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  By this time, the passengers were just as emaciated as the boat. Since they had boarded the Atlantic two months earlier, the refugees’ food had been limited to a watery soup at noon and tea twice a day. They would sometimes receive a small ration of vegetables, cheese, and bread for dinner, but often had to make do with moldy biscuits. Many were already malnourished and weakened from the earlier legs of the journey, and lacked the strength to continue living. The cramped conditions and poor sanitation also led to outbreaks of diarrhea, dysentery, and typhus. Death became a part of daily life aboard the Atlantic.

  On November 12, a stripped and powerless Atlantic drifted into the waters surrounding Cyprus. The immobile boat was intercepted by a British motor launch and towed to the port of Limassol, where it would stay until Great Britain could figure out what to do with its passengers. The British found themselves between a rock and a hard place. They were alarmed by the poor health of the refugees, who were suffering from exposure, exhaustion, and starvation, but could not allow them to disembark, because Cyprus lacked the infrastructure to care for them. At the same time, the British could not deport the Jews, because they had yet to break any laws. The British ultimately decided to escort the Atlantic toward Haifa. The refugees had no way of knowing that they were being taken to Palestine only so they could be arrested as illegal immigrants once they arrived.

  Ten days after the Atlantic arrived in Cyprian waters, a British captain and an armed military guard boarded it to sail it to Palestine. The British were shocked by the condition of the overcrowded vessel, which was listing so much that forty portholes on one side were submerged underwater. To make matters even worse, there were only enough lifeboats for one hundred people, and about a third of the 1,800 passengers did not have life vests. The British loaded the Atlantic with food, coal, and other supplies—albeit at exorbitant prices that required many of the refugees to sacrifice the little jewelry that had survived the earlier extortions. The Atlantic got under way at five the next morning, escorted by a convoy of British warships and minesweepers.

  On the next morning, November 24, 1940, the Jewish refugees finally set their eyes on the Promised Land. Almost a full year had passed since the first group of Jews aided by Storfer’s committee had left Vienna. As the sunrise illuminated the bay of Haifa, the historic mountain range known collectively as Mount Carmel became visible in the background. “From the Atlantic’s ghostly deck, green Mount Carmel was like a glimpse of heaven,” one passenger later recalled.29

  The refugees shouted with joy. Just as when they had left Bratislava almost three months earlier, they joined together to tearfully sing “Hatikvah.” This time, their joyful songs were accompanied by harmonicas and violins, perhaps including Erich Weininger’s Violin.

  The British anchored the Atlantic just outside the port of Haifa. The Atlantic was reunited with the Pacific and Milos, which had both arrived at the beginning of the month. Near the two empty ships was a large ocean liner named the Patria. Around noon, two British officers boarded the Atlantic and announced that all of the passengers would join their counterparts from the Pacific and Milos on the Patria. Later, civil servants boarded the Atlantic to question the passengers, search and seize their belongings, and give them forms to complete. The refugees naturally asked why they were not being allowed to come ashore. Were they being quarantined? Was the sequestration just a temporary measure until they could be accommodated on land? From the noncommittal answers they received, the Jews finally began to suspect that they would not be allowed to disembark in Haifa.

  Palestine

  The presence of the Pacific, Milos, and now the Atlantic in Palestinian waters presented a considerable problem for Great Britain. The rise of anti-Semitism in Germany and Austria had led to a dramatic increase in Jewish immigration to Palestine, which in turn had instigated a violent three-year Arab revolt. To placate the Palestinian Arabs and their allies in the region, Great Britain in the White Paper of 1939 had drastically cut the number of Jews who could immigrate to Palestine in any given year. But these quotas had not provided the deterrence they had hoped for. Hundreds of Jewish refugees had continued to land in Palestine every month.

  Great Britain had decided to put an end to illegal immigration once and for all. Beginning in January 1940, the naval Contraband Control Service had started to seize all ships carrying illegal immigrants before they reached Palestine. The captain, crew, and passengers of such vessels were brought to Palestine and placed in internment camps, but were ultimately released within a matter of months. The aggressive tactics seemed to have worked: by August 1940, the Mediterranean Sea was free of refugee ships.

