Flight from the Reich: Refugee Jews, 1933-1946

by Deborah Dwork, Robert J. Van Pelt

Flight from the Reich is a story about people at a time of crisis. As persecution, war, and deportation savaged their communities, Jews tried to flee Nazi Europe through legal and clandestine routes. In their multifaceted tale of Jewish refugees during and after the Nazi era, Debórah Dwork and Robert Jan van Pelt braid the private and public realms, personal memory and official history. They probe the challenges faced by German Jewish refugees; the dispute among the Swiss on allowing Jews to cross their border; the dangers braved by covert guides who helped the hunted out of occupied France; and the creation of postwar displaced person camps, which have much to tell us about refugee camps today. Grounded in archival research throughout Europe and America, hundreds of oral histories, and thousands of newly discovered letters, Flight from the Reich shows how the lives of people thread together to form history.

Genres: History, Holocaust, Jewish, World War II, Nonfiction

512 pages, Hardcover

First published April 13, 2009

About the author

A renowned historian of Holocaust, Dwork is the Rose Professor of Holocaust History and Director of the Strassler Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies in the Department of History, Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts.

Reviews

[Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. We know so much in my generation about the horrors of the pograms and the Nazi camps, but I had no idea the extent to which European Jews, even those who survived, were truly destroyed. The context that makes us who we are - family, career, nationality (or citizenship *anywhere*), even any sense of connexion to the memories of life before the Nazis - was completely stripped from these people; families were sometimes reunited but often never really reformed, and even many who went on to build new lives that appeared to be full and successful never escaped a haunting sense of not quite belonging to the human race. Many committed suicide years later.

Of course, many non-Jews also suffered terribly, but most of them at least were still recognised as belonging to Europe. The Jews lost even that. They literally had their internal identities erased, and many were never able to reclaim themselves.

An excellent addition to the historiography of WWII, 20th-century Europe, and the Jewish diaspora.

[Anne Vandenbrink · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very detailed and not an easy read, but very informative. Many Jews saw he writing on the wall and left Germany in the early 1930s. Most were not as lucky. Many nations didn't know how to deal with the Jewish refugees and limited immigration. Getting visas and passports were made difficult to obtain. But many organizations tried to rescue Jews from the Reich. Before Israel obtained statehood, many were sent to Palestine for resettlement. Refugees were placed in many displaced persons camps and didn't know where to go after the war. They felt they had no home and didn't belong anywhere. Communication was difficult for the families. Their homeland was destroyed and family members deceased. The kinder-transport was more expansive than I thought, involving many countries.

[Joel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Perspective I hadn't looked at before. Some things I learned: escapees were mostly children and young adults, most countries limited entry to refugees before, during and after the war, the germans didn't start their mass murders until they invaded the USSR - before that they hoped to push Jews out of their territory but once they'd taken over the USSR's part of Poland and large parts of the USSR they had millions more Jews and no where else to expel them to.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very informative. A good explication of the obstacles everyone put in place to prevent Jews from emigrating, as well as descriptions of the people and committees all over the world trying to rescue Jews from the Reich. Full of information I haven't found elsewhere.

[Heather]

Why didn't more Jews flee? This is a history book that describes the challneges faced by German Jewish refugees and the climate at the time.

[Denise M.]

with Robert Jan van Pelt

[Christine · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gut wrenching book that needs to be read by everyone. Makes one ashamed of being human.