During my time on the “Guardian” I was invited by the Mauritian government of Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam after Independence in 1968 to visit the island and write about it. In the course of this trip, I learned that a large group of refugees had been detained in prison during World War II between 1940 and 1945, when they were allowed to emigrate to Palestine or the country of their choice.
2020 was the 80th anniversary of the arrival of the ships with these unwilling passengers in Port Louis and this little known story is now my newest historical novel.
In “Bag Them All!” Norah Hillel, in 2014, received documents, diaries and other papers of her grandfather’s estate. As a result, she researched her family’s history of the 1930s and 1940s. Norah discovered the fate of her family as well as others of 3,600 refugees from Danzig (Gdansk), Vienna, Bratislava as well as of detainees released from the concentration camp Dachau. In his effort to force Jews to leave Germany and Austria, Adolf Eichmann had sent this group in 1939 under inhuman conditions via the Danube to Romania and across the Black Sea to Palestine.
After the fall of France in WW2, Churchill had ordered all Germans to be detained – “Bag ’em all!” Infuriated by the arrival in Haifa of this group of illegal immigrants in the country over which they held a Mandate, the High Commissioner planned to send them to Mauritius. The paramilitary Jewish organization, the Hagannah tried to prevent this. Unfortunately this led to a deadly incident. Thus, a number of immigrants were allowed to remain, while 1,584 sailed to Mauritius, arriving in December 1940. Families were separated and imprisoned from 1940 to 1945, when they were allowed to emigrate to Palestine or their country of choice.
Norah’s research in Germany, Austria, Slovakia and Hungary tells the story of the dispersal and destruction of one family of many millions through deprival of their belongings, eviction, separation and systematic murder. Yet Norah also learns of the moving tales of survival in multiple exile.
The year 2014 was not chosen by chance: It is the year when after long lasting efforts to revive the history of this group of Jewish exiles a Memorial site was opened next to the Jewish Cemetery in Mauritius, the Beau Bassin Memorial Centre .
