|
The ocean
liner St. Louis, which carried about 900 Jewish refugees on an
epic 1939 voyage from Europe to the United States and back again,
has become a lasting symbol of a nation's callous response to
the plight of Germany's Jews.
Departing from Hamburg,
Germany, 60 years ago this month, the St. Louis carried refugees
bound for one of the few countries that would take them: Cuba.
Passengers had paid $160 each for "landing permits" in the Caribbean
nation. But once they reached the Havana harbor, they were not
allowed to go ashore without real visas, which only a few dozen
passengers had.
Condemned to drift,
the ship headed north for Florida, where it hovered off the coast,
in sight of the lights of Miami, while the U.S. Coast Guard watched
for escapees. Despite worldwide publicity and pleas for help,
President Roosevelt would not intervene. U.S. law set strict limits
on the number of immigrants from each country, and the passengers
on the St. Louis would have to return to Germany and get in line.
After five days, the
German ship started back across the Atlantic. European nations
scrambled to strike a deal while a sympathetic German captain
sailed slowly to the east. In the end, the passengers were divided
among England, France, Belgium and the Netherlands, so they did
not have to return to Germany. Soon after, however, with the outbreak
of war, many of the former passengers fell into Nazi hands.
About half the passengers
turned back from America on the St. Louis eventually died in Nazi
camps and massacres, according to researchers at the United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., which is holding
a special exhibit on the St. Louis this summer.
- Tom Kizzia
|
