The history of the internment camps in France since 1939 is well researched but poorly known. The recently opened Camp de Mille memorial site near Aix-en-Provence is not the first memorial site of its kind.

Those who have heard the phrase "banality of evil" think they know something about it. Here is an ordinary factory building in the industrial suburb of Aix-en-Provence. Once the complex with two pipes was a brick factory. From 1939 to 1942 it served as an internment camp for foreign "enemies of the state". In the summer of 1942, far more than 2,000 Jews were deported from here to Auschwitz. Then the production of bricks was resumed, which continued until 2002 - as if nothing else had happened there. Now the complex has been turned into a memorial place.

Knowledge, emotions, thoughts

There are three phases in the history of the camp in "free" Southern France, which until the end of 1942 was directed by French officials on the orders of the French government. From September 1939 to June 1940, i.e. from the moment war was declared until the lightning victory of the Nazi troops, “enemies of the state”, read: German citizens, were kept here. The overwhelming majority were Jews and/or opponents of the Nazi regime who emigrated to France or were wrecked while fleeing there. Among the prisoners of the camp were figures of art and literature, for example, Hans Bellmer, Max Ernst, Lion Feuchtwanger and Golo Mann.

Then, from July 1940, Camp de Mile became an internment camp for "undesirable foreigners" who were considered as such by the Vichy government. The Spanish republicans and Jews joined the number of "enemies of the state", in October 1940 they were "pushed out" from South-West Germany. The complex, numbering at times more than 3,500 internees, was bursting at the seams. Food supply and hygiene conditions deteriorated markedly. The third phase was formed by the deportations of Jews in August and September 1942. The Petain regime agreed to extradite 10,000 foreign Jews to the Nazis. Since the bureaucratic structures did not know what to do with the remaining children, they, without hesitation, were sent along with the adults at the initiative of the head of the French government, Pierre Laval. The list of children deported from the Camp de Miles to Auschwitz contains more German names than French ones: Werner Blau, Renate Falk, Hans Kahn, Gerty Licht, Erwin Ur...

In 1992, a French railway company installed a historic wagon on the unused tracks of the factory site, which was used to deport Jews. The route of the 15,000 m memorial complex of the Camp de Mille now rests on three cornerstones: knowledge- a story about the history of the camp and the transfer of historical context; emotions- ensuring accessibility to parts of those buildings in which the internees lived and left traces of their stay, such as wall paintings, graffiti, etc.; reflections- the final section, specifically aimed at young visitors, designed to combat prejudice and strengthen the sense of citizenship and the spirit of resistance.

The history of the French internment camps is relatively well researched scientifically, but rather poorly known to the general public. Along with many separate studies, now since 2002 in the form of Denis Pechansky's book "France of the camps: internment, 1938-1946" (Gallimard publishing house) ("La France des camps: L "internement, 1938-1946" (Gallimard Peschanski, a historian and specialist on the Vichy period, estimates the number of camps at more than 200, the number of internees at about 600 thousand people.

It should be emphasized that the decree that made possible the internment of "undesirable foreigners" was issued a year and a half before the German occupation by a somewhat democratic government. This measure testifies to the hostility towards foreigners, which was growing in the late 30s. and in the non-fascist states of Europe. Communists were also interned (after the conclusion of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact) and Sinti ( the self-name of some branches of the gypsy ethnic group, politically correct, in contrast to the German Zigeuner, associated with the genocide of gypsies during the Second World War. - Approx. per.) (until 1946!). During the war in Algeria, the practice of internment was restored, including on the territory of the metropolis.

The history of the Camp de Rivesaltes near Perpignan forms a kind of summary of all possible camps with their use. In this "Camp Joffre" (the camp was named after Joseph Joffre (1852-1931), Marshal of France (1916), commander-in-chief of the French army, built in 1938 as a military camp, a small part of the 450 thousands of Republicans who fled Spain from Franco, joined by refugees from Nazi Germany from 1941, mostly Jews, who were deported to Auschwitz at the end of 1942. When the southern zone was occupied, German troops were quartered in the camp. their retreat in mid-1944, the French authorities kept a motley mixture of Spanish refugees, German and Italian prisoners of war, Soviet emigrants, and domestic collaborators there.The camp was liquidated in 1948, and it was followed in 1962-1977. "family camp" for Algerians who collaborated with the colonial authorities and, after gaining independence, the former colony was forced to flee from there.

Finally, in 1986, the site of the camp was taken over by an "administrative detention center" for undocumented persons, which until 2007 was one of the largest in the country.

Not the first place of its kind

It is this story, so rich in change, that a memorial under construction, designed by Rudy Ricciotti, an architect from southern France, must now retell. Already on September 23, in the Parisian suburb of Drancy, the center for the deportation of Jews, a memorial designed by the Swiss bureau Diener & Diener, a derivative of the Mémorial de la Shoah [the Holocaust memorial] in Paris, was inaugurated. With a strong media response, the opening of the Camp de Miles, which was attended by the French Prime Minister and other cabinet members on 10 September, should not let us forget that this kind of memorial site already exists.

Thus, the Internment and Deportation Memorial at the former Camp de Royale, opened in early 2008, has a route through its territory based on exactly the same three cornerstones as the route at Camp de Mille. Royale is of particular importance, since the first train with deportees left from here to Auschwitz. Das Center d "étude et de recherche sur les camps d" internement dans le Loiret et la déportation juive in Orléans [Center for the study and research of internment camps in the Loire department and the deportation of Jews in Orleans] was opened even as early as 1991. About others former large camps are at least informed by information centers (Camp de Gurs) or monuments and memorial plaques.

Mark Zitzmann

translation urokiistorii

Internment camp

I wondered if it was because the British had interned me that my German passport had a swastika stamp on the photo and there was no big red letter J, which means "Jew", as in the passports of German Jews issued to them after after I left Germany.

I unshakably believed in British justice and was sure that when they figured out who I really was, His Majesty's government would immediately release me to fight together against a common enemy - the Nazis. I wrote to His Majesty the King and Prime Minister Churchill that they had made a grave mistake by interning me, a Jew who was eager to fight the Germans. I commended them for placing in custody those who could help the Germans. But why me? I'm a sworn enemy of the Nazis. I do not know if my letters have reached and whether anyone has read them; I never received an answer.