  The British authorities were therefore alarmed on September 17, 1940, when they received a telegram from their embassy in Bucharest, Romania, informing them that the Atlantic, Pacific, and Milos were preparing to leave the port of Tulcea with several thousand illegal immigrants. The British realized that their threats to impound the ships offered little deterrent. Immigrants would simply arrive on derelict vessels such as the Atlantic, Pacific, and Milos that were practically worthless. The warnings that refugees would be detained were also not working. The Jews were willing to risk being interned for a few months because they knew they would eventually be released into Palestine. Great Britain decided to send a strong message by immediately deporting all illegal immigrants elsewhere and making it known that they would never be permitted to return to Palestine.

  To prevent the newest refugees from even setting foot in Palestine, it was decided that they would be transferred directly to the Patria. The 15,000-ton ocean liner was originally designed to carry 805 passengers, including a crew of 130. It was now being reclassified as a troop transport, which would allow it to hold 1,800 people without increasing the number of lifeboats.

  When the Pacific arrived in Palestinian waters on November 1, it was intercepted by a naval patrol and escorted toward Haifa, where the 962 refugees who had survived the voyage were transferred to the Patria. The Milos received the same treatment two days later, at which time its 709 refugees were taken to the Patria. It was decided that when the Atlantic arrived, eight hundred of its passengers would be assigned to the Patria—bringing its total contingent to a whopping 2,500. The remaining one thousand Jews aboard the Atlantic would be transferred to another vessel, the Verbena.

  But where would the refugees be taken? Jamaica, Africa, Cyprus, Australia, and even Great Britain were considered as possible internment locations for the illegal immigrants. All were ultimately rejected on logistical or political grounds. The British finally decided to take the 1,700 Jews from the Pacific and Milos to their colony on Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean five hundred miles east of Madagascar. The 1,800 refugees from the Atlantic would continue on to Trinidad.

  On the morning of November 25, 1940, one day after the Atlantic arrived in Palestinian waters, the British authorities began to transfer its passengers to the Patria. They started with women and children. By 9 a.m., 134 refugees had been transferred and another transport was just shoving off. Erich was on that dinghy and was heading toward the Patria.

  Suddenly, there was a violent explosion. Erich watched in horror as an intense flame shot out the side of the Patria. The enormous ship capsized immediately. It sank within fifteen minutes.

  The explosion was caused by a bomb that had been planted by Haganah agents from Palestine who had secretly boarded after learning of the British plan to deport the Jewish refugees. They knew that the forced expatriation of 3,500 immigrants would discourage other imperiled Jews from leaving Nazi-occupied Europe. They were determined to not let his happen. The Haganah snuck a bomb into the engine room in the hopes of disabling the Patria. If the ship was immobilized, they hypothesized, the British would have no choice but to allow its passengers to disembark in Palestine.

  But the Haganah underestimated the bomb’s power and overestimated the integrity of the Patria’s hull. Instead of merely damaging the engine, the explosion tore a large hole in
the side of the ship. The majority of the passengers found safety by clinging to the wreckage until they could be rescued, or by swimming to the long jetty that protected Haifa’s harbor. But more than two hundred refugees died, along with fifty crew members and policemen. Some were trapped in their cabins. Some got stuck in the narrow portholes when they tried to escape. Others fell off the deck and were sucked underwater by the downdraft of the rapidly sinking ship.

  The survivors of the Patria disaster were taken to the Atlit detainee camp, which Great Britain had established just a few years earlier to incarcerate illegal immigrants. Located twelve miles south of Haifa, Atlit was surrounded by barbed-wire fences and watchtowers. More barbed wire divided the camp into several sections that separated the survivors of the Patria from the former passengers of the Atlantic. The refugees were given blankets and cramped shelter inside the camp’s hundred Nissen huts.

