Ago’s presentation on the 22nd, as I’d mentioned in my previous post, gave me a perspective my mother experienced but never shared in such detail. With Ago’s permission, I am placing it here. — av

The Great flight from Estonia 
by Ago Ambre

Shared September 22, 2019 – 75th Anniversary of the Great Refugee Flight of 1944

Persecutions, arrests, executions, deportations and the scorched earth policy carried out by destruction battalions of Communist party members and the Red Army were fresh memories that spurred a massive flight from the oncoming Soviet hell back in 1944.

How massive was it? Here it would be like 25 million people getting on the road at once to head for Canada or Mexico, and twice as many sought safety within the country.

The Great Flight was a disjointed journey. It was not a direct flight. There was flight within Estonia, and for many the flight continued in Germany, too. If you were not from Tallinn you had to come there from the south or the east. Coastal areas offered for some a chance for a perilous voyage in mostly small open boats, hundreds of them, across the stormy Baltic sea to Sweden. In Tallinn there was chance to escape to Germany.

I would place the beginning of the Great Flight in early 1944 when the Leningrad front collapsed and refugees from the East reached my hometown, Tartu. Little did we know that half a year later we would be walking in their shoes.

By June, the situation was painfully clear, the Russians were coming. There was a glimmer of hope that Finland would accept Estonian refugees. An office was supposed to open in Tartu to register teachers who would resettle in Finland. Well, my mother was a teacher, she discussed the matter with us, my grandmother and me. My father was arrested during the first Soviet occupation. He died in a Soviet prison. A second Soviet occupation would be as good as a death sentence for us. But nothing came of the Finnish solution. In any event, Finland was no safe haven. After making peace with the Soviet Union on September 3, Finland agreed to repatriate all Soviet citizens.

The Soviet Union also demanded that Allies carry out forceful repatriation of USSR citizens. That is something we found out when were in Germany. Thanks to the efforts of many good men and women the Americans and Brits agreed that we were citizens of Estonia, that Soviet occupation did not make us Soviet citizens.

All those who left then have their own stories. They all deserve to be told. I was asked to tell mine today,  on the 75th anniversary of that tragic event. The hero of my story is my mother. And her support was her mother. When they had to leave Tartu they made sure that I would leave with them.

I had been badly hurt in July doing obligatory farm work as a fourteen-year-old boy. I was hospitalized in Tartu but as air raids became a daily affair, patients were evacuated to Ulila, a place about 20 kilometers from Tartu. I was sedated most of the time, because my pains were simply intolerable. Then in August the patients were brought back to Tartu because the Soviet tanks had broken through and were about to overrun the area. See on left the map from the New York Times on September 22. For the full September 22 account, click here. (once the image appears, click again to enlarge.)

I was transported on a hospital bed in a cargo truck.

I remember the view of Viljandi highway—it was like a twisting living organism, made up of farm families with horse-drawn carriages loaded with furniture and such, with cows and horses in tow. People were fleeing on bicycles, and on foot. It was a sight I never forgot.

Back in Tartu panic broke out as the Soviet tanks were now rumored to be only twenty-five kilometers away. It was night already when mother came to the hospital and demanded I be released. She had secured places for us three on a truck. Dr. Linkberg, the hospital head, one of the best surgeons in Estonia, was adamant. I was in no condition to travel. I had very high fever, and needed daily procedures to withdraw quantities of pus from my injured knee. But mother prevailed.

My memory is blurry how I was placed on a stretcher and placed on the truck. But I remember well when the truck crawled up a hilly street toward the Tallinn highway, how people swarmed the truck, threw off the baggage. Desperation filled up every inch of the truck bed. My memory is even clearer of that trip in the night when a Soviet plane dropped flares on that crowded highway. All vehicles stopped. People sought shelter in ditches. I remember lying in the truck, watching the flares floating slowly toward the ground. And I waited for the attack. It came in the form of three bombs. Not much damage, but it surely was annoying.

