The Cuban Government was swamped today with appeals to permit the landing of 936 Jewish refugees from the German liner St. Louis, scheduled to put out tonight for Hamburg, after two attempted suicides aboard the ship.
More than 2,500 telegrams from Cubans were received by President Laredo Bru and Army Chief Fulgencio Batista, the liberal press appealed for humanitarian treatment for the refugees, 14 Jewish organizations issued a joint appeal and a delegation arrived from New York to intervene with the authorities.
The delegation, Miss Cecilia Razovsky, director of the National Coordinating Committee for German Refugees, and Lawrence Berenson, arrived by airplane from New York yesterday for conferences with President Bru and Col. Batista. Characteristic of the attitude of liberal newspapers was an editorial in the daily Hoy which noted the attempted suicides and asserted that Cuba must not permit its name to be stained with Jewish blood. It asked permission to land for the “unfortunate Jewish refugees from the Nazi hell.”
The first suicide attempt aboard the ship lying in Havana harbor was made by Dr. Max Loewe, of Breslau, who had with him his wife and two children. He slashed his wrists and threw himself overboard. He was picked up by a launch and taken to the University Hospital in critical condition. Later, an unidentified refugee attempted suicide by poison, but was thwarted when guards broke down his cabin door and rushed medical aid.
Port police doubled the guard aboard the St. Louis, fearing possible disorders when the ship would be forced to put out to sea. Until a late hour, the authorities remained adamant about forcing the ship’s departure. A scheduled Cabinet session on the problem was postponed, but Labor Minister Portuondo Domenech and Finance Minister Oczotorena, who are in charge of immigration, announced that they would not permit landing of the refugees because entry of Jewish exiles increased unemployment in Cuba and their admittance would not be in accord with recent immigration decrees.
Meanwhile, a German Jew named David Lowenberg, accompanied by his wife and child, who came to Havana on the Cuban Mail liner Oriente with all his documents in order to await a visa for admission to the United States was barred from Cuba and force to return to New York on the same ship.
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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.
