I was confused about my father's nationality for some years, still am to some degree. He was born in Surokarta in Indonesia to two Dutch born parents and had a Dutch passport, so was presumably Dutch at that point. In his teens, because of trouble in Indonesia and unemployment in the Netherlands, his family were forced to move to South Africa.
After WWII began, his father apparently paid to naturalize most of the family as British, part of the Commonwealth. My father and his older brother fought in WWII. After the war, he went to university in England, married my mother and had 6 children. During that time South Africa left the Commonwealth. So did he become South African then? The South African definition of being a citizen was that if you remained in the country you were ok, but if you lived abroad you had to renew your citizenship at the embassy once a year, otherwise you lost it, thus becoming stateless. At some point, I don't know why, this happened to my father and he then became naturalized British.
I gather the Dutch refused to take in people wishing to leave South Africa and Zimbabwe no matter that all their family tree was Dutch. One of my uncles was quite bitter about this rejection, since he fought for them during the war. I do wonder what nationality my father thought he was, claytonbradley
