15 – North of Boston
How many “cousins” paying surprise visits, “cousins” who spoke little English, could suburban Boston accept? Four thousand frightened people could not be hidden for long, no matter how quixotic their rescuers hoped to be. The cleverest ones landed on shore and never stopped running, catching planes and trains and buses heading anywhere, ducking police and immigration authorities as best they could. Most of the people taken off the two ships, however, were smuggled into finished basements and attic bedrooms in houses in Boston suburbs.
These houses were not fitted with secret doors and hidden rooms like Anne Frank lived in. No underground railroad had been established to smuggle illegal Jewish immigrants. Instead, Jewish doctors, lawyers, businessmen, woken from their beds by late night telephone calls, had to make snap decisions.
“Can you take somebody in?” the caller would ask. “Just for a day or two until we sort things out. There’s really no risk to you. Nothing will happen to you. Don’t worry.
“Please, we just have to hide them for a day or so until things settle down. Then the government will step in and help these poor people.”
How could they refuse, just for a day or two?
Cold, wet, terrified, hungry people, sometimes an entire family, were dropped at nice houses in nice neighborhoods, four thousand people scattered and hidden before the sun rose the next morning. They were treated not quite as guests, not quite as fugitives. They weren’t foreign exchange students, an accepted category of foreigners who showed up once in a while. They certainly weren’t au pairs, neither were they foreign business visitors. They certainly couldn’t be fugitives from the law. Good people would not hide criminals.
People didn’t know how to handle these sudden visitors. Could the neighbors be told or not? Did they distinguish between Jewish neighbors and non-Jewish neighbors? Were they only staying at Jewish homes? Suddenly the distinction between Jewish friends and non-Jewish friends took on a new significance.
Roselyn Lowenstein was called to the principal’s office at Swampscot High School after lunch the day following the raid on the ships.
“Roselyn, I have some serious questions to ask you,” Principal Warren said.
Roselyn was a National Honor Society member and co-captain of the school’s state championship debating team. Principal Warren knew Roselyn and her parents well. Roselyn was never called to the principal’s office for causing trouble. This time, however, she was nervous, fidgeting while Principal Warren spoke to her.
“Roselyn, somebody told me you were talking at lunch about some visitors at your house. I’ll be blunt with you. I heard that you told people you have a family from those ships hiding at your house. Is that true?”
For a seventeen year old girl who should have been worrying about whether she should apply early decision to Harvard because, after all, it was Harvard, or to Columbia, because imagine going to the Columbia School of Journalism, hiding illegal refugees was the last problem Roselynn Lowenstein expected to have to face. She did not want to deal with it now. In fact, she did not want to give up her bedroom for four people who barely spoke English. And Mr. Warren wasn’t the enemy. He was OK. He’d promised to write a great college recommendation letter for her.
“It’s a secret. We’re not supposed to tell,” she whispered, laying the drama on thickly.
Warren removed a yellow filing folder from a desk drawer. Peeking, Roselyn could see her name was typed across the file folder tab.
“I have a very important letter to write for you,” the principal said, looking closely at the young woman. She stared at him for no more than five seconds, then glanced again at the file folder.
“OK. It’s only for a few days. Maybe the school newspaper should be covering this. Lots of other kids have them at their houses, too, you know.” He could hear the excitement in her voice.
Warren had watched the local TV news while eating breakfast that morning. He watched the bodies of the young Coast Guardsmen lifted from the water. He watched flaming footage of the remains of the two patrol boats. Like most people, he was ambivalent about letting the refugees off those two ships. Sure they needed some place to go, but hadn’t we just deported all those South Americans and Haitians and Asians. Fair was fair, after all. You couldn’t start making exceptions, especially not for white people, that would not be the liberal thing to do, and Warren thought of himself as a liberal, although a liberal gaining wisdom as he grew more mature. Can’t make an exception for white immigrants. Fair is fair.
And now ten Americans were murdered by these Jews. That sealed it for Warren.
When Roselyn left his office to return giggling to her Spanish class, where she huddled with half a dozen friends who also had instant relatives at home, Warren searched the telephone book for the Massachusetts State Police number, picked up the telephone and dialed quickly.
“I don’t know how many other families are also hiding people,” he told Detective Lieutenant Francis O’Brien, “but there is an awful lot of whispering in the halls, and its mostly the Jewish kids doing it. I suspect there are a lot of them in town, a lot of them. So what are you going to do about this?”