Early morning the truck broke down at a school house, in a place called Äksi. By that time I was delirious. A man who no longer could stand my cries, forced a bottle of vodka down my throat. By morning I felt nothing, I was stone cold. Mother managed to get transport to a nearby rail station, Voldi. The small station was crowded with soldiers. A military physician came by, looked at me, and declared me unfit for travel. As he had just set up an aid station nearby, at Saadjärve, he offered to treat me. He put me in his ambulance, took me to the aid station which at the time had no other patients. He drained my knee, and did his best to stabilize me for two days.

All that time my mother and grandmother stayed in that crowded, dirty station. They had no idea where I was. But the good doctor brought me back to the Voldi station, and made sure we were placed on a train carrying wounded soldiers to Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia. The wounded were in box cars, on stretchers on the floor. And the doors were open.

It was a rail journey like no other. I watched passing freight trains carrying heavy artillery tubes away from the front, toward the Port of Tallinn. Nearing Tallinn I had a view of ruins, only chimneys standing, reminders of the air raids on March 9.

At arrival at the Baltic Station in Tallinn, the wounded on their stretchers were lined up on the platform. The chief of a military hospital conducted a cursory inspection, and all men on stretchers were moved to a military hospital that was set up in a building in the suburb of Hiiu that once was a home for orphaned babies. And I wound up in that hospital. I was treated well. The operating room had three tables. I was treated there while wounded soldiers were also being operated on. I remember gory scenes when very young men were lying on their backs, with surgeons picking shrapnel from their intestines that were piled on their stomachs. They had been wounded on September 15 when a landing on a key Finnish island of Suursaari was repelled by the Finns, as required by the peace treaty with the Soviet Union. That failure opened the Baltic sea for the Red Fleet that had been bottled up for most of the war.

Soon our time was up again. The Russians were coming. The military hospital was made ready for evacuation to Germany. I was given a choice, go to a civilian hospital in Tallinn, or be evacuated to Germany to meet an uncertain fate. My mother told me that the choice was up to me. I added up the score: hospitals in Tallinn were bereft of doctors and nurses, and there was no mercy to expect from the Communists. We agreed that the uncertainty awaiting us in Germany was preferable to the certainty that would await us in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Estonia. By then the Red Fleet had access to the Baltic sea. Soviet submarines and airplanes attacked even hospital ships.

For the New York Times account of that exodus and the Soviet attacks on the ships, click here to link to New York Times, 23 September 1944 report.

We traveled in a cargo ship that had a rather mixed cargo: munitions, gasoline, hospital equipment, and even cabbages. Plus the hospital’s nurses, few civilians, lots of Russian POWs, and and a couple hundred soldiers.

When we arrived in the Danzig port of Neufahrwasser, everybody left. We stayed in the cargo hold and waited for the morning. Suddenly flashlights beamed. Military police demanded, who are you. Refugees. Soon six Russians POWs were summoned, four carried my stretcher, and two carried my mother’s and grandmother’s suitcases. We were led into a camp behind barbed wire, put in a barracks, with me on the stretcher on the floor watching lice crawling up the support poles of three-tiered bunks where mother and grandmother were resting on bare boards in the top bunk.

Next morning a physician took a look at me, and hung a ticket on me. The ambulance driver was a good Samaritan. He knew the destination well. He tore up the ticket and instead drove us to neighboring Gotenhafen, and put me in a municipal hospital.The flight continued within Germany for another seven months. Because the Russians kept coming.

The horrors of communism were news to most Americans back in 1949. After all, Uncle Joe had been an ally. As a new arrival, I was asked about what went on in Europe before and after WWII. A lot of people said, it surely could not happen here. I believed it then. Today, I am not so sure.

Thank you, Ago. –Andres

Through these combined efforts [US and German], more than 300,000 persons have found their hopes realized in the attainment of a new life in the United States. Americans have a peculiarly sympathetic feeling for persecuted people. From the very beginning of our history, those coming to the shores of our country were usually fleeing from the persecution of the  mind or body. —Samuel Reber,  Assistant High Commissioner for Occupied Germany, April 2, 1952.

The record of the United States Government and the American people in extending aid to the unfortunate of the world—the displaced by war, the refugees from political or religious persecution or simply the immigrant seeking freedom and opportunity is a proud one. —Robert J. Crockery, European coordinator of the US Displaced Persons Commission.

