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| Five important weeks for the UNRRA White Boat mission. |
After negotiations between UNRRA, read the Allies, and Swedish Government, 10 000 Displaced persons were welcomed to Sweden. Among them, maximum 1 000 children were allowed. It is likely that approximately this number of Displaced Persons came to Sweden. The mission goal was to partly empty the Bergen-Belsen emergency hospital. This emergency hospital was on 21 April 1945 opened to the first patients, former inmates of the concentration camp. Within the first four weeks, almost 29 000 survivors from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp were moved to the emergency hospital that slowly was becoming one of the biggest DP camps.
The main part of the persons that were transported during the UNRRA White Boat Mission came from Bergen-Belsen. However, when the stream of DPs that wanted to come to Sweden for hospital ward and rehabilitation diminished, the Swedish chef of the Transit Hospital in Lübeck decided to let other survivors then from Bergen-Belsen be included in the quota of 10 000. It is likely that the number of DPs that came to Sweden never reach this quota of a total 10 000.
The Swedish authorities introduced the so-called Lübeck number, the letter L, and the number. It just concerns the Holocaust survivors that arrived with UNRRAs White Boats.
Three DP-2 Cards are shown below. All of the have an L-number above 9500. The DP-2 cards were issued on July 23, 1945, the day of arrival at Swedish Transit Hospital where all former inmates were registered and hospitalized until the day of departure. In the left upper corner, there is the DP-1 number from the very first registration as DPs. The L-number in the upper left corner is the number from the Swedish Entry card (Inresekortet) that was also filled and issued in Lübeck. In the lower part with red is the name of the White Boat "Rönnkär" and the day of departure, here July 25, 1945. The passengers list, the list of former inmates of the concentration camps, transported on the White Boats always included the L-number.
After arrival to Sweden, the medical card (Läkarkort) was issued to all the former inmates that arrived by White Boats. They were different at different Hospitals. Numerous hospitals had, on the cards almost all possible numbers, including DP-1, DP-2, L- and local hospital registration numbers. The L-number from the Swedish Entry card (Inresekortet) was the one that was most frequently included in the registration number.
The very last two White Boats that left Lübeck on July 25, 1945, were S/S Kastelholm and M/S Rönnskär. S/S Kastelholm was specially reserved for the children while the last DPs, among others from Neustadt DP-camp.
The group that came from the Neustadt DP camp were earlier inmates in the Stutthof concentration camp. The last person on the list with L number 9529 was a German Jew that was sent with his family to Riga and from there to Stutthof. Chaim Kozieniecki 9516 and Leon Majerowicz 9519 were prisoners in Lodz Ghetto (Der jüdische Wohnbezirk in Litzmannstadt), Auschwitz and Stutthof. In February 1945, as the Soviet army approached, the inmates were taken on a death march, and finally on a barge on the Baltic Sea for almost 10 days to Neustadt, Germany. Chaim and Leon were liberated there by the American Army.
May 1945.
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| Swedish entry card L 9519 was issued for Majerowicz Leon (here called Lajb). |
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| The L-number 9529 was the highest on M/S Rönnskär. The number 9346 was the highest on KP Ingrid. Children's numbering on S/S Kastelholm was between numbers 7769 and 7923. These three White Boats left Lübeck on July 1945. It was the end of the UNRRA White Boat mission. |
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| L-number was used as an identification number when transferring the children between the institutions in Sweden. Here are some children from the last trip of the White Boat S/S Kastelholm where the list had the numbering between 7769 and 7923. |
