In July 1938, delegates from 32 countries met in Evian, France for a conference on the refugee crisis. The delegates expressed sympathy for the Jews who were seeking to flee Nazi persecution. Most countries, however, refused to admit more refugees.
United States delegate Myron Taylor delivers a speech at the Evian Conference on Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. Evian-les-Bains, France, July 15, 1938.
Between 1933 and 1939, Jews in Germany were subjected to arrest, economic boycott, the loss of civil rights and citizenship, incarceration in concentration camps, random violence, and the coordinated anti-Jewish riot known as Kristallnacht (often referred to in English as the "Night of Broken Glass"). Jews reacted to Nazi persecution in a number of ways. Forcibly segregated from German society, German Jews turned to and expanded their own institutions and social organizations. However, in the face of increasing repression and physical violence, many Jews fled Germany. More Jews might have left Germany had such countries as the United States and Great Britain been more willing to admit them.
Photo album containing photographs taken by a passenger aboard the St. Louis, with a depiction of the ship on the cover. In 1939, this German ocean liner carried Jewish refugees seeking temporary refuge in Cuba. It was forced to return to Europe after Cuba refused to allow the refugees entry into the country.
Kurt Klein (1920-2002) was born on July 2, 1920 in Walldorf, Germany, a town with a small Jewish population. Kurt was 12 when Adolf Hitler and the Nazis came to power in Germany in January 1933. The Klein family experienced antisemitic persecution throughout the 1930s and decided to leave Germany. Kurt immigrated to the United States in 1937, but his parents, Ludwig and Alice, were unable to leave. In 1940, the Kurt's parents were deported from Germany to France as part of the mass deportation of Jews from Baden. Ludwig and Alive were imprisoned in the Gurs internment camp. In August 1942, they were deported from France to Auschwitz, in German-occupied Poland, where they were likely murdered upon arrival. In 1942, Kurt joined the United States Army and was trained at Camp Ritchie in military intelligence. In Europe, he interrogated prisoners of war. In May 1945, he took part in the surrender of the Czech town of Volary. Kurt returned the next day to assist over 100 Jewish women who had been abandoned there during a death march. Kurt's future wife, Gerda Weissmann, was one of the women in this group.
As prewar antisemitism intensified, Hessy's family fled from Germany to Paris, France. France fell to the German army in June 1940. Hessy's family was smuggled into the "zone libre" (free zone) in southern France. The family received a US visa in 1941, but was unable to leave before the visa expired and could not obtain an extension. In 1942, the family obtained visas to enter Cuba, where they settled before immigrating to the United States in 1949.
Carl was born to Jewish parents living in a German village near the Belgian border. He fought in World War I and received the Iron Cross, a German military honor. He married Johanna Falkenstein and they settled down in a house across the street from his father's cattle farm. Carl ran a small general store on the first floor of their home. The couple had two daughters, Margot (born in 1928) and Lore (born in 1931).
11933-39: After the Nazis came to power in Germany, life became increasingly difficult for German Jews like the Heumann family. Carl struggled to find work. In the late 1930s Carl moved his family to the city of Bielefeld, where he worked for a Jewish relief organization.
1940-1944: After World War II began in September 1939, life became increasingly difficult for the Heumanns and other German Jews. Beginning in September 1941, German Jews had to wear a yellow Star of David badge on their clothes, marking them as Jewish.
In June 1943, the Heumanns were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto near Prague. They remained there until May 1944, when German authorities deported Carl and his family to Auschwitz. At Auschwitz, they were initially housed in the “Czech family camp” (section BIIb) of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Prisoners in the section had some privileges, such as wearing civilian clothes instead of camp uniforms. But, they still suffered from starvation and lacked proper shelter or sanitation. Carl did not survive the Holocaust, though his exact fate is unknown. Of the immediate family, only Margot survived. She last saw her father when they said goodbye at Auschwitz.
Amid intensifying anti-Jewish measures and the violence of Kristallnacht (often referred to in English as the "Night of Broken Glass"), Johanna's family decided to leave Germany. They obtained visas for Albania, crossed into Italy, and sailed in 1939. They remained in Albania under the Italian occupation and, after Italy surrendered in 1943, under German occupation. The family was liberated after a battle between the Germans and Albanian partisans in December 1944.
Between 1933 and 1941, the Nazis aimed to make Germany judenrein (cleansed of Jews) by making life so difficult for them that they would be forced to leave the country. By 1938, about 150,000 German Jews, one in four, had already fled the country. After Germany annexed Austria in March 1938, however, an additional 185,000 Jews were brought under Nazi rule. Many Jews were unable to find countries willing to take them in.
Many German and Austrian Jews tried to go to the United States but could not obtain the visas needed to enter. In the midst of the Great Depression, many Americans believed that refugees would compete with them for jobs and overburden social programs set up to assist the needy.
Congress had set up immigration quotas in 1924 that limited the number of immigrants and discriminated against groups considered racially and ethnically undesirable. These quotas remained in place even after President Franklin D. Roosevelt, responding to mounting political pressure, called for an international conference to address the refugee problem.
Refugee Conference in Evian
In the summer of 1938, delegates from 32 countries met at the French resort of Evian. Roosevelt chose not to send a high-level official, such as the secretary of state, to the Evian Conference. Instead, Myron C. Taylor, a businessman and close friend of Roosevelt's, represented the United States at the conference. During the nine-day meeting, delegate after delegate rose to express sympathy for the refugees. But most countries, including the United States and Britain, offered excuses for not letting in more refugees.
The Evian Conference: Outcomes
With the exception of the tiny Dominican Republic, no country was willing to accept more refugees. However, one result of the conference was the establishment of the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees (ICR), which would continue to work on the refugee problem.
Responding to the conference proceedings in Evian, the German government was able to state with great pleasure how "astounding" it was that foreign countries criticized Germany for their treatment of the Jews, but none of them wanted to open the doors to them when "the opportunity offer[ed]."
A few months later, in November 1938, the Nazi regime incited violent pogroms against Jews. Even though that news was widely reported, Americans remained reluctant to welcome Jewish refugees. Even efforts by some Americans to rescue children failed. The Wagner-Rogers bill, an effort to admit 20,000 endangered Jewish refugee children, was not supported by the Senate in 1939 and 1940. Widespread racial prejudices among Americans—including antisemitic attitudes held by US State Department officials—played a part in the failure to admit more refugees.
Last Edited: Sep 22, 2025
Author(s):
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC
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