The words quoted above marked the departure from Bremerhaven, Germany, of the last European emigres under the provisions of the US Displaced Persons Law, as passed in 1948 and amended in 1950, while my mother and I were on the high seas between Germany and New York City.

The quota provided by the law  was met with the departure on April 2nd  from Bremerhaven of the SS General Ballou . The last to board was the  Josef Zylka family, pictured here.  He had been captured by the Germans when they attacked Poland in 1939 and held in slave labor camps thereafter. (Image ©  dpa picture alliance / Alamy Stock Photo)

The ship would receive a ceremonial welcome on arrival in New York City ten days later, and selected families were treated to a visit with President Truman in the White House a day later. The Zylkas would move on to Chicago from there.

How distant the spirit of that day seems today, in July 2018!

( I  edited this post (the beginning and the very end) for clarity on June 29th.)

This posting has been brewing since Monday, June 25th. I thought it would be easy and quick—a kind of stroll through the times surrounding our arrival in June 1950. Instead, with immigration having become such a complicated matter—the supposed “crises” on our border with Mexico and in Europe—that I felt the need to dig deeper and look into the genesis of the law , the Displaced Persons Law of 1948, that made possible our arrival.  Basically, I wanted to know if US values concerning immigration during the days surrounding the passage of the law in June 1948 truly looked like the values I had come to believe our arrival in 1950  symbolized.  As it is today, the answer is complicated.

I had become accustomed through my life to saying that the generosity of the American people was evident in  the passage of the Displaced Persons Law of 1948, which allowed 200,00 European refugees to emigrate from camps in Europe to the United States.  (see https://www.fanande.netwp-admin/post.php?post=69)

The fact of that law, and a further liberalization of it two years later (the number allowed to enter was doubled and restrictions in the 1948 law were reduced), has been thrown at me by those aligned with the present administration’s anti-immigrant stance who object to my expressions of empathy for Central America’s migrants with the words, “You WERE LEGAL!”

Maybe so, but I can’t help but think that people who most loudly shout those words don’t really know—and most likely wouldn’t care if they knew—how much they sound like those in 1948 and later who opposed the entrance of Europeans displaced from their homes and dispossessed of virtually everything they had owned.

Following is a New York Times report of the floor debate in the House of Representatives on June 10, 1948 on the Fellows Bill, named after Frank Fellows, the Republican from Maine—let me repeat that, “…the Fellows Bill, named after Frank Fellows, the Republican from Maine”—who had the endorsement of the Democratic White House (From the New York Times (June 10, 1948):

The debate today centered primarily on the quality and character of the DPs who would enter the country under proposed law. The 1,300,000 persons in Europe officially classified as DPs were described in speeches as everything from “the best” to “the worst,” from “the scum of all Europe” to the “cream of the crop.”

In spite of the harsh language and purple rhetoric, it was generally predicted late this afternoon that some measure providing for at least 200,000 refugees would soon be approved by the House, probably tomorrow.

The Senate had passed its own DP bill on June 2, going into a late night session to accomplish it. The measure Is objectionable to most of the supporters of displaced persons legislation, however, on the grounds it imposes too many restrictions and discriminates against the Jews in favor of the Baltic Protestants.

The House bill, introduced by Representative Frank Fellows, Republican of Maine, is considered more generous in its treatment of the DP problem, according to the authorities, and omits the discriminatory sections said to be in the Senate measure.

For every attack on the bill, there was an immediate and ardent defense. Representative Eugene E. Cox, Democrat of Georgia, was the first violent detractor of the bill, terming the DPs it would aid “the scum of Europe.” He expressed doubt that “20 percent of the whole number” would be satisfactory immigrants.

Another Democrat, Ed Gossett of Texas, was as strong in his denunciation of the bill as Mr. Cox. The Texan asserted that many of the DPs seeking refuge here ae “bums, criminals, subversives, revolutionists, crackpots, and human wreckage.”