First we stopped at a makeshift camp in Maidstone, not far from our school. On that first Sunday morning, we were fed a hearty English breakfast of military scrambled eggs and bacon in a tin pot. They kept us in a barn and gave us sacks and straw to fill mattresses, soldiers' mattresses. A huge, red-faced, middle-aged major from the Territorial Army, a sort of British National Guard, seemed as clueless as we were when I asked him in English when they would let me go. He had no idea who we were. He was a real behemoth, and I hoped that I would not have to rely on him if I had to defend myself against the Germans.

We cleaned the latrine, did the work in the kitchen and dining room, and went out to the morning roll call. In order to respond to the parade-worthy roar of the chief sergeant - cockney, we stood in a row that could pass for a line. A few of the older internees were paunchy, a few more were limping or stooping; there were other impatient guys like me. Mangling all the names with his reprimand, the sergeant soon gave up trying to make us damned civilians stand with an army bearing. Roll calls were constantly interrupted as latecomers broke formation, rushing to acknowledge their presence long after the sergeant had called their names. They managed to be late even when they weren't doing anything.

Maidstone, located in the zone of a possible invasion, was not suitable for holding persons suspected of sympathizing with the Germans. A week later we were put on a train that ran intermittently all night. Through a crack in the painted windows, I could make out Reading's beacon tower on the road to the west. The next morning we landed at Liverpool and were then taken by truck to Huyton, a suburb where an unfinished public building was turned into a camp for thousands of internees, gathered from all over the British Isles.

Thanks to fluent English and youthful aplomb, I was assigned to the officers' canteen, where the commanders of the troops guarding us dined. I waited at the tables, washed the dishes, swept the floor, ate as much as I wanted and got as many cigarettes as I wanted, plus a couple of sips of beer and whiskey. Between work, we orderlies enjoyed playing bridge, darts and chess. We became Very Important Persons by bringing cigarettes, chocolates and yesterday's papers to our campmates.

As the blitzkrieg hit England, I could hear the distant rumble of bombs falling on Liverpool. However, the invasion did not take place. Apparently, the Germans wanted to win in the air before their transports challenged the British fleet.

Prisoners at Huyton included university professors, international financiers, writers and actors. Many of them gave impromptu lectures on history, finance, and art. Barbed wire created a society of equals, where I listened and asked questions to the luminaries, who in ordinary life would not even let me on their doorstep.

While the Battle of Britain was going on, the authorities decided that it was too dangerous to keep internees and German prisoners of war (captured in Norway, France and even Dunkirk) on their small island. The captured Nazi soldiers had no choice, but we civilian internees were allowed to volunteer to go to Canada. I volunteered to go because it meant getting away from the Nazis. I still hoped that I could escape from Canada to the USA to live with my parents, who settled in the Baltimore area. To prepare for my escape, I listened to American shortwave radio in the officer's mess and began to practice my American accent. When you're sixteen, everything seems possible.

The first group of internees who agreed to be deported to Canada left Huiton. A day later, the ill-fated Andorra Star liner, turned into a prison ship on which they sailed, was torpedoed. Many German Jewish internees drowned, and those who were rescued returned, telling terrible stories about what happened. My enthusiasm for traveling to Canada was gone, but it was too late, my name was on the list. Soon we, along with the survivors of the Andorra Star, were taken to the Liverpool docks, where we were herded along the gangway of the waiting Duner military transport. My few belongings—textbooks, notebook, precious Parker, toiletries, and meager clothes, even my shoes—were taken from me. They left me nothing but my clothes. Then soldiers with bayonets on rifles herded us into a hatch located well below the waterline. It all happened so quickly that it wasn't until I sat down on the bare floor that I felt dumbfounded, which soon gave way to fear bordering on panic. What awaits us? Why are we treated like this? What to do and how to escape from the ship if it is torpedoed?

Many years later, after reading the report at the request of the British Parliament, I understood what had happened. Some of our guards were soldiers from the front, who had recently been evacuated from Dunkirk, and others were criminals who were pardoned to enlist in the army. Among the prisoners rounded up on the Düner were Nazi soldiers captured in Norway and Dunkirk. The commander encouraged ill-treatment of prisoners. Then he received a reprimand from Parliament.

Of course, we did not know any of this when we were herded into the hold below the waterline. It was empty except for long benches with tables and hammocks to sleep from the ceiling. Sixteen holes in the floor, under which sea water splashed in an open chute, were the "latrine", that is, the toilet for our contingent of 980 internees. The feces often spilled over the edge of the shallow chute and then rolled back and forth across the plank floor. The queues for the latrine were endless, and some had surprises.

Shortly after leaving Liverpool, the waves of the Irish Sea began tossing the ship up and down, and most of my comrades got seasick. Symptoms ranged from complete apathy to what was happening around to continuous vomiting, followed by stupor. The pitching caused waste to overflow into the living quarters, and their stench mingled with the stench of vomit, sweat, and unwashed bodies, and the smell of fried bacon and eggs. The only decent thing on the Düner was food, probably the normal diet of British soldiers. Since I was immune to seasickness and didn't have any activities, I ate as much as I could.

On the third evening on the high seas, in the stormy Bay of Biscay, we heard a loud clang and a thud, after which there was a loud explosion that shook the ship. All lighting went out. It seemed like an eternity before it lit up again. Later we learned that a German submarine had fired two torpedoes at us. One did not explode, but the second cut through the stern and then exploded away from the ship. I never found out why the lights went out. Many years later, I heard that the German radio, not knowing that there were Nazi prisoners of war and German Jews on board, announced the sinking of the British military transport Düner.

We didn't have life jackets in the deep hold. There was never an abandon ship exercise, and all the passages on the upper decks were blocked with barbed wire. In the outhouse there was one porthole just above the waterline, through which I hoped to squeeze through in case of emergency.

Everything seemed to be against me. After I escaped from the Nazis, my former saviors imprisoned me in this floating coffin, and I will face certain death if a torpedo is fired at us again. I didn't have a life jacket to keep me afloat, even if I could get out. In the first place, because I had nothing to do during the day, and especially at night, I was afraid of everything that could happen. I was afraid of drowning like a rat, or being trampled by the running crowd if the ship began to sink or capsize. I couldn't think of a reliable way to escape. I was afraid of what might happen, afraid of the unknown. I imagined endless disasters and could not imagine a way to be saved if they did happen. But, paradoxically, after a few days, exhausted by fear and anxiety, I suddenly experienced an incredible feeling that I would definitely stay alive to do something important.

