Another fine refugee used passport – Shipwrecked

 

Czechoslovakian issue used by the new Slovak puppet-state.

 

When we read about one of history’s darkest moments, the period of six long years that dragged the world into conflict and slaughter, we are always relieved to find out that the plight of a victim ends with their rescue and freedom. This, in my opinion, is the most rewarding part of this story, of the ordeal.

 

The dark veil that was pulled over the continent and other parts of the globe for many years will always be etched into our memories and preserved into history books for centuries to come. We will learn about the time when man has descended to the lowest bottomless pits of evil, reaching to places where light does not shine, and at that precise moment can also overcome some of the hardest of difficulties, escape situations that at first seem impossible but at the end stand up high, and face evil with courage & strength.

 

Some of the amazing tales of escape, rescue and salvage from WW2 can be told by those who lived through the darkest long years of the war, by those who were hunted and persecuted just because of their religion: the Jewish people.

 

The Hollander saga is an amazing example when it comes to escaping evil and finding salvation at the end of a long and terrifying journey. The words in this article did not come from a face-to-face interview or some hand written journal that was written during the war. No, the story that will unfold here today was brought into light by paging through this temporary passport, the one used from the start of the trek, at the beginning of the war and that would end 4 long years later. The travel document in this article traveled through occupied hostile Axis Europe, moving to Italy and from there, at the end, to British Palestine.

 

Though it is a Czechoslovakian TEMPORARY passport, it was issued by the newly formed Slovak State in 1939 due to the fact they did not by then had time to issue newly printed samples. The passport here numbered 1200/986/39 was issued to Priska Hollander aged 25 from Veľká Sevljuš (now Vynohradiv) who was not a citizen. The passport was issued at Bratislava on July 31st 1939 by the city’s police authorities. It was valid for the short period of time of 5 months only, and was issued for the purpose of immigration. It was valid for Europe specifically as indicated on page 4.

 

Young Priska left their Bratislava on May 16^th on board the “Pentcho” and due to rough seas and the possibility of using a poorly looked-after vessel, was shipwrecked at the Aegean Sea and managed miraculously to find refuge at the port of Rhodes. The small Island with the community of close to 2,000 Jewish members did their utmost to bring comfort and assistance to close to 200 refugees of the Pentcho, who had lost all their belongings at sea.

 

The ancient Jewish community of the Island consisted of Sephardi Jews who have been living on the island since the Spanish Inquisition over 500 years ago and some families dating back to the ancient times. They all contributed to their brothers who were in need: food, clothing and some money donations as well (moat likely the internees were under the supervision of the special police headed by Lt. Col. Ferdinand Mittino – I added a sampled image of another passport that was issued by him to a Jewess living on the Island in 1938).

 

Up to the end of WWI the island was part of the Ottoman Empire but from 1922 to 1948 it was part of the Italian Fascist empire, part of Mussolini’s Italy. Today, Rhodes is part of Greece, its natural home.

 

Following the rise of fascism in Europe, many Jews fled from Europe via rivers and sea for British Palestine and some stopped, briefly, at the Island of Rhodes for refueling and refreshment of supplies. This same was most likely the case of the Pentcho, which, according to some reports, was shipwrecked close to the Island of Samos and hauled to Rhodes.

 

From 1940 to around 1942, she was living on the Island and paging through passport can only reveal bits and fragments of the puzzle, but it was enough to piece together the full story, well, most of it.

 

At the back of the document, there is one entry marking for Italy, for Bari, dating from March 16^th 1942. On line records and information does indicate that the survivors of the ship wreck, who were lodged at the Rhodes stadium, were transported from their make-shift refugee dwellings to internment at the infamous Ferramonti Di Tarsia camp (during the war Bari was the location for internment camps holding refugees and those that were not permitted to remain in the country and after the war the center for refugees and a major port from where illegal immigrants sailed to British Palestine and after 1948 to the newly formed State of Israel).

 

She was very very fortunate indeed, to put it mildly: spending over 1 year in an Italian Fascist internment camp, in much better conditions had they been under German hands, only to be liberated by the British in late 1943, then moving to Allied refugee centers in the same camps until June 5^th of 1944 were she immigrated to the Mandate and arriving at Haifa port (given refugee transportation papers by the British, for Palestine).

 

I have added an image of another example issued in 1940, a Slovakian equivalent, also used by a survivor of the Pentcho.

 

 

Thank you for reading “Our Passports”.