Inside the Mysterious Disappearance of Errol Flynn's Son

In April 1970, Sean Leslie Flynn — an acclaimed war photojournalist and the son of golden-age Hollywood superstar Errol Flynn — vanished without a trace. He was 28.

Sean was on assignment in Southeast Asia the day Viet Cong guerrillas reportedly abducted him and a fellow photojournalist; it would be the last time either man was seen alive. After Sean's perplexing disappearance, his mother, French American actress Lili Damita, declared him legally dead in 1984.

Below chronicles the troubling mystery of a promising life cut short and the story of a man whose disappearance has continued to confound Hollywood more than half a century later.

Who is Errol Flynn's son?

Sean was the only son of action hero Errol, best known for his swashbuckling escapades in 1938's The Adventures of Robin Hood.

Sean pursued a brief acting career, appearing uncredited in the 1960 film Where the Boys Are and starring in the 1962 movie The Son of Captain Blood. However, he found his true calling in photojournalism, traveling to dangerous war zones — from Israel, during an Arab-Israeli conflict, to Vietnam and Cambodia — taking pictures for TIME, Paris Match and United Press International.

During the Vietnam War, Sean parachuted into combat zones with U.S. troops. In 1970, as North Vietnamese troops advanced, he traveled to Cambodia on assignment for TIME.

What happened to Errol Flynn's son?

On April 6, 1970, Sean and fellow photojournalist Dana Stone were leaving the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh when they got word of a checkpoint on Highway One manned by the Viet Cong, the Vietnamese communist soldiers. Stone and Sean took off for the highway on motorcycles (turning down the limousines most journalists used) to get a firsthand look on the way to a press conference in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City). The pair was never heard from again, and Sean's mother had him declared legally dead in 1984.

While never confirmed, reports cited by TIME claim Sean and Stone were captured by Viet Cong guerrilla fighters and held captive for up to a year before being killed by the Cambodian communist organization Khmer Rouge. However, neither of their remains have ever been found. Remains thought to be Sean's were discovered in March 2010 but had no DNA match to samples from his family members, per The Telegraph.

Many of Sean's friends continued searching for the missing adventurer in the following decades, including British Australian photographer Tim Page, who visited Cambodia several times to look for clues about Sean's disappearance. However, Page died in 2022 without ever discovering what happened to his lost friend, according to The New York Times.

In 2015, the world had a rare glimpse of Sean via the keepsakes of Damita, who died in 1994 after exhausting her finances in the search for her son, when her estate went up for auction by the Boston-based RR Auction. 

"Sean Flynn's disappearance in 1970 captivated the country; he was so young," Bobby Livingston, then-executive vice president at RR Auction, told PEOPLE at the time.

Damita's collection of letters, photographs and mementos included pictures of the handsome photographer throughout his life and early letters that reveal a young man determined to chart his own path, giving a rare glimpse into the life of one of Hollywood's most daring descendants.

While in high school, he wrote to his mom, "If father and MGM want me to do a picture, they can all go to hell — I just want to be with my family." 

In another, he wrote about looking for a job in construction "loading cement." Sean also expressed his appreciation for his mother in one haunting letter.

"I just want to say 'thanks' for home, the car, and just the fact that you are the best mother that I could ever want; and although you never hear me say it, I love you very much! I actually tried to be with you a lot, but everything just didn't seem to go together," the letter read.

The collection included a gold-embroidered red silk banner with original packaging sent to his mom from Vientiane, Laos, during his last assignment during the Vietnam War.

The archive also contained materials Damita kept after Sean's disappearance, such as a "Whatever Happened to Sean Flynn?" bumper sticker, along with a "Where Is Sean Flynn?" T-shirt with a picture of the late photojournalist.

The archive sold at auction in May 2015 for $2,456. Later that year, RR Auction sold several other items once owned by Sean, including his black "Vest Pocket" Kodak camera. The vintage camera sold for $613.