I had never been taught or prepared to face danger, and I wondered if this new sense of calmness was not a protective denial of a dangerous reality, or perhaps a hidden natural resource that allows me to cope with mortal danger. I was afraid of many things that never happened, but still I got out of the situation quite well when something did happen. As my fears subsided, my confidence grew miraculously.

Many of my companions in misfortune slept all the time. Barbed wire and common misfortune eliminated all differences in age and social status.

I learned to distinguish the groaning sounds of the engine as the ship zigzagged endlessly to confuse the submarines. After a few days, I began to count more and more seconds between these groans and guessed that we were going on a more direct course. I decided that Canada was not more than ten days away, and that the king and state would surely understand what a terrible mistake they had made in my case. But I soon realized that I had drawn the wrong conclusions. Comparing the time on the ship, which counted the blows of the bells, and the time of sunrise and sunset, which I saw through that porthole in the outhouse, I guessed that we were going south, not east. Where are we headed?

With my modest knowledge of spherical geometry (the basics of navigation) acquired under the guidance of our wonderful teacher Benson Herbert, I borrowed a pencil and scribbled the formula on a piece of toilet paper. I came to the conclusion that we are going to South Africa. As the air became warmer and the sea calmer, my fellow prisoners began to consider me an oracle. With the help of a wristwatch, furtively hidden away by one of my comrades, a pencil and paper, I calculated, and then announced to everyone that we would soon cross the equator. And of course, a day later we entered Freetown on the west coast of Africa. There were rumors - yes, even in the lowest hold of the prison transport there were rumors - that we were taking water, fuel and food to go to Australia around the Cape of Good Hope.

My plan to escape from Canada to the US obviously fell through.

When we got out of the submarine-infested waters, twice a week the prisoners were taken out on deck to give them ten minutes of fresh air. We had to run barefoot on the deck, guarded by soldiers with machine guns at the ready. Sometimes they amused themselves by throwing broken beer bottles at our feet. Trying not to cut ourselves, we acquired eagle vigilance and reaction speed. Once one internee jumped overboard. Nobody tried to save him.

Days and nights on the "Dyuner" monotonously went one after another. Some of my younger comrades relived their pre-confinement sexual experiences, telling us about them until we found out all the secret habits of their girlfriends, while the rest just stared blankly in front of them. One tall bearded man continually took off his belt with money, which he managed to smuggle past the guards unnoticed, and constantly counted the money. He didn't know, but we silently counted his thousands of pounds with him. The ritual seemed to calm him down, but it never lasted long.

At night, a hundred hammocks swayed as the ship rocked on the waves. Some slept peacefully, others muttered in their sleep. Several times during the night someone called for help, apparently caught in a nightmare. It is strange that many shouted "mother", but no one called the father. During the day, which differed from the night mainly in that the guards drove us out of the hold, dull indifference was replaced by nausea and fear of submarines. There was nothing to do, to plan, if only to avoid cleaning. There were the usual rumors that we were given saltpeter as a sedative to keep us from having sex. Day and night merged in our hold with its dim electric lights, complemented only by the faint light from the hatch to the upper deck.

Once a week we piled our meager belongings into the hammocks to scrape and scrub the teak deck.

Everyone was first driven into a corner, and this corner was cleaned last. Seeing the gleaming, golden teak deck so clean was a constant pleasure for me. Otherwise, I had the feeling that I was sitting in some kind of hell without beginning or end. I remember how men cried and prayed, and sometimes someone could not stand it and screamed. But we survived.

When nothing happens, you gradually cease to be afraid, and this voyage should have come to an end sometime. With each turn of the propeller, I flew farther away from the Nazis, whom I even then feared more than the British.

Off the southwestern coast of Africa, I contracted dysentery, with a fever and a yellowing of the skin that robbed me of my strength. Even earlier, we chose the elder, and he insisted that I be carried out of the crowded hold. Being in the ship's infirmary, lying on a real bed, was an incredible pleasure, despite the illness. After hearing my story, the Irish doctor kept me in the overcrowded infirmary longer than expected. I probably slept most of the time. I got up only to go to the toilet - a real toilet on the "Dyuner"! Then I was discharged from the infirmary, but the good doctor arranged for me to spend a lot of time in his clean room, forcing me to wait for hours for a daily spoonful of mixture and quinine tablets.

We were separated from the Nazis by a corridor of barbed wire on both sides of it. They stood at the wire and waited until someone appeared to mock him. Somehow I got tired of their lies, and I told them that upon arrival in Australia they would be circumcised, and the officers would have a Star of David tattooed on their arm. I told them to pray that Hitler was dead by the time they got back from Germany, otherwise they would all be sent to concentration camps. And then I took off my pants and let the gas right in their face. They started shaking the wire and calling me a dirty Jew, and I called them stupid bastards. Incidentally, Hitler was actually dead by the time they returned to Germany after 1945, but neither they nor I could imagine that in 1940.

The Dunera made another stop at Takoradi, also on the west coast of Africa, to refuel and sail to Cape Town. There, through the porthole in the infirmary, I saw Table Mountain and the city. The spirit of adventure in me still hasn't gone anywhere. And here I am, a boy from boring, inland Gardelegen, in Africa, at least a few hundred meters away, on a ship that is about to bypass the Cape of Good Hope and head across the Indian Ocean to Australia. I saw the world, even through the porthole of a prison transport!

With my rudimentary knowledge of navigation, I predicted that we would land on the western coast of Australia within the next 24 hours, and I was wrong by more than three hundred kilometers. We stopped at the port of Perth Fremantle. Australian officers boarded there and were horrified by what they saw and heard. Their reports on the conditions at Duner caused the Australian and British parliaments to issue an inquiry that documented everything I have said here, and more than that, entire books were written about Duner.

The Duner made a stop in Melbourne to disembark the Nazis. They had to lead a carefree life of prisoners of war, avoiding the catastrophe of defeat that befell their fellow soldiers. The only thing they had to worry about was my warning that they would be circumcised and tattooed in the form of a star of David and returned too soon to their homeland to the Nazis.

