“99,1 per cent british”

On 15 June 1940, Britain’s High Commissioner in Canberra requested that the Australian government accept “enemy alien internees” for internment in Australial. On 3 Juli 1940, Australia agreed to accept up to 6,000 internees from Great Britain and the Straits Settlements[2] Wikipedia about the then British colonies in Southeast Asia, which included Singapore and areas of present-day Malaysia. for interment in Australia.

Yet in a memorandum dated 13 September 1940, Australia only agreed to accept prisoners of war and internees for internment in Australia. Britain was informed that the only persons to be sent to Australia were those interned in the United Kingdom, and these would remain interned in Australia until they were returned to Britain for release[3] This condition hindered the internees because they first had to be transported to Great Britain in order to gain their freedom. During the war, this could only be done at the risk of their lives. The Australian Menzies government wanted to keep internees out of the country. there.

This policy was based on a 1933 determination about Jewish refugees that “no undue influx” of Jews should be permitted entry to Australia, a position adhered to throughout the decade. The thinking was that vast numbers of Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany would dilute[4] How similar the racist propaganda of the conservative governments of the time and today's ultra-right-wingers against an alleged threat of "foreign infiltration" are ... the county’s racial homogenity – 97% British according to racial purists. Worse was a fear that Australia would fall under Jewish “domination”, and the Australian standard of living would drop. It was also recognised that the deliberate exclusion of refugees would deny Australia the chance of aquiring useful skills and capital brought by potencial “good” Jews.

Australia compromised; some Jewish refugees would be accepted. Australia would not be seen as renouncing ist humanitarian obligations, and the nation’s racial composition would remain essentially intact. The racial criteria adopted by Australia resulted in 90% of all eligible applicants who met all the Australien immigration requirements being rejected solely because they were Jewish.

With war’s outbreak in September 1939, Australia refused to take Jewish aliens of enemy nationality if they originated from within Nazi Europe and would only grant landing permits to aliens residing outside of European coutries in exeptional cases.

This is the context in to which Australia’s acceptance of the Dunera an Queen Mary internees must be placed. To be released, the Australians held that the internees would first have to be repatriated to Britain or Singapore and released there. There would be no possibility of them remaining in Australia, and it was never intended that they would add to Australia’s Jewish population.

Australia accepted over 2,300 Jews from Britain and Singapore in 1940. The internees lived in remote camps in New South Wales and Victoria, with no contact between them and the wider Australian population. They were in Australia but not of it. Their position remained constant throughout the rest of 1940 and 1941.

Meanwhile Britain’s House of Commons reconsidered the arrests that converted refugees into internees. In October 1940, ist White Paper sintained exemptions which affected most internees sent to Australia. In November 1940, Britain asked Australia to consider the release of eligible internees for movement tot he United States and other countries.

The UK Home Office sent Major Julian Layton to Australia to liase between the British government, the internees, and the Australian authorities. With Layton’s visit pending, Australia cabled the High Commission in London that it had no objection tot he repatriation of the internees to Britain “provided such persons are not released from internment until outside the Commenwealth’s jurisdiction.”

On 10 April 1941, Layton first visited the internees in the camp at Hay, News South Wales. He advised that internees would not be released into Australia and negotiated that several hundred internees would be repatriated to Britain on condition that they would join the Pioneer Corps[5] Unarmed units of the British Army.. Internees who did not want to transfer to Britain, or coinsidered that it would be less risky to remain in Australia. stayed in internment. On 5 September 1941, outgoing Interior Minister Harry Foll stated that any limited release of highly skilled internees for use in the war effort “should not imply in any way that the individuals concerned will be allowed to remain in Australia after the war,” and subject to this proviso, in November 1941, skilled internees could be released to work in projects of national importance.

This changed as a result of Japan’s entry into the war after December 1941, when invasion seemed likely. Over 100,000 Australian men were conscripted for full-time service, including many previously in reserved occupations such as agriculture, and a lanour crisis management emerged. The Army Minister established a labour corps along the lines of Britain’s Pioneer Corps, the 8th Employment Company[6] Among the 39 labour units of the Australian army, the 8th Employment Company played a special role: only former internees served there. Jews and Nazi opponents who wanted to stay in Australia were able to replace the Australians who had been drafted. The most important workplaces were the Albury and Tocumwal railway stations. There, military and civilian goods had to be transferred between trains of different gauges in the states of Victoria and New South Wales., to be comprised of released unskilled internees.

Finally by1948, the war service of those who had been organised into the 8th Employment Company forced a government rethink on the permanency of their migration.

Note: The article published here first appeared in English in the Dunera Association Newsletter No. 117 of February 2024. This publication – also in German translation – was made possible by the kind permission of the author Paul R. Bartrop and the Dunera Association.

About the author: The Australian historian Paul R. Bartrop (*1955) has been working intensively on the Holocaust and other genocides since his studies in Melbourne. He teaches in Australia and the USA. His early publications include “The Dunera Affair. A Documentary Resource Book” (Melbourne 1990). The volume provides access to numerous documents relating to the Dunera and internment in Australia. Among other honours, he was made a Fellow of the British Royal Historical Society in 2022.

Paul R. Bartrop. Photo: private.