Exodus Captain Dies

Can one man make a difference?

Captain Yitzhak (Ike) Ahronovitch died yesterday (12/23/2009). That is a name not recognized by many of us today – but was known world-wide 62 years ago.

Ahronovitch was the captain of the Exodus 1947, a cargo ship that took Jewish holocaust survivors and displaced persons from Europe and attempted to land them in what was then British controlled Palestine – today’s Israel.

The story was epic. A German/Polish-born Jewish captain; a cargo ship that had been sold for scrap to a paramilitary political group called the Haganah; a stand-off at sea – followed by a boarding and firefight in which three passengers were killed. A hunger strike by the passengers after they were taken to their point of disembarkation in France; re-interment of the passengers in camps in the British-controlled portion of Germany; a world firestorm of protest; and finally the gathering of the passengers by the British for transportation to and interment in Crete – then moved to Israel when Israel came into existence in 1948.

The British – responsible for maintaining order in Palestine – tried to block illegal immigration to that territory. A new policy created in 1947 was to send the immigrants back to the nation they had come from. The first ship to fall under this policy was the Exodus.

The Exodus was the former President Warfield, built in 1928. The 320 x 56 foot ship was given to the British under the World War II Lend Lease program, and had served as a troop carrier – housing 400 troops – during the Normandy invasion of 1944. It was sold for scrap in 1946 to a company that was controlled by the Haganah, refitted, and set sail for France to pick up Holocaust survivors for relocation to Palestine.

The Exodus left the port of Sete, France, on July 11, 1947 with more than 4500 passengers – most of them men, women, and 655 children who had survived the Holocaust. A week later, as the ship neared the coast of Palestine, it was ordered to stop by three British destroyers.

Ahronovitch attempted to run the blockade, but was stopped when rammed by two of the destroyers. The Jewish passengers fought the British, throwing smoke bombs, life rafts, and other items that came to hand on the British as they tried to board the Exodus. The British retaliated by opening fire, during which two passengers and one crewman were killed, with many more injured.

The passengers were placed on more seaworthy transports to be returned to France – where they were refused entry. The British then decided the only place large enough to house the emigrants was in their portion of Germany. The scene became violent after the ship docked in Hamburg, and had to be forcibly removed by British soldiers. They were placed in camps near the site of a former concentration camp at Lubeck.

The world outcry was tremendous, and they were relocated to camps in Crete until Israeli statehood in 1948.

The story was so compelling that it was later turned into a book (Exodus by Leon Uris, 1958) and a movie of the same title starring Paul Neuman (1960)

Captain Ahronovitch was born in Danzig, Poland in 1923, and moved to Palestine in 1932 when his family relocated there. Danzig was under quasi-Polish control as a result of the Treaty of Versailles (1919), and its population was 98% German. As a young man, he joined the Palmach, which was the para-military arm of the Haganah. During World War II he learned his sea craft trade by sailing on British and Norwegian merchant vessels. Ahronovitch was only 23 when he took the helm of the Exodus in 1947. On July 11, 1947, he picked up the holocaust refugees at the port of Sete and would sail into history.

Ahronovitch would avoid the limelight after the incident, ultimately studying and receivingn a master’s degree in business administration at Columbia University. He leaves behind two daughters, seven grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren – and a nation that came into being partially because of the attention given to the story of the Exodus.

A tribute to Ahronovitch came from Israeli President Shimon Peres, who stated: "Exodus was also his creation, he was not only its captain but a leader that gave the voyage character and determination." Peres also described Ahronovitch as “one of a kind ... a combination of pioneering, courage and love of his people."

What happened to the Exodus? The Exodus lay as a derelict, moored off of the port of Haifa. It burned to the waterline in 1952, and was sold for scrap in 1963.

WEB RESOURCES:

Wikipedia
Jewish Virtual Library
Hagshama

PHOTO RESOURCES:

Captain Ahronovitch, New York Times
Exodus 1947, Wikipedia
Refugees on board the Exodus, Jewish Virtual Museum
British escort wounded off of the Exodus at Haifa, Jewish Virtual Museum
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