The internees landed from the Duners in Sydney. At the gangway, seeing us off, stood Johnny, the most terrible sadist of the guards. Even during the voyage, Johnny, long-faced, slightly cross-eyed, in the rank of chief sergeant, with the insignia of counterintelligence on his uniform, snooped around, rummaging with his stick the miserable piles of belongings that we left behind and barely audible, hoarsely muttering. Once every few days, he grabbed one of the internees and put him in a "hole" - a solitary cell in a guardhouse intended for deserters and rebels. Johnny was a natural sadist. And now he was standing at the top of the ladder. He looked sad, because - I was sure of it - he had lost power over defenseless captives. As I passed, I said to him, "I hope you drown on the way to England."

I nearly passed out as we walked out into the sun after long weeks in the dark hold of the ship. Our Australian guards were speechless when they learned that we were Jews, refugees from Nazi Germany. We were seated in several antediluvian railway cars, and the train headed for the Australian outback. Kilometer after kilometer, hour after hour, it rumbled along the crooked rails, and we became grimy from the soot and sand thrown up by the train. As he snaked his way into the Australian bush, kangaroos hopped along the railroad tracks. We drove to the unknown town of Hay. The guards began to nod off, and one of them let go of his rifle. I picked it up and noticed that it was not loaded.

Hei is a point on the map near the Hei River, which had completely dried up by the time we arrived. From there we were taken by trucks to the camp. The first thing that caught my eye was that there was practically no barbed wire around. The commander explained to us: “We will not guard you very much, because the nearest source of water is more than a hundred and thirty kilometers from here. The water tanks are guarded and you will only be given one flask of water at a time. If you want to run away and die of thirst, you are welcome.”

Every evening at sunset, the wind kicked up a dust so fine that it crawled into all the pores and orifices of the body, into the toiletries given to us, into everything. During the day it was hot, and at night it was cool, and the stars shone incredibly brightly. I admired looking at the Southern Cross.

They fed us well, and soon we were already getting used to the new order, and the Duner with its dangers faded in my memories. And of course, now we were not threatened by the Nazis. It's like we're stuck in time. It was the middle of August 1940.

On the fifth day in Hey, I asked to speak to the commandant. He reminded me of a burly major from Maidstone. But he listened to me. I explained how stupid the British (he called them lemongrass) had done when they sent me to Hay, because I myself wanted to fight the Germans. I told him that I would gladly join the Australian Army. When I finished, the commandant said:

Son, I can neither enlist you in the army nor let you out of here, but from this day on you are my batman.

What does it mean? I asked.

Come here tomorrow morning at seven o'clock and you'll find out," he said.

The next morning he said:

So we went kangaroo hunting and killed some snakes and birds with his gun. And they were back by eleven before they died of the heat.

I had only been in Hay for ten days when it was suddenly announced over the loudspeaker that I should report to the camp office, where I was told to pack my things immediately. I am sent back to England and released on arrival. I asked:

Why not right now?

Such an order, - they answered me.

The news stunned me. I never found out why the British authorities decided to release me and five others among thousands of our number. Now I was to return to England, while most of my fellow prisoners were to remain in the Australian camp. I was glad to be free again, but at the same time I well understood that we would again have to sail the sea, teeming with German submarines.

I was told that I was going to Melbourne immediately. They issued a new Australian soldier work uniform and black kangaroo leather boots that I adored. The train we were on was better than the ones that took us to Hay, but still the journey took twenty-three hours. Although we were guarded, the Australian soldiers apparently considered us to be some kind of important person.

To my annoyance, in Melbourne we were taken to the city jail because we should have been kept "safe". Since we were placed in a wing with hardened criminals, I filed a complaint. Our jailers had a lot of fun when we were later transferred to the wing for prostitutes, where we were promised good entertainment. And so it turned out, to be sure. Girls from the streets adored the company of men and gave us a striptease show. Nothing is hidden for me! They were witty, talented, uninhibited and shameless. My knowledge of female anatomy has grown immensely. The ladies offered us for free through the bars what they sold on the streets for money, for which they thundered into the government house. If not for the fear of syphilis inspired by my parents, this could have been a turning point in my youth. Alas, the pleasure of their company lasted only two days.

Since my departure from England, I have not been able to write a single letter. The jailer promised to bring me paper, a pen, and an envelope, but before he could fulfill his promise, we, the six "returnees", were suddenly put on a truck and - amazingly - again taken to the "Dunera".

What a shock!

Johnny was there and all the other guards. Although we were no longer prisoners, we knew that we would only be free when we arrived in England. We were still under the control of the ship's commander, but, fortunately, not the same tormentor who commanded on the road from England. We were allowed to move freely around the ship, but we had to clean and clean everything: pots, pans, plates, decks, tables and benches. As in any military service, even if something is already clean, you clean it again, because idleness is considered harmful to morale and soldier's character. I became an excellent cleaner with a six-hour day, even if the second and third cleanings could no longer improve anything.

Every day I asked myself why we have lifeboats and abandon ship drills. Isn't that too much? The Dunera bypassed Australia and headed for the Indian Ocean. Then one day the alarm sounded. It was not teaching. The Duners' four-inch stern gun fired with a roar. I accidentally saw Johnny near the boat and noticed that he was scared. He looked at me and I showed him my nose. He couldn't even make a grimace in response. After that, he never even approached me again.

Nearby, several shells exploded in the water. Then I was told that the Duner was distracting German and Italian raiders - converted ocean liners, fast and armed, who attacked merchant ships. Soon a British cruiser appeared. I never found out who fired.

After that, for some reason, we turned to Bombay. There, our small group of internees, who were to be released in England, were dropped off at the pier and handed over to the Indian police inspector. Soon a welcome committee from the Bombay Jewish Aid Association appeared, led by a fat Jew from South Germany in khaki shorts and a pith helmet. He spoke English with a thick accent but told us that he was a British citizen. Hearing our story, he vouched for us to the police inspector.

They took our fingerprints and gave us identification documents. The police warned us not to have weapons, cameras, binoculars and radio transmitters (very funny, I thought, I don't even have a second pair of underpants), and then our patron took us to Habib Chambers, a house owned by an association in native quarter of Bombay. He said goodbye and handed us over to the matron, who was the hostess there.

The next day I went outside. I had not gone ten paces when I ran into Mr. and Mrs. Helms, German Jews from a town near Gardelegen. There they unsuccessfully tried to conceive a child until my mother helped them. Their daughter, who was now in a wheelchair on Byculla Road, was born in a room in our house that had been converted into a delivery room. I always felt uncomfortable in their presence - there was something sickly false in them - but here they were standing in front of me, and I exclaimed: “What, Mr. Helms, Mrs. Helms, what are you doing here?” They had some funds and fled to Bombay from Nazi Germany.

