British deportations
Part 2

The <em>Duchess of York</em>[1] Wikipedia about the  Duchess of York (German),  retrieved Sep 1, 2023. was launched in 1929 for the Canadian Steamship Company. In 1939, the 183 meter long 20,000 GRT ship was requisitioned by the British Navy. It was designed to travel at speeds of up to 18 knots (33 km/h[2] 1 knot corresponds to one nautical mile or 1852 meters of speed per hour.) and, in civilian service, was certified to carry 1,570 passengers in three classes. Its official capacity as a troopship is not known. In 1943, she was sunk off Spain. With her older sister ship Duchess of Atholl, Ida Dehn and the Nussbaum family, among others, completed the first overseas leg of their escape to Australia in January 1939. In October 1942, this ship was also sunk with 534 passengers, 273 sailors and 25 gunners for armament on board. 827 people were rescued by another British ship.

The Duchess of York departed Greenock, Scotland, on June 24, 1940, bound for Canada and reached Quebec on 26 June. The number of internees and prisoners[3] Peter & Leni Gillman „Collar the Lot“, page 169. is given as 2,602. Among them were 500 prisoners of war and 2,100 civilian internees[4] Michael Hallerberg, thesis „Darstellung und Wahrnehmung von deutschen Kriegsgefangenen in Kanada, 1940-46“ Osnabrück University, 2019, page 44. In comparison with the permitted number of persons, the number of guards and crew members, which has not been handed down, must also be taken into account; there may have been a total of about 3,000 people plus the ship’s crew on board.

According to one report, 150 Luftwaffe POWs were given preference in 1st and 2nd class cabins, which were said to have been cleaned daily by stewards. This preferential treatment was said to have been arranged because the British government feared acts of revenge by the Nazis[5] Gillman ibid page 170. against Britons in their custody. These POWs were also invited to an exclusive captain’s dinner[6] Eva Colmers, Interview with POW Fritz Skerries, quoted from Hallerberg page 64..

In contrast, 2,100 internees, whether Jews, refugees, other civilians or Nazis, were crammed into overcrowded mass quarters[7] Riedel „Hinter kanadischem Stacheldraht“ quoted from Hallerberg page 63.. “From the ceilings hung hammocks. Comrades lay on mattresses on the tables.

The Duchess of York transported the first internees to Canada. Source: Ship profile on Wikipedia.

Behind and under the tables they lay on benches. They use the life jackets as pillows.”

Allegedly, during an attempted mutiny[8] Hallerberg page 63f. – a German sailor was shot; up to ten POWs were injured. According to one account, an officer had ordered a group of internees sitting in the sun to go below deck. This had not been obeyed quickly enough, whereupon a shot was fired. The historians Leni and Peter Gillman[9] Gillman ibid page 170. and Michael Hallerberg quote the German Colonel Georg Friemel[10] Georg Friemel was captured in Holland in May 1940 and taken to Canada. In 1941, he was promoted to general in absentia. Cf- Lexikon der Wehrmacht, retrieved Oct 15, 2023. (1891 – 1977): A sentry was ordered to point his gun at the internees who were leaving. The internees became restless and panic set in. The officer had now ordered the shot at a certain man. He had prevented the soldier from pointing his weapon upward for a warning shot. The shot had been fired from 15 meters away. A court-martial acquitted the officer on guard duty.

The <em>Arandora Star[11] Cf. Blue Star Line online, retrieved Aug 25, 2023. was commissioned in 1927 as a luxury cruiser by the Blue Star Line. The 163 meter long 15,500 GRT ship reached a maximum speed of 16 knots (30 km/h). It was taken over by the British Navy in 1939, given a gray military livery and armament.

On July 1, 1940, the ship sailed from Liverpool with destination St. Johns in Newfoundland (British territory until March 1949). On board were 734 Italian and 479 German internees and 86 German prisoners of war. The number of guards is given as 200 men, the strength of the crew as 174 seamen.

The ship was sunk[12] Wikipedia about the Sinking of the Arandora Star (German), retrieved Sep 2, 2023. as early as July 2 northwest of the northern tip of the Irish island by the U-boat U-47 of Captain Lieutenant Prien, stylized by the Nazis as a naval hero.

Of the surviving 248 Italian and 304 German prisoners, 200 Italians and 251 Germans were already deported on the Dunera on July 10, 1940 – now to Australia.

For the shipping company P. & O. Steam Navigation, the SS Ettrick[13] Cf. Ubootarchiv (German), retrieved Sep 2, 2023. sailed on the Gibraltar – Glasgow route in 1938/39. The ship of nearly 11,300 GRT had a top speed of 20 knots (37 km/h) and was 157 meters long. She was sunk off Gibraltar[14] Cf. Uboot.net, retrieved Aug 30, 2023. on April 15, 1942. Of 336 people on board, 312 were rescued.

As the third deportation steamer, the SS Ettrick made the voyage to Canada on July 3, 1940 and arrived in Quebec on 13 July. In civilian traffic, she had 258 berthes, and 1,150 military personnel were allowed. The number of prisoners or internees on board is given as 3,062 (!). With reference tot he ships Captain Milne, there is talk of space for 1,200 soldiers, but 2,600 internees[15] Cf. Hallerberg loc.cit., page 63. were said to have been on board. According to Leni and Peter Gillman, 900 were prisoners of war. The War Cabinet[16] Minutes of the War Cabinet from July 3, 1940, The National Archives signature CAB-65-8-4 page 28. lists “858 B Class Germans, 1,348 German prisoners of war and 405 young Italians.” Elsewhere, the strength of the guard contingent is given as 377 officers and enlisted men, so the figure of “3,062” may be close to the total number, including sailors. Captain E. Howell[17] Gillman loc.cit, page 204., commander of the specially formed 201st Prisoner of War Company, is quoted as saying that he could hardly accommodate his men: “Too many prisoners and foreigners for the quarters available.”

