Lt. Gen. Sir Frederick Morgan, chief of UNRRA displaced persons operations in Germany, has been “released from duty,” the British War Office announced today. The announcement said that Director-General Fiorello H. LaGuardia had informed the War Office that Morgan’s services were no longer needed.
In January of this year Gen. Morgan raised a storm of criticism by a statement to a press conference that the Jews fleeing Poland were arriving in Germany in good physical conditions and with their pockets filled with money. He also declared that their movement out of Poland was organized. Following a great number of protests and demands for his dismissal, he wrote a letter to the then Director-General of UNRRA, Herbert Lehman, explaining that he had been misunderstood by the correspondents present at the press conference.
Philip Noel-Baker, British Minister of State, queried upon his return from Geneva where he headed the British delegation to the UNRRA Council meeting, whether UNRRA was taking any steps to halt the use of its facilities by refugee Jews en route to Palestine, replied: “In this matter the real solution is to remove the cause of the movement Eastward of these people.” He added that “UNRRA has a responsibility for many of these people who are homeless and destitute and therefore entitled to UNRRA care.”
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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.