———–

The measure would pass and be reconciled with an earlier Senate version, which contained more restrictions, including the obligation that 30 percent of DPs come from the Baltic States [I corrected this figure from 50 percent] —a measure seen to discriminate against Catholics, because of the largely Protestant makeup of Baltic church communities. Another required that 30 percent of visas be granted to farmers–or at least potential farmers in the United States.   These obligations would eventually be reduced and the quota increased in a revised law in 1950–passed as my mother and I whiled away the hours on the SS General Heintzleman.

Of course, little, if any, of that was known to us.  For us, arrival in 1950 would be a joy. No cameras or journalists covered our arrival–we had become a routine, but the arrival of the first of the DPs to reach New York under the law on October 31, 1948 made the front page of the Times and it was captured on film. There is much more that is complicated about the day and the attitude of Americans (and especially their politicians) to the newly arrived and arriving refugees that I will save for another time. For the moment, let me attempt to share the joy, evident in the October 31 NY Times account of the arrival of the SS General William Black the day before with 813 refugees from Europe—and films—totally unexpectedly found showing the occasion.

Much more can be said about the fears evident in the United States on that day and the day my mother and I arrived, but I can save those for another day. For now, let the sense of relief and joy evident in the below speak to the feelings of two Displaced Persons, Hedvig Marie Steinberg and Andres Steinberg (to become Vaart after my father’s arrival, a year to the day later).

New York Times, 31 October 1948

 U.S., City Welcome Ship with 813 DP’s, 1^st Under New Act

Harbor Whistles Greet Army Transport Bringing Tyranny to Homes Here

Group Shows Gratitude

Clark Speaks for the President in Ceremony on Deck—Mayor and Cardinal Spellman Also Attend

By Kenneth Campbell

The first group of homeless Europeans to arrive under the Displaced Persons Law came up New York harbor yesterday past the Statue of Liberty amid the thunder of welcoming whistles. [and sprays of water from firefighting tugs]

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675074156_USS-General-W-M-Black_Statue-of-Liberty_skyline_Displaced-Persons

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675074153_Displaced-Persons_USS-General-W-M-Black-AP-135_waving-from-deck_arrival

There were 813 men, women and children in the group. They came from former police state countries once under the Nazi heel and now under Russian dominations. They were on their way to many parts of the United States and Canada where, as their spokesman said they would find “the miracle of second birth.”

As they lined the rail of the Army transport Ge. William Black, they were a little tearful, very polite and quite stunned as the greatest city of the western world arose before them.

They saw the Statue of Liberty through the leaping spray from the nozzles of two municipal fire boats. The skyline of lower Manhattan was hung with autumn mist as they passed on their way up the North River to Pier 61 at West Twenty-first Street.

Here, with the Empire State Building in full view to show them how a city can seem to stand up they were welcomed by national, state and city officials and representatives of the Roman Catholic, Protestant and Jewish faiths.

Attorney General Tom Clark, representing President Truman; Edward Corsi, chairman of the State Commission on Displaced Persons; Mayor O’Dwyer and Cardinal Spellman were there to greet them. Mr. Corse represented Governor Dewey.

Everybody was pleasant to the newcomers. Nobody pushed them around or made them line up. Instead they had a chance to see someone else pushed around for a chance. The newspaper reporters, newsreel and radio men and photographers were subjected to the confused and scrambled procedure that characterizes such events, however well planned.

The welcoming ceremonies were held on the upper deck of the transport. Ugo Carusi, representing the Federal Displaced Persons Commission, presided. The newcomers were crowded on another section of the upper deck where they were photographed until their heads swam. The ceremonies were in English, which only a few of the new arrivals could understand. They waved and cheered and expressed their thanks at what seemed to them to be the proper moments.

Clark Speaks for Truman

Attorney General Clark said:

“Harry S. Truman, the President of the United States, bids you a hearty welcome to our shores—the land of your new-found home. The President greets you as the Pilgrims of 1948 entering this historic gateway of freedom as did the Pilgrims of 1620/ You too came here to escape persecution.

“This is a historic event—for this ship is the vanguard of a fleet of transports that will transform the victims of hatred, bigotry, religious intolerance and wars into happy and peaceful souls.”

After expressing the regret that all the military transports of the world could not be used on similar peaceful missions, Mr. Clark said:

“Do not think of yourselves as strangers in a strange land. You are following the path of millions who have come before you. The fact that you are being admitted to our land is evidence that our people have not forgotten that our nation was founded by immigrants, many of who fled oppression and persecution.