  The British authorities now had an even bigger problem on their hands: what should they do with the 3,300 refugees who were now on Palestinian land? After several days of internal debates, Great Britain yielded to pressure from Jewish groups in Palestine and the United States and announced a compromise. Those who had been on board the Patria when it sank would be granted amnesty, released from Atlit, and allowed to stay in Palestine. The former passengers of the Atlantic, however, would be sent to Mauritius as quickly as possible.

  On December 8, the British instructed the refugees from the Atlantic to deliver their packed bags by midnight and be prepared to wake at five the next morning for transport. Although the Jews were not told where they were going, they suspected that they were being expelled from Palestine. The Jewish auxiliary police who helped guard Atlit encouraged the refugees to resist, assuring them that they had the support of the entire Jewish community in Palestine. The refugees devised a plan of nonviolent protest in which they would leave their bags unpacked, lock themselves in their huts, sleep naked, and refuse to leave their beds in the morning.

  Midnight came and went without any luggage appearing at the depot. The commandant announced that any missing luggage would be left behind. This, too, failed to produce any response.

  The silence, combined with Jewish work strikes throughout Palestine protesting the impending deportations, convinced the British authorities that the refugees would not leave Atlit quietly. Overnight, police wagons and armored cars rolled into the camp. Armed British soldiers surrounded the barbed-wire perimeter and posted machine guns in the camp’s corners. They replaced the Jewish auxiliary police with a special squad of Palestinian police officers who were known for their brutality. Finally, they entered the camp, fortified with clubs and metal helmets.

  The order to wake for departure was given at 5 a.m. Nobody moved. The police waited fifteen minutes, and then started advancing from hut to hut. They broke open doors, overturned cots, and ripped blankets off the naked refugees. As soon as they moved on to the next hut, the protesters went back to bed.

  An hour later, the police made a second round. This time they bludgeoned whoever refused to rise. Those who offered the most resistance were dragged outside and beaten unconscious. They were wrapped in blankets, dragged on the ground, and tossed into the backs of the trucks that had arrived throughout the night. Others were carried to cars and buses on stretchers with bleeding wounds and broken bones. Confusion reigned as the unarmed refugees tried to fight back, shouting, cursing, and crying in protest. Some courageous young men continued the protest by running around the camp naked. They were chased down and beaten until they collapsed into pools of their own blood. “Look at the bloody Jews!” the policemen taunted.30 The abuse that the Jews were enduring in Palestine was not very different from the cruel treatment they had thought they had left behind in Europe.

  Of all the injustices the Jews had suffered, this was the worst. For those who, like Erich, had suffered in Dachau and Buchenwald only to endure captivity in Bratislava before making the arduous trek to the Promised Land, the thought of being deported was too much to bear. Everyone was crying. “At least let me die here,” pleaded one elderly refugee.31

  As Erich was being corralled toward the military transport, British soldiers repeatedly tried to steal his violin. Every time a soldier got close, Erich threw the instrument over a separation fence to detainees in the neighboring yard. Whenever a British soldier on the other side would try to seize the violin, it was thrown back to Erich. The British never got the instrument. Erich eventually disappeared into one of the trucks with the violin that had accompanied him from Vienna to Dachau, Buchenwald, Bratislava, and Atlit.

  The Jews were taken back to Haifa, where they were put aboard two Dutch steamers that Great Britain had requisitioned to carry them to Mauritius.

  Palestine to Mauritius

  The Johan de Witt and Nieuw Zeeland left Haifa on December 9, 1940, with Erich and 1,600 other Jewish refugees on board. Escorted by two British warships that zigzagged along while sweeping for mines, they sailed toward Port Said, Egypt. The Jews had still not been told where they were going, and had no way of seeing for themselves. The portholes were shut, and although the holds’ hatches had been removed to compensate for the closed windows, the refugees were not allowed on deck. Their only clue that they were even under way was the drone of the engines.

