While overcast skies symbolically gave way to bright sunshine, the German liner St. Louis yesterday entered the River Schelde and slowly proceeded into Antwerp port, completing the five week odyssey of 907 refugees who had been barred from Caba. The liner was boarded at Flushing by Morris C. Troper, European director of the Joint Distribution Committee; Dr. James L. Bernstein, director of the HIAS-ICA Emigration Association, representatives of the Brussels and Antwerp refugee committees and police officials.
For the last mile of the voyage the ship was accompanied by a tugboat bearing journalists. Under a huge swastika fluttering from the liner’s mast, the refugees lined the rails, laughing, crying, gesticulating pointing out landmarks and shouting replies to salutations from the press boat. The crew ignored the greetings, except for one member who persistently gave the “Heil Hitler” salute.
(In Brussels, the Rexist organ, Le Pays Reel, opened a violent campaign against refugees, demanding a Government anti-Semitic program and accusing Finance Minister Gutt, who was declared to be of Jewish origin, of being overly generous in treatment of refugees.)
Before the landing the passengers, officials had been busy on board with the dividing of the passengers into four contingents. A special train waited to take Belgium’s quota of 250 to Brussels. The contingent bound for the Netherlands is sailing for Rotterdam today on a Dutch vessel, while the Hamburg American boat Rakotis will take the French and British contingents to Boulogne and Southampton.
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.