I borrowed (and then returned) money from them so that I could send a telegram to my parents, who were then in the United States and had not heard anything from me since June, when I was sent from England. They thought I was dead. It was already September and I was in India. When my father died, I found my telegram sent from Bombay on his desk. It said: "Released in Bombay, send money to Cook." I assumed, of course, that they would understand what I meant by Cook's delivery and travel agency.

The Aid Association provided me with food and lodging. The heat was unbearable, and the first night I went out on the porch. Soon I noticed large birds circling around and swooping down on me. Every time I moved, they flew away. I returned to the stuffy bedroom. The next day I learned that these birds were scavengers that used to circle around the nearby Tower of Silence, where the dead Parsees were buried. There they pecked the meat clean from the bones, and then the bones were burned. At night, the motionless boy on the porch was a possible meal for the vultures.

I heard a noise in the room, as if soldiers were marching in the distance. I turned on the light, and an army of huge cockroaches began to hurriedly climb the stone table and climb into the first dark gap that came across. I was taught to shake out my shoes before putting them on to make sure there were no scorpions. High boots were preferable in case you stepped on a cobra. It passed me.

My parents, rejoicing that I was alive, and completely bewildered that I ended up in Bombay, somehow scraped together and sent me fifty dollars - they earned twenty dollars a month for two. But in 1940 in Bombay, that was enough to buy linen, sew a khaki cotton suit, buy cigarettes and, most importantly, a sun hat - a topi, which etiquette prescribed for every white man. I still wore my favorite Australian kangaroo boots.

There were several families of Jewish refugees in Bombay. A daughter grew up in one of these families, and either she or her parents became attached to me. In any case, I was invited to visit them more often than I could bear. Teenagers have a lot of likes and dislikes, and this girl was not for me. She ended up marrying another man from Habib Chambers.

Meanwhile, I corresponded with my parents. Through friends they introduced me to American Quakers who had come to India on a mission of mercy. They, in turn, introduced me to a couple from Switzerland. They received me very kindly. He was a banker and his wife was a lovely young Jewish woman who had escaped from Nazi Germany. I spent many pleasant hours at their apartment and on the beach, where the monkeys threw coconuts to us from the palm trees.

Soon I became acquainted with Parsis, Hindus and members of the Nehru Indian National Congress. I learned a little Urdu, enough to talk to dhobis (male laundresses) and gharis (taxi drivers) and to ask "Kidna baja hai?" (“What time is it?”) and something else. To my surprise, these helpful people treated me with the respectful respect with which they treated their masters from the British Empire.

In the native quarters, consider yourself lucky if you didn't step into the bright red betel juice spit that people spit right through the open windows on the dirty sidewalks. Hundreds of homeless people slept on the street. I have seen people who have syphilis or leprosy eat their noses. Cows roamed the crowded streets with superfluous tails fantastically grafted onto their sides. Nobody prevented these sacred animals from eating vegetables from open stalls in the central market, while people were starving. During the monsoon, I saw that the sewers were clogged with rats that drowned in the sewage streams due to heavy rains.

Habib-Chambers was located on Bikulla Road, the city's main artery for trams and buses. I freely walked around the area, never seeing violence and not fearing for my safety. Not far from us was a large red-light district, where lush Indian beauties sat at open windows and openly displayed their goods. If moral principles had not stopped us, then the fear of Asian syphilis, a debilitating and disfiguring disease that was rarely treated by the locals, would definitely discourage us from physical contact. It was enough for me to look, talk and see with what pleasure women met clients.

There were tea and hash shops everywhere, and their smell filled the air in the evenings. In them, I often engaged in heated discussions about colonialism in this distinctive English with an Indian accent. I also learned for the first time that people in the position of the oppressed feel as if their suffering surrounds them with a kind of halo of holiness and gives them moral superiority. Like my interlocutors, I believed that the end of colonialism would end the poverty and other ills of this exotic country.

I also began to understand some fundamental difference between the culture of the East and mine. When I was growing up, I was taught to perfect the application of moral values, and I tried to do everything to the best of my ability. I have seen in Western culture, even in the vile morality of the Nazis, a culture of action in which one acts to live but lives to act. In the culture of Hinduism, or what I considered Hinduism, on the contrary, I discovered the culture of being. If you've been a good coolie in this life, maybe in the next life you'll be a taxi owner.

At that time in India there was a caste of Banyas, usurers who lent money to the poorest of the poorest. Debts were inherited, and the sons had to pay interest on the fathers' loans, which they took out to pay for the traditional wedding of their daughters. It was said that not a single Indian managed to escape from the usurer by changing his name or place of residence. These banyas infuriated Gandhi. I once met one of them, who was educated at Oxford, and asked him how, with his Western values, he justified the exploitation of the poorest. He replied: “Providence sent the poor into this world to suffer poverty, but Providence chose me to be a good usurer. I am not going to interfere with the world order, on the contrary, I am here to serve it.” He spoke sincerely and slept peacefully at night.

Like my banya friend, the whole city of Bombay seemed Western on the surface, except for the signs on the shops and the clothes of the inhabitants. Buses, trams, and automobiles replaced wagons. But wandering sacred cows gave it a unique flavor.

In Bombay I met several Parsis. This is an isolated people, they are always rich, thoughtful and devoted to their ancient creed of Zoroastrianism. A philosophical harmony developed between me and a young woman named Usha, quite unusual for a German of Jewish origin, sympathetic to the English, and a woman descended from the ancient Persians. We were young and thought the same. We believed in the brotherhood of man, hated prejudice, loved the prophets, but detested organized religion and abhorred colonialism. We were like-minded, emotionally but not physically close. Sexual relations before marriage would ruin the rest of Usha's life.

About that time I received a long letter from Hellmuth, who told me that the school had moved from the zone of possible invasion to Shoreshire Wem, and everyone was terribly happy when they found out that I was alive. He also mentioned that my friend was worried that I did not write to her. I never wrote to her. Oh, how cruel we are when youthful passions pass! I also got a lovely letter from Betty, whom I didn't want to remember, although now we were separated by oceans, and I thought, let it stay that way forever.

I decided to find a job. But as a representative of the white race, sir, I was ordered to become an unskilled worker, and I did not have sufficient qualifications for the usual activities of a white man. How to be?

