Ocean Vigour

HMT Ocean Vigour was a British freighter which had been converted into a caged prison ship used to deport illegal Jewish immigrants who had attempted to enter the Mandate Palestine back to Europe and to prison camps in Cyprus. On April 3, 1947, the ship was damaged by a bomb planted by the Haganah’s Palyam forces^[1], while docked at the port of Famagusta.^[2]

The Ocean Vigour was one of 3 ships ^[3] used by the British authorities in “Operation Oasis” to deport the refugees from the Exodus 1947, most of whom were Holocaust survivors, to Germany. The Haganah commander on the Ocean Vigour was Meier Schwarz. The ship carried 1,464 deportees to Port-de-Bouc near Marseilles and, when they refused to disembark there, on to Hamburg, Germany, where they were forced off by club-wielding British troops.

References

1. ^ The Royal Navy and the Palestine Patrol , Ninian Stewart, C. L. W. Page, p.196 Routledge, 2002
2. ^ British Rule in Palestine
3. ^ "In Palestine or Never"