Free Violins of Hope by James A. Grymes

process better than the saga of the MS St. Louis . The ocean liner left Hamburg on May 13, 1939, with 937 immigrants bound for Cuba, where most planned to stay only until their American visas came through. The majority of the passengers were German Jews, including Günther Goldschmidt’s father Alex and uncle Helmut. Many of them had been imprisoned alongside Erich in Dachau and Buchenwald. When the St. Louis arrived in Havana, its passengers learned that the Cuban landing permits for which they had paid inflated fees had been revoked. Cuba was closing its doors to immigrants. By this time, one of the original passengers had died of congestive heart failure, leaving 936. Of those, 28 passengers who had paid five-hundred-dollar bonds were allowed to disembark, while the remaining 908 passengers were denied entry.
    In the hopes of protecting his passengers, the German captain rerouted the St. Louis to Florida, only to be turned away by the U.S. Coast Guard. The United States had already filled its quota of German immigrants for the year, and refused to accept any more. The captain reluctantly set sail back to Europe, docking the St. Louis in Belgium instead of returning to Nazi Germany. Great Britain welcomed 287 refugees. One Hungarian businessman returned home. The remaining 620 passengers found refuge in France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Being outside of Nazi Germany brought a reprieve from danger, but only briefly. As Germany occupied more and more of Europe, the 620 refugees on the continent found themselves in danger once more. By the end of the Holocaust, 254 of them would be dead, including Alex and Helmut Goldschmidt.
    Erich and the other Jews in Germany and Austria were well aware of the difficulties with emigrating. With few options at their disposal, thousands of them decided to immigrate to Palestine illegally. Many of them had been fully assimilated into European culture and would have never otherwise considered moving to Palestine. Even some of the staunchest Zionists were reluctant to risk breaking the law in such tenuous times, especially if doing so would weaken the relationship between Jews and Great Britain. But they could not find any alternatives. There was simply nowhere else to go.
    A number of Jews sought assistance from the Zionist organization Hechalutz (Pioneer), which prepared young Jews for immigration to Palestine. Erich was one of many hopeful colonists who lived on training farms sponsored by Hechalutz. These camps offered instruction in agriculture and other trades to give future settlers the skills they would need to successfully integrate themselves into the Jewish community of Palestine.
    When the Hechalutz office in Vienna was unable to secure passage to Palestine, Erich and many others turned to Jewish financier Berthold Storfer, who had been named director of the Committee for the Transportation of Jews Overseas by Adolf Eichmann himself. For the Nazis, facilitating illegal immigration killed two birds with one stone: it would rid Europe of more Jews while also irritating the British government, which was struggling to maintain peace between the Arabs and the Jews who were already in Palestine. Viennese Jews would begin lining up at Storfer’s office before midnight, hoping that the next day would bring the paperwork that would enable them to emigrate. Since some certificates expired quickly, the Jews would have to return every two months until their transports could be arranged.
    While they waited for Storfer to orchestrate their emigration, the Jews continued to be terrorized. Nazi hooligans would grab them off the streets—sometimes while they stood in line in front of Storfer’s office—and force them to wash their cars, polish their boots, or scrub the pavement to the delight of jeering onlookers. The Jews could not even feel safe in their own homes. The Gestapo could knock on the door at any minute. “They came at night, hauled us out of bed, beat me,