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Biography & Autobiography. History. Military. Nonfiction. HTML: Alex's Wake is a tale of two parallel journeys undertaken seven decades apart. In the spring of 1939, Alex and Helmut Goldschmidt were two of more than 900 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany aboard the St. Louis, �??the saddest ship afloat" (New York Times). Turned away from Cuba, the United States, and Canada, the St. Louis returned to Europe, a stark symbol of the world's indifference to the gathering Holocaust. The Goldschmidts disembarked in France, where they spent the next three years in six different camps before being shipped to their deaths in Auschwitz. In the spring of 2011, Alex's grandson, Martin Goldsmith, followed in his relatives' footsteps on a six-week journey of remembrance and hope, an irrational quest to reverse their fate and bring himself peace. Alex's Wake movingly recounts the detailed histories of the two journeys, the witnesses Martin encounters for whom the events of the past are a vivid part of a living present, and an intimate, honest attempt to overcome a tormented family legacy.… (more)
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Unfortunately, due to the Cuban political situation, almost all were denied admittance to Cuba and the ship was sent back to Europe. Many countries including the US and Canada, denied asylum to the refugees. Eventually, they were divided among four countries with about 25% each going to the UK, Belgium, France and the Netherlands.
Goldsmiths’s relatives were among those released to France. At first the pair were in resettlement camps, but once the territory was under Nazi control, they moved to prisons camps and eventually were shipped to Birkenau where they were murdered in the Nazi gas chambers.
In this account, Goldsmith follows their journey to Cuba and then step by step across Europe, visiting the sites, finding evidence of their lives in the camps and their eventual deaths.
It’s a disturbing and humbling story, made very immediate by recent refugee criseses where refugees are also often denied asylum in the US and elsewhere.