In England, I studied the Admiralty Handbook of Wireless Telegraphy, the official training manual for British naval radio operators. Then I found a copy of the reference book in the Bombay library. I re-read it until I learned it almost verbatim. I wanted to get a job with a radio transmitter.

By that time I had made friends with a group of four bachelors, German Jews, who shared a large apartment and used the services of a butler, a cook and a cleaner. When I told them that I wanted to find a job, they could not believe their ears, but then one of them introduced me to an Indian gentleman who ran a workshop for the manufacture of simple radios - a good business, because imported radios were no longer available. He took me on a trial period without pay, but soon I was supervising a dozen Indians assembling simple two-tube receivers. I learned to play the roles that fate threw me: now I carried the burden of a white man in Bombay and received decent money for this. I knew that this incarnation would also be temporary. What then, I thought.

I was seventeen years old, I was not looked after by my parents or anyone else, I had adult friends, a job and housing in an interesting city, far from the Nazis and British jailers. I could come and go and do as I pleased. This delightful freedom and ability to take care of himself compensated for the uncertainty about the future and the lost connection with the family. But still, I lacked a constant girlfriend and friends of the same age.

One day I went to the American consulate. When I entered the building, I noticed how pleasantly cool it was. And the sign: Carrier Air Conditioners. I have never been in an air-conditioned building before. In the Bombay heat I tasted America for the first time and it tasted wonderful and cool. “This is for me,” I thought.

Vice Consul Wallace Larue was a tall, thin man with short hair. He wore an impeccable brown suit that I had never seen before - I later learned that these are worn in Palm Beach. He asked me what I needed and I said, "I want to go to America." He asked for my documents. I only had an identity card issued by the police commissioner in Bombay, but Mr. Larue needed a birth certificate so that he could put me on the quota from Germany. Then he asked why I wanted to go to America, and I said that my parents were in Baltimore.

Do you know anyone in Baltimore? - he asked.

I only knew Mr. Lansbury, who acted as a guarantor for my parents to get a visa. Mr Larue jumped up.

Did you say Lansbury? Are you playing me?

We will contact you.

As I found out within a week, Mr Larue made sure that I applied for a visa in Berlin as early as 1937 and got my story confirmed. He said he could give me a visa. But I didn't have a passport. "No problem," he said. He will give me a certificate. But I have to show him a ticket to the United States before he can issue a visa.

Who could believe in such a turn! I'm going to America! My brother was still in a boarding school in besieged England, and because of the submarine war, passenger ships stopped sailing from there and from Nazi Europe across the Atlantic Ocean. My fellow prisoners in Bombay, who at that time had the official status of citizens of a state at war with the British authorities in India, had nowhere to go. Hundreds of other internees with whom I sailed to Australia are still in the bush. Why did it happen that I alone got an American visa?

On the way from Bombay to America, one had to go through Ceylon and Indonesia to Japanese Yokohama, and from there to the western coast of the United States. Traveling almost the entire globe and arriving in New York was quite in keeping with my penchant for adventure, but I was afraid that Japan would soon go to war with the United States. The possibility of ending up in a Japanese military prison did not appeal to me.

Another route lay through South Africa to South America and the Caribbean. Vessels of the American President Line used this route, but only expensive first-class tickets were offered. Their "President Wilson" was due to sail from Bombay on March 21, 1941, and was supposed to arrive in New York on April 26. A first class ticket cost $660, which was a huge amount for me at the time.

Parents managed to raise part of the amount. I managed to save a few hundred dollars from my salary and borrowed the last twenty dollars from those same bachelors who were ready to help. With the last rupees, I bought a third shirt and some inexpensive souvenirs. Friends arranged a farewell banquet for me. On the morning of my departure, I took a taxi and boarded the President Wilson with a black metal box instead of a suitcase. I was wearing a gray linen suit, washed and ironed, and a khaki pith helmet. I was now a first class passenger. The cabin was shared with me by a Turk who never once spoke to me. There were also several pretty American girls on the liner who were leaving away from the military threat in Asia and the Middle East.

Since the United States was still neutral, the letters "USA" glowed brightly on board the ship to protect it from attacks by German submarines. This flight was as safe as could be in 1941.

A few days after we went to sea, I impressed the ship's radio operator with my knowledge of wireless communications. He agreed with me that we would keep it in the strictest confidence, and for several hours every day I sat at the radio in his cabin, and he dozed right there, just in case to be nearby. He paid me decently, but I managed to spend money on whiskey, cigarettes, new clothes and some other things in ports of call. I played a lot of bridge with a British baronet and his wife. It was an extremely pleasant journey of five weeks, and how different from my previous voyage!

By the end of the journey, I had enough money to pay off my debts, and there were still three dollars left so as not to disappear in the USA. Several missionaries sailed with us, and they did not approve of my lifestyle. However, I got on very well with everyone else who did not try to re-educate me. I remember eating delicious food and spending time with Sally Simms in the nooks and crannies of the boat deck. She was very clever at dividing her attention between me and the handsome young steward. I became better versed in radio, as electronics were then called, and the laws of the sea. Barbed wire, the Duner, and the Bombay turmoil were fast becoming a thing of the past. American movies were shown in the cabin of the liner, and I watched some films several times. Sally, who spoke with a sweet Texan accent, had me practice my Hollywood accent and later assured me that I spoke like a real Yankee.

After visiting Cape Town, Trinidad and Havana, New York was just around the corner, and I thought I was approaching the goal that I had set for myself when I voluntarily agreed to be deported from England. It seemed incredible that less than a year had elapsed since the morning when I left Bunce Court as an internee.

Why am I so lucky, while others on the Andorra Star drowned just a couple of days before the Dunera sailed? Why was I one of six people out of three thousand who were released in Australia? And why was I the only one in Bombay who got an American visa and got a ticket? My brother Helmut and thousands of people are stuck in England and other countries. Isn't it strange that, having left England under such circumstances, which did not augur well, I am now going to the USA? It seemed to me that in comparison with the past, the future could only be pale.

Then it seemed to me that I would lose my freedom if I returned to a normal family life again. I didn't want this. Before sunrise on the last morning on the liner, I knew one thing for sure: I would no longer be a schoolboy in the care of my parents. I'm not going to give up independence. When I get to America, I will live on my own!

