Five hundred and fifty-seven refugees from Nazism who had been stranded in Portugal and unoccupied France, arrived here last night aboard the Portuguese liner, S.S. Nyassa. The Nyassa left Lisbon, Portugal, on July 10, put in at Casablanca, French Morocco, several days later to pick up the bulk of her passengers who had been transferred from Marseille, unoccupied France, in order to board the ship, and stopped over at Bermuda on July 21 for a week.
Among those on board were 38 children who came here under the care of the U.S. Committee for the Care of European Children. About 350 passengers were Jewish refugees. Arrangements for the transportation of the refugees were made by the Joint Distribution Committee and the Hias-Ica. The passengers were met at the dock here by members of the Hias pier service who came from New York to arrange for reuniting them with relatives in the United States. The arrival of the Nyassa brought to 6,000 the number of persons evacuated by the JDC since Pearl Harbor. Through its American representatives in Lisbon, the JDC is arranging for the sailing of another ship during August.
In the ages between the oldest and youngest passengers aboard the Nyassa there was a difference of nearly a century. The youngest were Reger and Jeanne Martin, twins, who were born in June, Their mother, Mrs. Jeanette Bougerol Martin, Canadian-born, is a 28-year-old widow whose husband, a French army officer, was lost at sea before the children were born. The oldest passenger was Mathilde Wertheimer, 99 years old. Mrs. Wertheimer, a native of Germany, traveled with her daughters Rosa and Sophie.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
