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Book Rescue Board

    Rescue Board

    Book Details:
  • Author : Rebecca Erbelding
  • Publisher : Anchor
  • Release : 2018-04-10
  • ISBN : 0385542526
  • Pages : 384 pages

Download or read book Rescue Board written by Rebecca Erbelding and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2018-04-10 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: WINNER OF THE NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD For more than a decade, a harsh Congressional immigration policy kept most Jewish refugees out of America, even as Hitler and the Nazis closed in. In 1944, the United States finally acted. That year, Franklin D. Roosevelt created the War Refugee Board, and put a young Treasury lawyer named John Pehle in charge. Over the next twenty months, Pehle pulled together a team of D.C. pencil pushers, international relief workers, smugglers, diplomats, millionaires, and rabble-rousers to run operations across four continents and a dozen countries. Together, they tricked the Nazis, forged identity papers, maneuvered food and medicine into concentration camps, recruited spies, leaked news stories, laundered money, negotiated ransoms, and funneled millions of dollars into Europe. They bought weapons for the French Resistance and sliced red tape to allow Jewish refugees to escape to Palestine. In this remarkable work of historical reclamation, Holocaust historian Rebecca Erbelding pieces together years of research and newly uncovered archival materials to tell the dramatic story of America’s little-known efforts to save the Jews of Europe.

Book America and the Holocaust War refugee board Hungary

Download or read book America and the Holocaust War refugee board Hungary written by David S. Wyman and published by . This book was released on 1989 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Paper Walls America and the Refugee Crisis 1938 1941

Download or read book Paper Walls America and the Refugee Crisis 1938 1941 written by David S. Wyman and published by Plunkett Lake Press. This book was released on 2019-07-31 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Paper Walls was the first scholarly book to deal with the question of America’s response to the Nazi assault on the European Jews. A revised version of my Ph.D. dissertation at Harvard University, it was originally published in 1968... Those times were very different from these. There was little public receptivity to Holocaust studies then, and only limited academic interest... The scholarly reviews, of which there were several, were favorable. But the general press paid little attention to the book... A pioneer in its field, Paper Walls first established the thesis that three features of American society in the 1930’s and 1940’s were key to understanding the nation’s inadequate response to the refugee crisis. They were anti-Semitism, nativistic nationalism, and the unemployment problem of the Great Depression. This basic concept has been followed in all the succeeding scholarly literature on the topic. This concept is also the main legacy from Paper Walls to my more recent book, The Abandonment of the Jews: America and the Holocaust, 1941-1945 (1984). AlthoughAbandonment stands as a complete study in its own right, it is in fact the sequel toPaper Walls. It is a continuation of the history of America’s reaction to the plight of the European Jews in the Nazi era.” — David S. Wyman, Preface to the 1985 paperback edition of Paper Walls “[A] thorough study of American refugee policy from 1938 to 1941... On the basis of Wyman’s book, the United States stands indicted for a tragic failure to live up to its nineteenth-century ideal of asylum... Though Wyman makes no effort to disguise his strong sympathy for the refugees, his book... gives a careful and well-documented history of American refugee policy... The state department — above all Assistant Secretary of State Breckinridge Long — emerges from his pages as the primary culprit... The attitude displayed by... the foreign service... led to the creation of the paper walls that Wyman so honestly and tragically describes in this important book.” — Robert A. Divine, Journal of American History “The first scholarly examination of American refugee policy between 1938 and 1941... What Wyman sets out to do he does extremely well. Paper Walls is a worthwhile addition to our growing knowledge of the policy of those who bore witness to the Holocaust.” — Henry L. Feingold, American Jewish Historical Quarterly “No one who reads this book will be able to ignore the fact that blatant antisemitism in the United States — from the public, from Congress, and from within the State Department — prevented our government from giving more than minimal assistance to the Jewish refugees... Professor Wyman has done an immense amount of research in primary and secondary sources and Paper Walls is extraordinarily sound and superbly documented. It is tightly written, well-organized, and logically presented.” — Leonard Dinnerstein, Jewish Social Studies “The conclusions of the book are stark and simple: ‘The half-filled quotas of mid-1940 to mid-1941, when refugee rescue remained entirely feasible, symbolize 20,000 to 25,000 lives lost...’ In the eight years from 1933 to 1941, about 250,000 refugees found safety here. The total is not small, but neither is the country which received them.” — Raul Hilberg, Political Science Quarterly “Generally [President Roosevelt] left refugee policy to the disposition of a hostile Congress and the State Department. Yet, as the author points out, neither Roosevelt, the State Department, nor Congress can be blamed entirely for what happened. ‘Viewed within the context of its times, United States refugee policy from 1938 to the end of 1941 was essentially what the American people wanted.’ In December 1938 only 8.7 per cent of the respondents to a Roper poll favored entry of a larger number of European refugees than the quota law allowed; fully 83 per cent were flatly opposed. This book tells a dismal story. While it is dear where the author’s sympathies lie, he tells the story with restraint; if anything, his approach and writing style underplay the pathos involved... Wyman has given us a scholarly description and analysis of the first act of the tragedy, which he promises to carry on through the war and postwar years.” — J. Joseph Huthmacher, The American Historical Review “This thoroughly documented study of the United States policies in regard to the refugee crisis of 1938-1941 is the best available source in this field and on that period. Drawing on material from some well known as well as several previously untapped sources, Wyman discusses both the ambiguous role of particular figures and organizations and the underlying forces at work in American society which influenced governmental policy and practices; anti-semitism, nativism, fear of unemployment and of Nazi subversives are shown as the major pressure to which America’s people and leaders succumbed.” — Joseph S. Roucek, The International Migration Review “This is a depressing topic impressively researched. Professor Wyman has investigated almost all the relevant primary and secondary materials in order to recount the tragic story of America’s indifference to the hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing Hitler’s Europe... Over two-thirds of Americans desired to keep the Jewish refugees out of the United Stales. Wyman argues that this sentiment was due to three sources: ‘nativism, anti-Semitism, and economic insecurity’... There is enough evidence in Wyman’s book to cause the Statue of Liberty to collapse for lack of moral foundation.” — John P. Diggins, The Historian “Professor Wyman skillfully investigates and thoughtfully analyzes the complexities of the crisis and the reasons why more was not done to aid the refugees in the crucial period between 1938 and 1941... The author examines the problem thoroughly from a number of standpoints... The State Department, the Congress, and the President really were reflecting the attitudes of the American people, who, Wyman asserts, were indifferent and even antagonistic to the refugees [because of] the economic insecurity engendered by the depression, nativistic nationalism, and anti-Semitism. A well-researched and lucidly, if not dispassionately, written book, Paper Walls is a sound, workmanlike study of a significant episode in our nation’s recent past.” — E. Berkeley Tompkins, The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science