From the author's book

Attribute of Nazism - camp * * *Nazis did not invent concentration camps, but they brought them to monstrous perfection. Places of mass imprisonment were required immediately after Hitler came to power in 1933 to isolate political opponents. The Nazis were worried that

From the author's book

CHAPTER 7 Internment Camp I was wondering if the British interned me because my German passport photo was stamped with a swastika and there was no big red letter J, which means "Jew", as in the passports of German Jews issued

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§ 2. “The question of the situation of Russian internees on the territory of the Polish Republic is ... a political issue of great importance” Another form of solving the problem of the presence in Poland of a significant number of refugees interned in camps and related

From the author's book

Annex 14 Letter from DV Filosofov to the Eastern Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Poland on the situation of interned volunteers of anti-Soviet formations in Polish camps 110-96B Eastern Division

From the author's book

Appendix 17 Letter from former internee A. Matveev from Granville to B. V. Savinkov in Paris about the conditions of work of internees in Poland Dear Boris Viktorovich! Forgive me for not answering your letter for a long time, unfortunately, I can write only on Sundays, . to.

From the author's book

The camp on the river Kerulen On July 15 at the station Boin Tumen unloaded. And immediately - a 50-kilometer march through the heat to the concentration area on the Kerulen River. The transition seemed very difficult for us. In the division I have 250 people, 130 horses and ten cars. All property: shells, communications, kitchens,

From the author's book

Chapter 4. THE CAMP IN LEVASHOVO Upon arrival in Levashovo, life changed dramatically. Strict discipline was introduced, and we felt that this was not a game of soldiers, but that we had the honor to stand in the ranks of the defenders of our dear homeland. Everyone pulled themselves up. A place was taken under the camp, almost

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Chapter X. The attack on the fortified camp For some time the current dominated - to speak with great disdain about the trenches and their significance. This neglect was fed by the unfortunate outcome of a number of battles in which the defense relied on fortifications: cordon

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Personal. Sending to the camp The post office was forbidden to accept parcels. An exception was made for those who sent warm clothes and food to the front. This decision became disastrous for many people whom relatives could no longer help. Among them was my cousin, Nikolai

From the author's book

CAMP IN BULGARIA "If all armed conflicts are seen as senseless bloodshed, then the Crimean War has every chance to top the list." Colonel George Cadogan. 1856

+ 25 photo cards....>>>

lager for interned US citizens of Japanese origin Manzanar. California, USA, 1943.
Author: Ansel Adams.

Belongings of internees of US citizens of Japanese origin at the entrance to the Salinas camp in California, April 1942.

Repairs to a power line at California's Manzanar camp for interned US citizens of Japanese descent. California, USA, 1943.

Japanese American women work in the clothing industry at the Manzanar internment camp. California, USA, 1943.

A view of the Manzanar camp for interned US citizens of Japanese descent. Newell, California, USA, 1943.

Japanese-American Sumiko Shigematsu works in the textile industry at the Manzanar internment camp in California. 1943

A panorama of California's Santa Anita camp for interned US citizens of Japanese descent. Arcadia, California, USA, April 1942.

anorama of the production of camouflage nets in the California internment camp for US citizens of Japanese origin Santa Anita. California, USA, 1942.

Young Japanese American women at the Tule Lake internment camp in California.

View of the canteen for interned US citizens of Japanese origin at the Pinedale camp. California, USA, 1942.

US citizens of Japanese descent work in the Tule Lake internment camp field. California, USA.

US citizens of Japanese descent stand outside the barracks of the Tule Lake internment camp. Newell, California, USA

US citizens of Japanese descent sit at the entrance to the Waldorf Astoria barracks at the Puyallup internment camp in Washington state. 1942

The name of the barrack is ironic, since the Waldorf Astoria is the name of a fashionable American hotel.

Panorama of the Tule Lake camp for interned US citizens of Japanese origin. The camp was located near the city of Newell in northern California. 1942 - 1943 years.

Under the territory of the camp was allocated 7,400 acres of land (about 3 square kilometers), about half of which was occupied by fields. Tulle Lake consisted of 570 residential barracks and over 400 general purpose barracks.
Construction started on February 16, 1942; On May 26, 1942, it was opened to receive internees, the number of which reached 18,700 people. Separately, German (up to 800 people) and Italian prisoners of war (up to 200 people) were kept in the same camp.
Closed February 28, 1946.

Japanese-American internment camp guard Santa Anita searches the suitcase of an arriving woman who is standing nearby. Arcadia, California, USA, April 1942.

A group of Japanese American citizens awaiting transfer to another internment camp at Pinedale Camp in California. 1942

Japanese women wash clothes at an internment camp at Pinedale, California. 1942

A guard at the Santa Anita Japanese Internment Camp (Arcadia, California) inspects the suitcase of a Japanese family in the background, April 1942.

To the left, leaning on a table, is an American policeman.

The construction of the barracks of the camp for Japanese internees in the town of Parker in the state of Arizona, in the area of ​​​​the Indian reservation on the Colorado River, April 1942.

View of the barracks of the Japanese internment camp at Puyallup in Washington State. 1942

A panorama of the construction of a Japanese internment camp at Puyallup in Washington state in the spring of 1942.

In Internment and POW camps in Australia.

During the Second World War, the Australian authorities created a network of camps in the country. In these camps, for the period of hostilities, a contingent was moved, from those considered unreliable, from the inhabitants of Australia itself, as well as an unreliable contingent from the British metropolis and colonies. Subsequently, prisoners of war were placed in such camps, as well as an unreliable contingent from countries where hostilities were fought with the participation of the Australian and British armies.

Although this method of working with part of the population was not new to Australia, such camps were set up on the territory of the country during the First World War. True, in the First World War the contingent of such camps was limited; camps were used, as a rule, to identify and develop a part of unreliable residents. During the Second World War, in such camps began to put all the unreliable inhabitants of Australia, by origin from the countries of the opponents of Britain. This was especially true of the Japanese, who were forcibly sent to such camps. It also applied to Italians, Germans. Ethnic Finns, Hungarians, former residents of the Russian Empire (more than 30 countries in total), as well as persons who are members of various Nazi right-wing parties, also ended up in the camps.

map of camps in australia.