Consequently, “conditions of indescribable congestion and overcrowding” prevailed on board. Sleeping areas were even locked at night, preventing access to the toilets. “There were 2 insufficient meals per day, […], and only after 6 days one received a daily ration of 2 cookies [sic!], half of the rations issued from the first day to the German POWs on board”, is further reported[18] Hallerberg loc.cit, page 62, quoted from TNA HO 215/210 „Property of Internees – Compensation for loss and damage“, „Sumamry report fort he internment of German und Austrian Refugees in Canada“ from Feb 18, 1941..

A civilian internee[19] Quoted from Hallerberg loc.cit, page 62. sent Canada’s Director of Prisoners of War his diary on March 13, 1941, in which he wrote of the SS Ettrick’s voyage, among other things, “Inhuman treatment – like a slave ship. Two large rooms, perhaps suitable for 500 soldiers (…) are occupied by 1,000 people. Result – too few hammocks and the space is not enough for them.”

The SS Ettrick was not assigned to any convoy by explicit decision of the British War Cabinet, although both the sinking of the Arandora Star and the activities of German U-boats on the route (especially in the area of the North Channel) were known to the Churchill government[20] Minutes of the War Cabinet loc.cit,. July 3, 1940, page. 28. The National Archives (TNA).. Equally deliberate was the omission of public information that might have deterred German ships from attacking if the worst had happened.

The SS Ettrick, a sister ship of the Dunera, was used for the third transport of internees to Canada.

In a House of Commons debate on July 1, 1941, War Secretary David Margesson[21] Minute of House of Commons from July 1, 1941, retrieved Sep 1, 2023. was asked what action had been taken regarding the treatment of internees on the ship. “I am satisfied that no further action is necessary.” Complaints had concerned treatment after landing, for which Canadian authorities were responsible.

Despite the sinking of the Arandora Star the previous day, the War Cabinet expressly decides to send the Ettrick to Canada “without escort” with “858 B Class Germans, 1,348 prisoners of war and 405 young Italians” on board. Source: The National Archives, CAB-65-8-4, sheet 28.

Built in England in 1938 for the Polish Gdynia-Ameryka Line, this 11,000 GRT transatlantic steamer was 156 meters long and reached a top speed of 17 knots (31.5 km/h). In civilian service, 260 crew members served up to 940 passengers. After only one civilian voyage, the SS Sobieski[22] Wikipedia about SS Sobieski, retrieved Sep 1, 2023. was in service for the British Navy from 1940 to 1947. From 1950 until her scrapping in 1974, she sailed routes in the Black Sea under the Soviet flag as the Gruziya.

The SS Sobieski was used to send 1,838 internees on a voyage to Canada on July 7, 1940. Chamberlain, however, reported to the War Cabinet[23] Memorandum by N. Chamberlain, TNA FO 916/2581 vom 2.7.1940, quoted from Hallerberg page 44. only 450 German POWs and about 1,000 internees in categories “B” and “C”, which neither reduces nor improves the problem of systematic overcrowding.

The ship arrived in the port of Quebec City on July 15, 1940. Throughout the crossing, Jews and anti-Nazis felt a constant threat of Nazi mutiny[24] Clive Teddern, „Enemy Aliens: The Internment of Jewish Refugees in Canada, 1940–43“, quoted from The Canadian Encyclopedia „Prison Ships in Canada“  from June 20, 2017, retrieved Aug 26, 2023.: “We weren’t worried about the U-boats. It was the danger from the people we were with.”

Off the U.S. coast, U-boat mate Kurt Reich, a prisoner of war, jumped through a porthole: he reached the shore not far away by swimming. There he was picked up by U.S. authorities. The German embassy bought him free and shipped him to Germany, where his “heroic deed” was exploited for propaganda[25] Reich described "the spirit of our U-boat weapon" in a propaganda book in 1942 and in the Nazi organ "Die Kriegsmarine" in 1943, among others. purposes.

The SS Sobieski was originally built for a Polish shipping company. Source: Imperial War Museum No. 19103.

The Sobieski is said to have been part of the top-secret Operation FISH II[26] See Today in Ottawa’s History, retrieved Aug 25, 2023.: it transported part of the British national treasure in gold and securities, the total value of which is “conservatively” estimated at 450 million pounds sterling[27] Equivalent to 67 billion Canadian dollars in 2015, or just under € 45.5 billion today.. The super-secret and high-risk operation is described in the literature as a “bold but desperate gamble,” especially since the sinking of the SS Laurentic with 43 tons of gold by a German submarine during World War 1 may have been an unpleasant memory. The Batory involved in the operation was forced to stop due to engine damage. On board the Monarch of Bermuda, refugee families were brought “to safety” along the way. Children and internees as a human shield[28] Today in Ottawa, loc.cit.?

With the HMT Dunera[29] Wikipedia about HMT Dunera (German), abgerufen am 20.8.2023. registered as a military transport for 1,167 or 1,157 passengers, 2,542 men were deported from Liverpool on July 10, 1940. Among them were 451 German and Italian survivors of the Arandora Star. The Dunera was the last of the five deportation ships and the only one bound for Australia.

Already on the second day of the voyage, the Dunera was fired upon by a German submarine with two torpedoes. The 3,000 internees, guards and sailors on board escaped with horror. Legends have grown up around this incident, and Nazis probably had a hand in the later creation and spread of false information about a German submarine would have accompanied the Dunera at times.

The 57-day voyage from Liverpool to Australia proved to be a horror trip in view of the robberies and violent actions of the guard crew against the internees. Officers had assisted in this, covered up the actions, and were themselves involved in anti-Semitic attacks.