Book The Shelter and the Fence

Download or read book The Shelter and the Fence written by Norman H. Finkelstein and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2021-06-08 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This chapter in World War II history is a well-kept secret. Make this title a first choice." —School Library Journal STARRED review The story of Holocaust refugees who found shelter in the United States—with unique parallels to today's stories of asylum seekers. In 1944, at the height of World War II, 982 European refugees found a temporary haven at Fort Ontario in Oswego, New York. They were men, women, and children who had spent frightening years one step ahead of Nazi pursuers and death. They spoke nineteen different languages, and, while most of the refugees were Jewish, a number were Catholic, Greek Orthodox, and Protestant Christians. From the time they arrived at the Fort Ontario Emergency Refugee Shelter on August 5 they began re-creating their lives and embarked on the road to becoming American citizens. In the history of World War II and the Holocaust, this "token" save by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the War Refugee Board was too little and too late for millions. But for those few who reached Oswego it was life changing. The Shelter and the Fence tells their stories.

Book America and the Holocaust Confirming the news of extermination

Download or read book America and the Holocaust Confirming the news of extermination written by David S. Wyman and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 1989 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Too Little and Almost Too Late

Download or read book Too Little and Almost Too Late written by Rafael Medoff and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2017-11 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the final, desperate months of the Holocaust, a small U.S. government agency raced against the clock to save Jews from the Nazis. Despite President Franklin D. Roosevelt's disinterest and the State Department's obstruction, the men and women of the War Refugee Board successfully employed unorthodox means of rescue. They bribed border officials, produced forged identification papers, arranged to have Jewish refugees moved out of dangerous regions, and used psychological warfare to disrupt Hungary's cooperation in the deportations to Auschwitz. It was the War Refugee Board that persuaded Raoul Wallenberg to go to Nazi-occupied Budapest, and financed his heroic life-saving activities there. Reflecting later on what they did, the board's senior staff lamented that their efforts came "almost too late" and achieved "too little." Yet the War Refugee Board played a major role in the rescue of an estimated 200,000 Jewish refugees. Too Little, and Almost Too Late is the first scholarly book about this extraordinary and little-known chapter in the history of the Holocaust. It demonstrates how even a handful of good people can make a real difference. Too Little, and Almost Too Late was authored by noted Holocaust historian Dr. Rafael Medoff, with additional essays by other leading scholars in the field of America's response to the Holocaust. The foreword is by Prof. Walter Reich, former executive director of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Book Passionate Crusaders

