The ghosts of the Second World War were different from their earlier, First World War counterparts; they did different things, related differently to the living, and seem to have had different social purposes. The very circumstances of Second World War deaths shaped new relationships between the living and the dead after 1945. Stories about ghost encounters among Germans and Britons after the Second World War often feature ghosts who appeared once and then departed; sometimes, they disclosed a message, and then left, not to return again. A number of the examples suggest that the ghosts of the Second World War appeared to the living in order to depart, precisely not to remain ghosts. This seems rather a striking difference from the situation after the First World War, when whole societies became obsessed with the living dead and how to propitiate them and to make themselves worthy of their mortal sacrifices.