JOURNEYS TO SOUTH AMERICA

Seven refugee boats left Sweden for Argentina between 1946 and 1950, six of which were organized by Estonians and Latvians. Several boats also headed to Brazil, but less is known about them.

The Baltic refugees ignored warnings from officials in Brazil against making the difficult journey to South America without visas. On September 10, 1950, Välis-Eesti posted a long article by Karl Ast, the former Estonian consul to Rio de Janeiro. He noted that two large boats with Estonian refugees had arrived in South America that year and that the people on the first, unnamed boat had to wait four months before they could get a residency permit. During that time, they were forced to live on their meager provisions on board because they did not have work permits and were restricted from leaving the boat. Ast wrote that people on the other vessel, which was probably the Themis, waited for three months to get permission to come ashore, but then gave up and sailed to Argentina.