Second World War
In the Second World War Sweden was neutral, and until December 1941 so was the USA. At first Drottningholm continued the service between Gothenburg and New York.[32][33]
By the end of January 1940 Drottningholm was the only SAL passenger liner still operating between Gothenburg and New York.[34] On 3 February, 150 Finnish-American and Finnish-Canadian volunteers to fight for Finland in the Winter War sailed on Drottningholm from New York.[35]
In March 1940 Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn from German-occupied Poland reached New York aboard Drottningholm.[30]
Later in the war the US, UK and French governments each chartered Drottningholm to repatriate civilian internees, prisoners of war (PoWs) and diplomats between the two belligerent sides. She also carried PoWs and civilians for the Red Cross.
One source states that Drottningholm repatriated 14,093 people.[29] Another says she made 14 voyages and repatriated about 18,160 people.[30] Another states that between 1940 and 1946 she made 30 voyages and carried about 25,000 people.[2] The discrepancy may be because in August 1945 Drottningholm reverted from charter trips to her regular commercial Gothenburg – New York route, but she continued to carry refugees from Europe to North America.[36]
In March 1942 the US Department of State and US Maritime Commission[37] chartered Drottningholm via an arrangement with Germany and the other Axis powers, facilitated by the Swiss and Swedish governments and with the cooperation of 15 Latin American republics who had also broken off diplomatic relations with the Axis. On her first eastbound voyage she left from New York on 7 May 1942 for Lisbon carrying Bulgarian, German, Italian, Romanian nationals including ambassadors and diplomats.[38]
Her first westbound voyage was from Lisbon on 22 May, reaching New York on 1 June. Her passengers included the US diplomats Leland B. Morris and George F. Kennan.[39]
Drottningholm started her second eastbound crossing from Jersey City on 3 June 1942[40] carrying 985 Axis nationals, including diplomats. On 12 June she reached Lisbon, where she was held to await trains from Axis countries carrying people for repatriation to the Americas.[41] By 21 June she had embarked either 941[42] or 949 passengers at Lisbon for repatriation to both North and South America. Many had been released from Nazi concentration camps.[43]
When Drottningholm reached New York on 30 June 1942, US immigration authorities and military and naval intelligence personnel came aboard and prevented her passengers from disembarking until they had searched the ship and questioned each of the passengers. They included 470 US citizens, 110 South American diplomats and nationals, and a group of Canadian women rescued from the Egyptian liner SS Zamzam, which the GERMAN AUXILIARY CRUISER Atlantis had sunk in April 1941.[42]
US officials released about 125 passengers on 2 July and allowed them ashore. First to be released was the reporter Ruth Knowles, who had escaped execution by the Gestapo after spending a year serving with the Chetniks resisting the German and Italian occupation of Yugoslavia.[42] By 3 July nearly 700 passengers were still being held aboard.[37] and by 8 July about 400 had been released, but 300 had been detained on Ellis Island until their cases were decided.[44]
At the end of June 1942 the Nazi government withdrew its guarantee of safe passage for the ship, which prevented further exchanges.[45][46] On 15 July Drottningholm left New York for Gothenburg carrying at least 800 Axis nationals.[47] Most were German or Italian, plus a few Bulgarians and Romanians.[45]
Drottningholm continued to serve the UK and French governments as a repatriation ship. Her white hull was emblazoned on both sides with her name and "Sverige" ("Sweden") in huge capital letters, between them were stripes of blue and yellow, the colours of the Swedish flag, and above them was the word "Diplomat". As a neutral ship she was fully lit so that her markings could be easily seen.[40][45] By 1945 the word "Diplomat" had been replaced with "Freigeleit – Protected".[30]
In October 1943 Drottningholm and RMS Empress of Russia arrived in the Firth of Forth carrying a total of about 4,000 Allied PoWs. They nicknamed Drottningholm "Trotting Home".[48]
On 15 or 16 March 1944 Drottningholm reached Jersey City from Lisbon with 662 passengers including 160 civilian internees from Vittel internment camp, 35 or 36 wounded US servicemen and a group of US diplomats from the former Vichy France, which Germany and Italy had occupied since November 1942. Internees released from Vittel included Mary Berg and her family. Drottningholm's previous eastbound voyage had returned about 750 Germans to Europe.[40]
In summer 1944 the Swiss government facilitated an agreement between the German and UK governments to repatriate almost all of each other's interned civilian nationals. Drottningholm was chartered, and on 11 July reached Lisbon carrying 900 German nationals who had been interned in South Africa. She was then to await three trains carrying UK nationals from German-occupied Europe.[49] 900 UK civilians and PoWs were brought by train under International Red Cross protection from German-occupied countries to Lisbon.[50][51]
However, by summer 1944 the French Resistance was at its height, sabotaging rail and road transport in France, and especially in the southwest toward the Spanish frontier. The trains had left Germany on 6 July but were struggling to cross France.[52] By 16 July the trains still had not arrived, so the UK was threatening to return the German internees to South Africa on Drottningholm.[53] However, on 21 July trains carrying 414 UK and other evacuees from Germany reached Irun on the Spanish frontier, where they changed to Spanish trains to continue toward Lisbon.[54] On 4 August Drottningholm at last left Lisbon taking them to England.[55]
In September 1944 the Swedish Red Cross arranged an exchange of 2,345 Allied PoWs for a similar number of Germans. The Allied PoWs would be brought by sea and land to Gothenburg, where they would embark on Drottningholm, MS Gripsholm (1924) and the UK troop ship RMS Arundel Castle.[56] When the Allied prisoners reached Gothenburg their number was reported to be 2,600.[57]
In March 1945 the UK and Germany agreed via Swiss and Swedish intermediaries to another exchange of civilian internees via Drottningholm.[58] On 15 March she left Gothenburg carrying UK internees, Argentinian and Turkish diplomats, Portuguese nationals[59][60] and 212 released Channel Islands internees. She had landed the Channel Islands and UK nationals in Liverpool by 23 March[61] and was then due to take the Argentinians and Portuguese to Lisbon and the Turks to Istanbul.[60] On 11 April she arrived in Istanbul, carrying 137 Turkish Jews who had been released from Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps as part of a prisoner exchange. Turkish authorities temporarily refused entry to 119 of her passengers.
On 3 May, the eve of the German unconditional surrender, Drottningholm was in Lisbon where she was meant to embark 200 Germans to be repatriated. But 61 of them refused to go, and the Portuguese authorities were reported to be assessing them as civilian refugees.[62]