  The Dutch steamers were former luxury liners that had been converted into troop carriers. Both had several hundred cabins. These were left mostly empty except for a few that were occupied by elderly refugees, women with children, and Palestinian police officers. While the open dormitories in which the majority of the Jews traveled would have hardly qualified as luxurious, they represented a significant upgrade from the accommodations aboard the Atlantic. The Jews had hammocks for sleeping, shelves for storing their belongings, and even benches and tables where they could sit and eat.

  By the third day of the voyage, the Johan de Witt and Nieuw Zeeland had passed through the Suez Canal and had reached the Red Sea. The refugees were finally allowed on deck, but only for limited times. Eventually, as the temperatures in the hold grew stifling, the Jews were permitted to not only sleep on the deck but also use the ships’ swimming pools. The portholes and the hatches were left open during the day, but were closed at night for blackouts.

  The ships arrived in Port Louis, Mauritius, on December 26, 1940, after two and a half weeks at sea. The Jews were immediately struck by the island’s tropical beauty. “Mauritius, rising in the distance out of the calm Indian Ocean, appeared more and more enchanting the closer we approached,” one refugee later recalled. “The island, surrounded by lagoons of a blue I had never seen before, was fringed with thick green vegetation and tall, exotic coconut palms behind which rose hazy, purplish hills. Here was something new, something totally different from anything I’d ever known, so exciting I felt my pulse race; my eyes welled up with tears.”32

  The Jews were taken by bus to the town of Beau Bassin. Along the way, they continued to be struck by the beauty of the island and the friendly welcome they received from its residents, who threw flowers as they passed by. The reception was more befitting to war heroes returning from battle than to destitute refugees.

  It was therefore quite a shock when the buses reached their destination. “There we had the biggest surprise of our entire voyage, which had contained quite a few during the past four months,” one refugee recorded in his diary. “The bus stopped in front of a small one-story building. We crossed a porch and entered a large yard where we saw two enormous cellblocks, each 90 to 100 meters long, with barred windows—A PRISON!”33 This prison was to be their home for the next four and a half years.

  Mauritius

  The island of Mauritius was first visited by Arab sailors in the Middle Ages, but was rediscovered by Portuguese en route to India in 1507. It was later settled by the Dutch, who named the island after Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, and used as a naval base. It was the Dutch who discovered the now-extinct dodo bird on Mauritius. France took control of the island in
the early eighteenth century, but lost it to England in the Napoleonic Wars. Great Britain had ruled the island and its valuable sugarcane fields ever since.

  Five miles south of the Mauritian capital of Port Louis is the Beau Bassin Prison. A maximum-security compound that dates back to the nineteenth century, the prison was once the home to thieves and murderers. The British had planned to intern fascist political prisoners there during World War II. Instead, the prison grounds became home to 1,600 Jewish refugees.

  By the time the Jews arrived at the Beau Bassin Prison, many were suffering from a variety of physical and mental illnesses, ranging from malnutrition, dysentery, and diarrhea to psychological exhaustion and depression from their yearlong ordeal. Initially, the most critical of these maladies was the typhoid fever that had gone untreated throughout their flight from Europe. As soon as the typhoid epidemic came under control, an outbreak of malaria took its place. Lacking adequate medical facilities and medication, twenty-eight refugees died within the first five weeks.

  The males were confined to the Beau Bassin Prison. The men from Prague and Danzig moved into Block A, while Erich and the other men from Vienna occupied Block B. In each block, endless rows of heavy doors led to inhospitable cells. Each cell was approximately twelve feet long and nine feet wide and contained only a hammock, a shelf, and a barred window. There was no electricity. The men were, however, free to wander around the cell blocks. The door locks had been removed. The men were even able to enjoy a large prison yard that included trees, grass, and flower beds.

  On the other side of the fifteen-foot stone wall that surrounded the prison was a hastily constructed camp for the women and children. The camp was enclosed by a barbed-wire fence. When the refugees first arrived, the construction was still ongoing. The camp eventually included thirty wooden huts with corrugated iron roofs. Each hut could hold twenty-five to thirty women and children.