Introduction
Displaced Persons & UNRRA
In the aftermath of the Final Solution (the Nazi's planned annihilation of all Jews and Gypsies and other races and groups considered inferior or defective) millions of people in Europe had fled or been forcibly removed from their homes and homelands. They were truly displaced. They were displaced in body, mind, spirit, health, displaced from family and friends, from home - in every aspect of their lives - truly displaced. Often their home countries in the East had become cemeteries. These people were survivors of the German's concentration, forced labor, extermination camps, and death marches. These survivors were given the stereotyped label "displaced persons", and most often were referred to as "DP's".
The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) was officially formed in November 1943 in anticipation of the massive numbers of people (estimated at 21 million) who would need assistance when the War came to an end. President Roosevelt, representative of the United States along with emissaries of 44 other nations, signed the agreement establishing UNRRA. Though funded by all the signatory nations, most of the burden was shared by France Great Britain, the former Soviet Union, and the United States. The majority of UNRRA activities in Europe took place in Austria, Italy, and Western Germany which had been divided into British, French, and United States occupation zones. UNRRA's primary function was to coordinate the relief efforts of various agencies and provide for the care, shelter, rehabilitation, and repatriation of the displaced persons. Rapid repatriation was UNRRA's primary focus.
UNRRA, working with and under the Allied Military Government (AMG), was not prepared for the major task of caring for millions of displaced persons and arranging for their repatriation. It was anticipated that at the War's end, 5,000-6,000 workers would be needed. Hurriedly recruited and poorly trained, by July 1945, UNRRA had less than half that number. The most efficient personnel came from countries that had experienced the War firsthand. In the early months following Liberation, the Allies transported over 5,000,000 people to their homelands, leaving an estimated 2,000,000 refugees and displaced needing assistance.
Displaced persons in Germany were rounded up and put into assembly centers. Hundreds of these centers, commonly called camps, were established. Special children's centers for the "lost children" (war orphans) were created. The displaced had no legal or social protection from their home country; they suffered the disabilities of the stateless, and often considered themselves inmates in the DP camps. They were mass billeted in former concentration camps such as Belsen in the British zone, where up to 40% were billeted outside camps. A part of Auschwitz was used as a repatriation camp. Housing was provided using former Wermacht barracks such as Wildflecken, an SS training camp hidden in the Bavarian forest. Wildflecken was one of the largest camps and at one point housed over 10,000 Poles. Thus, when the War ended many of those who survived the Nazi horror and their notorious camps found themselves again behind the barbed wire (ultimately removed) of former Nazi camps.
Most UNRRA camps were overcrowded. Though the intention was good, all people admitted to the camps were dusted with DDT to prevent the spread of lice and disease. Jewish and non-Jewish nationalities were thrown together, and the living conditions were poor, although food rations were generally ample in most camps. Some people were placed in requisitioned residential housing. As time went on the Jews were allowed to live outside the camps due to the special religious requirements and needs of the group. They often set up their own camps, particularly in the United States zone, into which the flow of refugees was great, especially so in late 1946. With time, the overall quality of the camps improved but the situation remained somewhat chaotic.
UNRRA officially defined displaced persons as being separated from their country of origin. If still in their own country, they were considered refugees, thus not qualifying for UNRRA assistance. In December of 1945, UNRRA determined that all Jewish people, despite UNRRA's criteria, would be considered displaced persons - under the circumstances, a belated irony. It should be noted that in oral histories many Jewish survivors did not consider themselves displaced persons but rather refugees. They seem not to consider the displaced persons camps established by UNRRA as a greatly sign)ficant piece of their story. It was a recovery period - a time, a place, in which they could begin to return to a somewhat normal way of life within the confines of the DP camps.
Displaced persons were assisted by UNRRA in their attempts to locate any living relatives. As repatriation was an urgent priority for UNRRA, a rigid system was set up for individuals and families, of which there were few. This system included physical and mental health screenings, determination of age, gender, occupation, country of origin, etc. This information was used for ID cards enabling more rapid repatriation. Not all those displaced wished to return to their own country. Fear of either further persecution or reprisals by post-war governments caused many to become hard-core refusers with regard to returning to their homeland. UNRRA however, pushed feverishly for repatriation -often enticing those who were recalcitrant with incentives such as a sixty day ration of food upon return.
Of the displaced persons roughly 20% were Jews and about 80% of those were Poles. Because the Jewish people had been the primary victims of the Final Solution and had been treated more brutally during the War, they received a greater amount of public attention after the fact. However, when it came to immigration, those who made the decisions regarding numbers to be admitted into the United States knew very little about displaced persons. DP's were commonly considered to be passive, lacking in skill or ability, without initiative or hope, and having nothing to offer. It was not understood why everyone had not simply gone home after the War. The United States Congress, business, and industry feared a depression and a glut of workers if too many immigrants were allowed to come into the United States. In an attempt to awaken an apathetic nation to the plight of the displaced persons, lobbyists emphasized that 80% of these people were Christian, a little known fact at the time. It is unfortunate to note that when this became public knowledge, Congress then began receiving much mail in support of the primarily Christian displaced persons. In the Autumn of 1947, a Congressional committee was sent to investigate the camps. Their report noted that if the disposition of the Jews could be cleared up, the solution for the remainder of the displaced persons could be facilitated. The opening up of Palestine for Jews to resettlement would break the stalemate. Basically anti-semitic, the United States Displaced Persons Act was passed in 1948. The Act was liberalized in 1950 by which time displaced persons ceased being of great concern to either Jewish Americans or the Congress as many displaced Jewish refugees were already resettling in Palestine.
As had been planned, UNRRA transferred a large part of its operations in early 1947 to various other international organizations, closing most of its offices in Europe. On July 1, 1947, the Provisional Committee of the International Relief Organization (IRO) took over the UNRRA responsibility for the almost 700,000 displaced persons remaining in its care. Though Great Britain was slow to relinquish its control of Palestine, and the U.S. was even slower in its acceptance of displaced persons, the Jewish people finally did have a home to go to with the establishment of Israel (Palestine) in 1948. However some Jewish refugees and displaced persons remained in the camps until 1957 when Fohrenwald, the last camp, closed. - APJ