1939, reports CBC News. He returned from Belgium after six years, having suffered a serious brain injury, and committed suicide in 1948. Unbeknownst to any of his children in Canada, Hellyer also left behind their half-sister overseas, the result of an affair he had while stationed in Ghent. Belgium's Florence Heene, 71, who knew only that her father was a Canadian soldier named Herbert, found his photo in a box of her mother's things and shared it on Facebook recently in an effort to find out more about him. Hellyer's great-granddaughter saw the photo circulating in the media in Canada—a blogger at the Toronto Sun was among those on the case—and thought it looked familiar. In a box of her own mother's items, she found an identical picture Hellyer had sent home during the war, signed, "Love from Daddy." "I'm an elderly woman, I know what went on in the war and it's to be expected," Janes, 79, says of her father's affair. But the discovery of a half-sister left her in "absolute shock," she says. Several family members have since reached out to Heene to share their father's story and to welcome her to the family. Heene, for her part, tells the CBC that "I have the piece [of my life] that I was looking for," she says.