In total, during the Second World War, more than 7 thousand inhabitants passed through the camps, of which about 1.5 thousand citizens of Britain. During the war, there were also more than 8 thousand people sent there after the outbreak of hostilities, prisoners of war and citizens of the states where hostilities were fought.
It is worth noting that the living conditions of the citizens of Australia and the British colonies differed little from the life and life of prisoners of war. Both of them received the same allowance and lived in the same conditions. Very often they were placed together. The difference was that prisoners of war did not receive a monetary salary for their work.

Ensemble of Italian POWs at Camp Hay, New South Wales.

class of German children at Camp No. 3 Tatura, Victoria.

The camps were located on various converted sites, such as former prisons or old soldiers' camps, and were under the control of the military department. Internees and prisoners of war were recruited for various jobs, and they were also allowed to leave the camp. For example, Italian prisoners of war were allowed to leave even before the end of hostilities.

a prisoner-made park at Camp No. 1 Harvey, Western Australia.

interned Japanese and residents of the island of Java while picking tomatoes. Camp Galsworthy, New South Wales.

The camps existed until the very end of the war. The last camp was closed in January 1947. Thereafter, citizens of European descent were allowed to stay to live in Australia. In addition to Japanese citizens of war, there are also some Japanese of Australian origin. They were sent to Japan.

General view of the residential area at Camp Loveday, South Australia. This camp was one of the largest; during the war, about 5,000 people of various nationalities passed through it. The camp developed the cultivation of various agricultural crops, tobacco, and the production of various goods. The internees were engaged in deforestation. The prisoners were engaged in many outdoor activities, the camp also had its own golf club.

For the first time, the Chinese authorities acknowledged the existence of "preparation and residence" centers.

According to the head of the region, the camps for Muslim minorities provide "intensive training and accommodation" for those who, according to the authorities, are influenced by extremist ideas, as well as for those who are suspected of committing minor offenses.

A senior official in China's western province of Xinjiang spoke for the first time in detail about the expanding network of internment camps, in what should be seen as another move by Beijing to defend the country's mass detentions of Muslim minorities amid rising global outrage.

In a rare interview with the state-run Xinhua news agency published on Tuesday, Xinjiang provincial governor Shohrat Zakir called the camps "vocational guidance and training institutes" that focus on "learning the country's common language, legislation, and also on the development of professional skills together with anti-extremism education.”

These centers are intended for "people under the influence of terrorism and extremism", those who are suspected of committing minor offenses and do not deserve legal punishment, Zakir said, without saying how many people were interned or how long they were interned. are in the camps.

However, according to him, an unknown number of "people in training" came close to the standards to complete the training, or already meet the required level. They are expected to be able to complete "their education" by the end of the year, meaning they could soon be released, he said.

Zakir is the first senior Xinjiang official to speak publicly about the criticized camps. China is under increasing pressure over mass detentions and subsequent forced political formation. About a million ethnic Uighurs, as well as representatives of other Muslim communities in the region, became victims of this campaign.

The Xinjiang provincial leader's interview came after his leadership last week attempted to retroactively legitimize the existence of such camps, for which regional legislation was revised, and the local government received the right to open such camps in order to be able to "educate and transform" people under the impact of extremism.

According to Maya Wang, a senior fellow at Human Rights Watch, Beijing's "clumsy excuses" are clearly a response to the international condemnation of the practice, but they won't dampen criticism.

Context

20 days in a re-education camp for Uighurs

Berlingske 04.07.2018

South China Morning Post: Why China maintains tight control over Xinjiang

South China Morning Post 09/14/2018

Uyghurs forced to surrender their passports

EurasiaNet 11.01.2017

South China Morning Post 10/12/2018

Sohu: Who is Islamizing faster - Russia or Europe?

Sohu 10.10.2018

“These camps continue to be completely illegal and unfair under both Chinese and international law; and the suffering and deprivation faced by about a million people cannot be pushed aside by propaganda,” she said.

In his interview, Zakir did not say anything about the detentions, however, according to him, these institutions provide "concentrated training" and "education with room and board," and security guards control the entrance.

According to Zakir, "trained people" study the official Chinese language in order to be able to deepen their knowledge in modern sciences, Chinese history and culture. It also requires the study of legislation, which should increase their "national and civic consciousness."

Vocational training is said to include courses to acquire skills for subsequent employment in factories and other enterprises. We are talking about the production of clothing, food processing, assembly of electronic devices, printing, work in hairdressers, as well as in the field of e-commerce. Apparently, the companies participating in this project pay for the goods produced by the "disciples".

While Zakir talked about language learning and vocational training, he evaded explaining what constituted "anti-extremism classes" held in such camps.

However, the former internees told the international media that they were forced to denounce their faith and were also forced to swear allegiance to the ruling Communist Party.

Omir Bekali, a Chinese-born Kazakh citizen sent to such a camp and later released, told the Associated Press earlier this year that detainees are politically indoctrinated there and forced to listen to lectures. about the dangers of Islam, and they are ordered to chant slogans before eating: “Thank you party! Thanks to the motherland!

The families of the detainees said that they did not have the opportunity to contact their loved ones, who "disappeared and then ended up in such camps."

However, in an interview with Xinhua News Agency, Zakir painted a rosy picture of life inside the internment camps: numerous sports facilities, reading rooms, computer labs, movie screening rooms, and rooms where recitation, dance, and singing competitions are “frequently organized.”

“Many students said that they were previously under the influence of extremist thoughts and had never taken part in cultural and sports activities before. However, now they understand how colorful life can be,” he said.

This interview is the most detailed description of the previously denied internment camps from the Chinese government. Pressure from Western governments and international organizations is increasing, and so Beijing has moved from denial to active propaganda aimed at justifying the existing program. Chinese officials call it a "legitimate" and necessary approach to prevent people from becoming "victims of terrorism and extremism."

However, human rights activists and legal experts believe that such camps have no legal basis in China today, despite all attempts by the government to legitimize them.

“The authorities in Xinjiang seem to be under pressure, and this shows that international condemnation is working,” said Wang of Human Rights Watch. “What is needed today is for foreign governments and international organizations to make more intense efforts and move on to more meaningful actions.”

The US Congress is pushing for sanctions against Chinese officials who run internment camps, including Chen Quanguo, the province's party boss.

The European Parliament this month called on EU member states to raise the issue of mass internment in multilateral talks with China, while the new UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet last month called for monitors to be allowed access to the region.

The materials of InoSMI contain only assessments of foreign media and do not reflect the position of the editors of InoSMI.