Refugee Life in Albania 1939

On 30 January 1939 Grandpa arrived in Durres, (Durazzo), a coastal town in Albania. Grandma and Dad arrived there sometime in February/March 1939 and the family was finally reunited. We think Siegfried’s sister Elsa in Trieste may have arranged the visas.

In a little-known facet of Second World War history, out of all the countries of mainland Europe Albania, a Muslim country, was the only one not to hand Jews over to the Nazis. King Zog instructed all his embassies and consulates to offer visa to Jewish refugees, no questions asked.

Our treasured family documents include Grandpa and Grandma’s Albanian tourist visas.

Hedwig and Siegfried's Albanian 'tourist

Siegfried and Hedwig's Travel Visas.

© Schrötter/Stevens Story

This impulse to welcome, shelter and protect Jewish refugees came from ‘besa’ a code of honour deeply rooted in Albanian culture and incorporated into the faith of Albanian Muslims. It dictates a moral behaviour so absolute that non-adherence brings shame and dishonour on oneself and one’s family. Simply stated, it demands that one take responsibility for the lives of others in their time of need. In Albania and Kosovo, Muslims sheltered, at grave risk to themselves and their families, not only the Jews of their cities and villages, but thousands of Jews fleeing the Nazis from other European countries. Astonishingly Albania emerged from the war with a population of around 1800 Jews, eleven times greater than at the beginning.

Not long after they arrived Albania was invaded by Mussolini and Dad recalls seeing bodies on the streets following the Battle of Durres between the 7th and the 12th April.

Despite the Italian occupation, the family lived in relative safety for the next six months in one room of a communal house of 40 Jewish refugees near the beach.

The community was financially supported by an organisation called HIAS, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society which worked with the American Joint Distribution Committee known as ‘The Joint’.

Among the community were some Czech builders who built the house and made furniture and beds. Grandma remembers it as a positive time after the horrible events in Vienna where they were relatively safe and able to enjoy chess and swimming in ‘the lovely ocean there’. One of the refugees was a teacher and taught the children.

We discovered that Scarlett Epstein, then a 16 year old Viennese refugee, who would become a renowned anthropologist, was living in the commune at the same time as our family. She vividly describes life in the commune in her 2005 autobiography.

Life in Durres

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'Albania Jewish refugees' noted on rever

Young Eric (standing) with refugee commune members, Durres, Albania. Colourised photo. © Schrötter/Stevens Story

“I owe my life to King Zog in particular and to Albania in general” Dr T Scarlett Epstein OBE (neé Grünwald), anthropologist 13 July 1922 - 27 April 2014

When researching the Albanian strand of the story I came across, in early 2018, a Dr T Scarlett Epstein piece on the Albanian Royal family website about the Jews of Albania. I thought it was very likely she had lived in the same refugee commune in Durres that our family had. Revisiting that research in August 2020 I found a brilliant YouTube video interview from 2011 with Scarlett giving more details of her experiences in Albania as a 16 year old refugee, and her terrifying escape via Nazi Germany to London in April 1939.

So she had lived in the commune at the same time as our family, including around the time of invasion of the country by Italy, and the battle of Durres (renamed Durazzo by the Italians) in April 1939. I found and contacted Scarlett's daughter Michelle who provided extracts from her late mother's 2005 autobiography ‘Swimming upstream : a Jewish refugee from Vienna’. Her memoir adds fascinating new details about the life that our family must have lived in the commune.

Scarlett arrived in Durres in November 1938 with her parents and was met by two German Jews who explained there was a small refugee community of 55 people in the town next door to the police station by the port. Her parents were very unhappy and distressed, finding it difficult to deal with the catastrophic change in their circumstances and loss of status. Scarlett at 16 years old was much more robust and resilient and enjoyed getting to know the town and the locals and even getting paid work as a language teacher. She writes about the squabbling among the refugees in the commune, and the hardships of refugee life with insufficient food and makeshift furniture. This contrasts with Grandma’s positive recollections of the lovely time there after the “horrible time” living under Nazi rule in Vienna and Kristallnacht.

Grandma said they were “glad to be free”. They “played chess a lot and then we went swimming in the ocean. It was a lovely ocean there”. People from different walks of life, who might have had no natural affinity with each other in normal life were thrown together as refugees through force of circumstance and this caused tensions. A Mrs Greenburg, whose husband had been a senior engineer, insisted on everyone calling her "Frau Ober-Ingeneur" (Mrs Senior Engineer) and got annoyed if people didn't observe this deference. It was difficult for refugees to obtain permits from the British Home Office, especially for men. This must have been a great worry for Grandma and Grandpa.

Scarlett describes how the refugees hid from the Italian soldiers during the invasion in April 1939. As she could speak Italian, she led the group out of hiding holding a white handkerchief on a stick. The soldiers were friendly, Scarlett having told them they were Germans. The Italians were then German allies, but she neglected to tell them the Jewish bit. The soldiers escorted the group back to the Commune but then proceeded to search the house, which must have been very nerve-wracking for everyone. Dad recalls seeing bodies in the streets - maybe on the march back out of hiding in the Commune.

Immediately following the invasion, all civilian travel outside Albania was suspended so again this would have been very worrying for Grandma and Grandpa. Scarlett’s departure with her mother from Albania to London in April 1939 on the same intended route as our family - by ship via Bari and Naples, didn’t happen because the ship was delayed by 3 weeks. Their visa for England was soon to expire and couldn’t be further extended. So they had to get to England by air via two stops inside Nazi Germany. If the SS Orontes had been delayed in that way, our family would have been trapped in Italy at the beginning of the war in September 1940 with no means of escape.

As the danger of war increased, the family made preparations to leave Albania utilising Grandpa’s work friendship with Leeds businessman Philip Boyle to arrange a guarantorship in England.

The family departed Naples on 16 August on the SS Orontes and arrived in Tilbury on 24 August 1939, just a week before the outbreak of war.

HS 2020