“This warm reception by some many Americans who have taken time out of their busy hours to meet you and to lend guidance on out ways to your new home is characteristic of our democratic way of life. They and the 144,000,000 Americans in our land wish you well. In America you will get out of life what you put into it. You take on here the responsibility of proving to the world that America’s confidence in you was not misplaced. You, too, can—and I am sure you will—contribute much to America.

”You can be strong and courageous in its behalf—and soon, I hope, each of you will be granted the most precious possession in the world—American Citizenship.

“God bless you and keep you and grant you Godspeed!”

Dewey Sends Message

A letter from Governor Dewey was read by Mr. Corsi. It said:

“I want personally to welcome the families on the General William Black. These potential citizens will find that here they have the opportunity to earn their living in peace, to worship God by the tenets of their own religion and to raise their children in the true spirit of freedom and democracy.”

Mayor O’Dwyer said:

“New York City is glad to have you here. I am glad to see you getting your first breath of good New York air. Many of you will stay here—and I will all of you good. You will like it in New York.”

And then the Mayor threw out his arms and said: “Welcome to New York!” His gesture was understood by the newcomers, who cheered him loudly.

Cardinal Spellman did not speak to the group. Before the ceremony he said to newspaper men:

“We Americans must remember that these people must be treated with consideration, sympathy and understanding. Just putting their foot on United States soil doesn’t give them orientation to all America means.”

Victor Fedial, a young White Russian, spoke on behalf of the new arrivals. He had a prepared speech but he became overcome with emotion and could only say:

“This is the miracle of our second birth We have come here to enjoy the benefits of democracy and freedom.”

No Standing in Line

Every care had been taken to make sure that the new arrivals would be greeted with Friendliness and warmth rather than with the official coldness and long periods of standing in line to which they had been subjected in the past. They did not go through Ellis Island as have millions of other immigrants. They were checked off the boat with care to prevent duplication or confusion.

ON the pier they were greeted by uniformed representatives of the official recognized travel agencies who arranged for the to go to the places where they have informed the authorities they have homes and work ready for them;

Of the 813 displaced persons arriving on the transport yesterday, 197 were children und sixteen. There were 388 Poles, 214 Balts, 53 Czechoslovaks and the remainder were classed as stateless persons.

Seven religious denominations were represented, as follows: 491 Roman and Greek Catholics, 161 Jewish, 75 Russian and Greek Orthodox, sixty-seven Protestants and eighteen unknown.

The occupation skills were as follows: Eighty-three farmers, eighty tailors and allied crafts, forty technicians, twenty-seven interpreters, fourteen domestics, thirteen accountants and bookkeepers, thirteen engineers and eight nurses. There were also carpenters, locksmiths, masons, barbers, butchers, and other assorted trade including one professional ballet dancer.

Raymond M. Hilliard, chairman of the Mayor’s Committee for Displaced Persons, was in charge of arrangements at the pier and on the boat. Considerable inconvenience was caused to newspaper reporters, photographers, radio men and newsreel cameramen by seemingly conflicting orders. The United States Coast Guard and the office of the Collector of the Port issued credentials which said the bearers could board The Transport. But when the newspaper men and the associates came to the side of the transport it was explained that the ship was under the jurisdiction of the Army and that they would not be permitted to board.

AV Afterword

And finally, I should add that on looking back through my sampling of Estonian, European, including Baltic, and other immigrants I know of the period–it is safe to say a goodly more than 20 percent managed life well in their new country.

For evidence of that, one need only look at the marvelous book on Estonians in America written by Priit Vesilind. I blogged about it last year:

A Miracle Delivered to Our Doorstep

It is a great testimonial to resilience and faithfulness to family, friends, heritage, and new home.

As to the US public mood in 1948: divided, though apparently less so than it is today.  But in 1948 and then in 1950, the good won the day. For that I am eternally grateful–and maybe a bit hopeful that the United States will side with its good angels again today and the days ahead.

More another day about the climate in June 1950—hopefully with fewer mistakes.

av (June 29, 2018)