Maritime Museum Marks Anniversary of Tragic Jewish Voyage

The 70th anniversary of the tragedy made famous in the 1976 movie Voyage of the Damned will be marked by a special preview of an planned Maritime Museum of the Atlantic exhibition today, June 17 at 7:30 p.m.

The preview of the exhibit, will include a survivor from the fateful voyage as well as rare documents highlighting the little-known Canadian connection to the human rights tragedy. The full exhibition will open October 1.

In June 1939, 907 German Jews fled Nazi Germany aboard the ocean liner St. Louis. They were turned away by Cuba, the United States and Canada and the ship was forced to return to Europe where 254 of the passengers later died in Nazi death camps.

The St. Louis voyage is a haunting human rights tragedy, however few people know that St. Louis had a close connection to Halifax. Halifax was a regular port of call for St. Louis as the liner made both its maiden and final voyage to Halifax. St. Louis was two days away from Halifax in 1939 and hoping to receive sanctuary for the 907 refugees to enter the port, when indifferent and anti-Semitic officials in Ottawa refused an appeal by Canadian academics and religious leaders to let the ship dock.

Lisa Avedon was four-years-old when she, her mother, grandmother and brother tried to escape the Nazis aboard St. Louis. After the ship returned to Europe, the family travelled to the U.S. Ms. Avedon will attend the special preview, which is 70 years to the day that St. Louis began its return journey to Europe.

The exhibit includes the original secret telegram, on loan from Library and Archives Canada, that refused the ship entry to Canada. It also has a rare selection of ocean liner documents about St. Louis, including an anti-Semitic postcard written by a passenger who travelled aboard the ship after the infamous refugee voyage.

The Maritime Museum of the Atlantic is located at 1675 Lower Water St., Halifax.