THE ESCAPE OF THE DANISH JEWS

In 1944, Werner Best planned to remove all the Jews from Denmark. He did not anticipate trouble with this plan. However, one of Best's colleagues, Georg Duckwitz, had close personal friends in the Danish government and he immediately decided to inform them of Best's decision.

Within hours, Duckwitz's news spread throughout Denmark. Jewish and non-Jewish Danes relayed the message to Jewish friends and colleagues, and Rabbi Marcus Melchior announced the plans to his synagogue congregation in Copenhagen. Jews immediately began to plan their escape, and they were aided by their non-Jewish countrymen. Danish Jews hid with friends and neighbors, coworkers, and even complete strangers. Over the next few weeks, Danish resistance groups, now fully operational organizations, arranged to hide Jews in houses, inns, and even hospitals throughout the country. The ultimate goal was to help the Jews leave Denmark before the Germans found and captured them.

Meanwhile, when Nazi soldiers arrived at the homes of Danish Jews on the night of October 1, they managed to capture only a few prisoners--450 of a total Danish Jewish population of approximately 8000 people. With help, most Jews managed to flee to the coast, where they awaited boats to take them to Sweden. Jews captured by the Nazis either had not heard the news or refused to leave upon first hearing the plans.

As Jews hid throughout Denmark, individuals and resistance groups organized the rescue operation. Some Danes bought boats and managed to smuggle hundreds of Jews to Sweden. The larger groups negotiated with trustworthy Danish fishermen who agreed to take the Jews to freedom. Plans were made for the Jews to be smuggled to the docks and, once there, for them to be concealed on the Danish fishing boats, out of sight of German soldiers.

In the end, around 7500 Danish Jews escaped to Sweden--almost the entire Jewish population of Denmark. The 450 who did not escape were sent to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp in Czechoslovakia. All but 51 of these deportees survived the camp. The majority of the Theresienstadt prisoners returned to Denmark in 1945; most of the refugees living in Sweden also returned to Denmark at the end of the war.

Source: The Bitter Years: The Invasion and Occupation of Denmark and Norway April 1940-May 1945 by Richard Petrow and The Rescue of the Danish Jews: Moral Courage Under Stress by Leo Goldberger.

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