St. Louis

MS St. Louis

MS St. Louis, in full Motorschiff St. Louis, also called SS St. Louis, German ocean liner that gained international attention in May–June 1939 when Cuba, the United States, and Canada denied entry to its more than 900 Jewish passengers, most of whom had fled Nazi Germany. Ultimately, several European countries took the refugees, though 255 of the passengers are believed to have later died in the Holocaust.

The St. Louis was a transatlantic luxury liner owned by the Hamburg-American Line. On May 13, 1939, it departed from Hamburg, Germany, for Havana, Cuba, a popular stopover for refugees seeking to immigrate to the United States. On board were 937 passengers and 231 crew members; the captain was Gustav Schröder. Most of the travelers were Jews leaving Germany amid growing concerns over safety; some six months earlier Nazis had attacked Jewish persons and property in an event known as Kristallnacht. The passengers had obtained landing certificates to enter Cuba, where most would then wait for their U.S. visas to be approved.

However, before the ship departed, there were indications that the passengers would not be welcomed. In early May Cuban Pres. Federico Laredo Brú signed a decree that invalidated the passengers’ landing certificates. His decision was supported by many Cubans who feared that the immigrants would compete for jobs as the country continued to struggle through the Great Depression. Further inflaming public opinion were rumours—which some believe were spread by Nazi agents on the island—that the Jewish passengers were communists and criminals. On May 8 a large anti-Semitic rally was held in Havana.

Against this backdrop the St. Louis arrived on May 27, 1939. The Cuban government admitted 28 passengers who had the necessary paperwork but refused to let the 908 other travelers disembark; one of the elderly passengers had died during the voyage and was buried at sea. For the next several days the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) attempted to negotiate with Cuban authorities. During this time, morale among the passengers waned, and one man attempted suicide by slashing his wrists and jumping overboard; he was taken to a hospital and allowed to remain in Cuba. As the talks dragged on—with money reportedly being at issue—Laredo Brú ordered the St. Louis to leave Cuban waters on June 2.

After waiting off the coast of Cuba for several days, Schröder sailed for Florida. However, the U.S. government also refused to admit the refugees, citing the country’s yearly immigration quota. The U.S. State Department told the refugees that they must “await their turns on the waiting list”—which was several years long. The U.S. Coast Guard shadowed the vessel, though the USCG later claimed its “units were dispatched out of concern for those on board” and not to keep the ship from docking. The Canadian government also refused to admit the refugees. As the saga continued, the Nazi regime used it as propaganda to support its anti-Jewish policies.

On June 6, 1939, Laredo Brú ended the negotiations. With supplies dwindling, the St. Louis began the voyage back to Europe later that day, and it reached Antwerp on June 17. Through talks spearheaded by the JDC, England, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium agreed to take the refugees, and by June 20 all the passengers had disembarked the St. Louis. In September World War II officially started. It was later determined that of the 907 passengers who had returned to Europe, 255 were killed during the war, the vast majority of them dying in concentration camps.

The incident was notably chronicled in the book Voyage of the Damned (1974) by Gordon Thomas and Max Morgan Witts. It was later adapted (1976) into a film. In 2017 the ill-fated voyage received new attention through a Twitter account that listed the passengers who had died during the war. The account was created the day before U.S. Pres. Donald Trump signed an executive order that suspended immigration from certain Muslim countries. The following year Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau formally apologized for his country’s failure to grant asylum to the Jews on board the St. Louis.