Download or read book Passionate Crusaders written by Heather Voight and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Passionate Crusaders tells the gripping story of a few righteous Americans who sought to do what many thought impossible in 1944-save Jews who had not yet been murdered in the Holocaust. By January 1944, Treasury Department officials Henry Morgenthau, John Pehle, and Josiah DuBois had already convinced President Franklin Roosevelt to create the War Refugee Board, an agency with the authority to provide rescue and relief for Jews and other groups persecuted by the Nazis. Scholars have criticized the Board for its inability to save more Jews and maintained that the agency should have been created sooner. Heather Voight's groundbreaking research proves that despite its shortcomings, the War Refugee Board changed history and forever altered American foreign policy. Its creation ended the cycle of indifference that the government and the American public had shown to victims of the Holocaust. In the words of Henry Morgenthau, from 1944-1945 "crusaders, passionately persuaded of the need for speed and action" risked their reputations and sometimes their lives to save Jews. In addition to saving more than 100,000 lives, Board members also made a lasting impact on international law. They pressured the War Crimes Commission to broaden its definition of war crimes by including the murder of civilians by their own countrymen. This new definition of war crimes was applied to genocides committed many decades later in Bosnia and Rwanda, and continues to be used today. "[Passionate Crusaders] shows that the efforts of an honorable and courageous few can create small steps to change history. This detailed, well-told, and inspiring story will be of value to students of the Holocaust, American history, and human rights." -From the Foreword by Dr. Leon Stein, Professor Emeritus of History and Education Director Emeritus, Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center.

Book American Jewry and the Holocaust

Download or read book American Jewry and the Holocaust written by Yehuda Bauer and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 2017-12-01 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bauer confronts the tremendous moral and historical questions arising from JDC's activities. How great was the danger? Who should be saved first? Was it justified to use illegal or extralegal means? What country would accept Jewish refugees? His analysis raises an issue which perhaps can never be answered: could American Jews have done more if they had grasped the reality of the Holocaust?

Book American Experience America and the Holocaust Benjamin Akzin

Download or read book American Experience America and the Holocaust Benjamin Akzin written by and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Features a June 29, 1944 letter written by Benjamin Akzin of the U.S. War Refugee Board addressed to Lawrence S. Lesser of the U.S. War Refugee Board, in which he urges the bombing of the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Birkenau. The information is presented as part of the resource on "America and the Holocaust," a documentary television program that was broadcast by the WGBH Educational Foundation and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).

Book FDR and the Jews

    FDR and the Jews

    Book Details:
  • Author : Richard Breitman
  • Publisher : Harvard University Press
  • Release : 2013-03-19
  • ISBN : 0674073673
  • Pages : 410 pages

Download or read book FDR and the Jews written by Richard Breitman and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2013-03-19 with total page 410 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nearly seventy-five years after World War II, a contentious debate lingers over whether Franklin Delano Roosevelt turned his back on the Jews of Hitler's Europe. Defenders claim that FDR saved millions of potential victims by defeating Nazi Germany. Others revile him as morally indifferent and indict him for keeping America's gates closed to Jewish refugees and failing to bomb Auschwitz's gas chambers. In an extensive examination of this impassioned debate, Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman find that the president was neither savior nor bystander. In FDR and the Jews, they draw upon many new primary sources to offer an intriguing portrait of a consummate politician-compassionate but also pragmatic-struggling with opposing priorities under perilous conditions. For most of his presidency Roosevelt indeed did little to aid the imperiled Jews of Europe. He put domestic policy priorities ahead of helping Jews and deferred to others' fears of an anti-Semitic backlash. Yet he also acted decisively at times to rescue Jews, often withstanding contrary pressures from his advisers and the American public. Even Jewish citizens who petitioned the president could not agree on how best to aid their co-religionists abroad. Though his actions may seem inadequate in retrospect, the authors bring to light a concerned leader whose efforts on behalf of Jews were far greater than those of any other world figure. His moral position was tempered by the political realities of depression and war, a conflict all too familiar to American politicians in the twenty-first century.