Many survivors became DPs (“Displaced Persons”) after the war. In Western Germany and other West European countries, this people were taken care of in “DP Camps”. In 1947 there were over 250.000 Jewish DPs in Germany and 40.000 in France.
Comments
Log in with your Bluesky account to leave a comment
Palestine, under British control at the time, was one of the principal migration objectives for those DPs. But the UK had had a very restrictive immigration policy regarding Jews to Palestine for decades, and no intention to change it.
For this reason, the Jewish underground organisation Haganah had been organising illegal migration to Palestine since the early 1930s. The US-American steam ship President Warfield was purchased and modified for this purpose in 1946.
On July the 11th 1947 the ship left the port of Sète in France. 4.515 Jewish DPs were on board, 650 of them were children. The Royal Navy followed them with HMS Ajax and five destroyers. On July the 17th, the ship was renamed “Exodus from Europe 1947” and a flag with the Star of David was risen.
The Exodus sailed to Haifa then. But, during the next night, the British rammed and boarded the ship. The migrants posed a strong resistance. There were numerous wounded and five dead: four Jews and one British sailor.
Upon arrival in Haifa, most of the migrants were moved to prison ships. Only pregnant women and the wounded were allowed to stay.
The prison ships were to take the migrants back to France but in Port-de-Bouc only a few accepted to leave the ships.
The prisoners were then taken to the British Occupation Zone in Northern Germany. They arrived in September to Hamburg. There, the prisoners were taken out of the ships by force and interned in camps.
Comments
The prison ships were to take the migrants back to France but in Port-de-Bouc only a few accepted to leave the ships.