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Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust

holocaust talks nycLECTURE: Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust

Lecturer: Dr. Scott Miller, United States Memorial Holocaust Museum

The ordeal of the refugee ship St. Louis has become a symbol of the world’s indifference to the plight of European Jewry on the eve of the Holocaust. In the spring of 1939, more than nine hundred Jewish refugees boarded the St. Louis in Hamburg, Germany, hoping to escape escalating oppression by the Nazi government. Except for a small group that had special visas and was able to disembark in Havana, the ship and its passengers were denied entry by Cuba and the United States. Returning on an uncertain voyage to Europe, the refugees eventually were accepted by four western European countries. Other than the 288 sent to England, most once again fell under the Nazi grip that closed upon continental Europe a year later.

Although the episode of the St. Louis is well known, the actual fates of the passengers, once they disembarked, slipped into historical obscurity. Prompted by a former passenger’s curiosity, Sarah A. Ogilvie and Scott Miller of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum set out to discover what happened to each of the 937 passengers. Their investigation, spanning ten years and half the globe, took them to unexpected places and produced surprising results.

Scott Miller is the Director of Curatorial Affairs at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Scott has worked at the Holocaust Museum since 1989. Prior to the opening of the Holocaust Museum to the public in 1993, Scott was a research historian for the museum’s Wexner Learning Center —a multimedia information center on the Holocaust. In 1993, Scott became the Academic and University Programs Coordinator for the Museum’s Research Institute. In 2001, he was appointed Director of the Benjamin and Vladka Meed Registry of Jewish Holocaust Survivors—the Holocaust Museum’s names-information and tracing center.

Scott has also taught Jewish History for the Jewish Studies Program at American University, in Washington, DC. With Randolph Bradham, Scott co-edited The Nazis’ Last Victims: The Holocaust in Hungary (1998), and he co-authored with Sarah Ogilvie Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust (2006). In 2006, Scott assumed his current position of Director of Curatorial Affairs.











When: Sun., Jun. 7, 2015 at 1:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Where: Queensborough Community College
222-05 56th Ave.
718-281-5044
Price: Free
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holocaust talks nycLECTURE: Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust

Lecturer: Dr. Scott Miller, United States Memorial Holocaust Museum

The ordeal of the refugee ship St. Louis has become a symbol of the world’s indifference to the plight of European Jewry on the eve of the Holocaust. In the spring of 1939, more than nine hundred Jewish refugees boarded the St. Louis in Hamburg, Germany, hoping to escape escalating oppression by the Nazi government. Except for a small group that had special visas and was able to disembark in Havana, the ship and its passengers were denied entry by Cuba and the United States. Returning on an uncertain voyage to Europe, the refugees eventually were accepted by four western European countries. Other than the 288 sent to England, most once again fell under the Nazi grip that closed upon continental Europe a year later.

Although the episode of the St. Louis is well known, the actual fates of the passengers, once they disembarked, slipped into historical obscurity. Prompted by a former passenger’s curiosity, Sarah A. Ogilvie and Scott Miller of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum set out to discover what happened to each of the 937 passengers. Their investigation, spanning ten years and half the globe, took them to unexpected places and produced surprising results.

Scott Miller is the Director of Curatorial Affairs at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Scott has worked at the Holocaust Museum since 1989. Prior to the opening of the Holocaust Museum to the public in 1993, Scott was a research historian for the museum’s Wexner Learning Center —a multimedia information center on the Holocaust. In 1993, Scott became the Academic and University Programs Coordinator for the Museum’s Research Institute. In 2001, he was appointed Director of the Benjamin and Vladka Meed Registry of Jewish Holocaust Survivors—the Holocaust Museum’s names-information and tracing center.

Scott has also taught Jewish History for the Jewish Studies Program at American University, in Washington, DC. With Randolph Bradham, Scott co-edited The Nazis’ Last Victims: The Holocaust in Hungary (1998), and he co-authored with Sarah Ogilvie Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust (2006). In 2006, Scott assumed his current position of Director of Curatorial Affairs.

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