The story of the Drom Afrika

Issie Granoth,

This article, by Issie Granoth, appeared as a “Guest Column” in The Jerusalem Post in 1997 and is reprinted with kind permission of the newspaper.

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In May 1947, the Drom Afrika set out from Cape Town for Haifa. The little ship sailed with the aspirations, hopes and prayers of the founders or the Jewish Maritime League and the Jewish Community of South Africa, in that she would help to promote the building of the Yishuv in a way that had been closed to Jews for centuries.

During World War II the ship, a 500-tonner, served as a mine sweeper and cruised at 11 knots under good conditions. The crew was a motley lot: our skipper was Danish, our chief engineer Norwegian and our second engineer English. The rest of the 17-man crew were South African and included seven young Jews whose fervent wish was to make Eretz Yisrael their home. The State of Israel was then but a dream.

Of these, only Chaim “Solly” Chait had been to sea before. At 16 he had taken his brother Solly’s identity document and run away to join the wartime merchant navy in the hope of making his way to Palestine. After many hardships he returned to Pretoria in time to hear of the Drom Afrika.

He immediately came to Cape Town and signed on. We all belonged to or sympathised with one of the Zionist youth movements. Sam Gross joined us for the first stage of the trip to Mossel Bay. A crowd of well-wishers came to the docks to see us off. Hatikvah was sung and hope was in all our hearts.

By nightfall the wind had risen to gale force. The little ship rolled and pitched as she struggled through mountainous waves and howling winds. At midnight I went up on watch. Water poured into the tiny fo’c’sle [the section of the upper deck at the bow forward of the foremast] where ten of us bunked in tiers around the mess table. Lines had been made fast on deck to haul oneself, battered by waves coming over the bows and side of the ship, across the short distance of deck from fo’c’sle to galley and then to the bridge.

The bosun [petty officer in charge of the ship’s riggings, anchors, cables and deck crew] gave me the course to steer. I grabbed the wheel, and watched the compass pin. With luck I got the hang of it and managed to keep on course.

Meanwhile, a drama was unfolding in the engine room. The pumps were not working and the engine room floor was awash with water. If the fire was extinguished by the rising water, we would have no steam and the ship would drift helplessly onto the rocks off Mossel Bay. Since we had sailed on the National Day of Norway, the chief engineer had celebrated with gusto and was lying on his bunk in a stupor! The other engineers were hardly in better condition. All available hands were called to bail from the hold with buckets and long ropes.

The bosun and I came off watch at four in the morning to join the others. The stokehole was hot and we stood knee-deep in the oily bilge water, lurching with the heaving of the vessel. One could stay below for only a short while without being sick. Before dawn a hand pump was rigged and eventually we made it to Mossel Bay.

After repairs we sailed for Port Elizabeth, East London and Durban. The Jewish communities in these ports of call received the Drom Afrika with enthusiasm and warm hospitality. But our troubles were far from over. At each port we had repairs. Sometimes we would leave harbour only to return within a few hours for more repairs. Most of us, even the old salts, would be seasick for the first four days out of every port. We experienced even worse storms going through the Mozambique Channel, but our spirits were high and we sailed with enthusiasm and anticipation.

There are few pleasures in life that compare to seeing a sunrise at sea after standing in the small cosy world of the bridge, ploughing through the dark sea, stars fanning out over the sky as the ship rolls matron-like through the swell, and a reassuring rhythmical throb of engines below. We were on our way to the Promised Land. After Lourenco Marques, the heat and humidity drove us out of the unventilated fo’c’sle. Clothing turned green. We staked out shelter on deck and I made myself comfortable under the life boat. At Beira we took on water and sailed for Mombassa. Again several days were spent on repairs. We launched the life boat – a very difficult operation – and sailed in the lagoon enjoying a rare spell of leisure.

The next port of call was Aden. Schools of porpoises frequently accompanied us on our way, showing off a wonderful repertoire of tricks. Often shoals of flying fish would take off, scintillating in the sun and sometimes a few would land on deck. Aden was dry and ashen, grey goats wandered aimlessly through the streets. In the evening the townspeople brought their beds to the docks to sleep. Once more we took on water and sailed up the Red Sea. On a calm moonless night we ran aground on a sandbar. The engines were flung into full astern with such alacrity that we came off the bank almost immediately.

At Port Suez, a pilot came aboard and we took our place in the convoy going up the Canal. I had first met “Palestinians” eighteen months before, at the Air Force base at Shamdur across the lake, while waiting to return to South Africa after the war. Their spirit and zest made me a Zionist without having read a line of Herzl. I then decided to return on aliyah. A short call at Port Said and off on the last leg.

When the sun rose the following day, we were sailing up the coast of Eretz Yisrael towards Haifa. While it had been an extraordinary voyage for all of us, for the seven Jewish crew members the emotions were profound. It seemed that we had yearned for this moment for generations. This was a homecoming made more poignant by the hardships of our voyage and the fact that Eretz Yisrael was still forbidden to us by the British. As we approached Haifa, our captain was in doubt what the local flag was, so we hoisted the Zionist flag. Immediately a police launch shot out to investigate and made us take it down. Thus we entered Haifa; the Carmel benign in sunshine.

The Drom Afrika anchored near a line of a dozen derelict ships. This was an honour as those ships had brought the illegals home. They looked pathetic and it was incredible that they could have crossed the Mediterranean with such a heavy freight of suffering. The British would not grant us shore leave so we stayed aboard the Drom Afrika, looked longingly at Haifa and the Carmel, and listened to the noises from the town. After more repairs and some delays we set out on our first fishing trip. Thus we learned what hard life deep-sea fishermen lead.

As soon as the huge net had been cast and the trawl doors had spread the net-like wings under the water, anyone off-watch would bunk down. When the order for the trawl-up came, everyone was at the net manhandling it into the boat. If nets were torn they had to be repaired and we all worked at it. The first trawling expedition lasted five days and we totalled six hours sleep. We caught very little fish but miles of net were repaired. On the second trip we almost lost our propeller.

The Drom Afrika sailed slowly back to Haifa, then on to Alexandria in Egypt to repair the propeller and scrape her bottom. We arrived in the middle of a cholera epidemic and spent a month in Alexandria anchored in the bay, on constant guard against pirates who often boarded the ships there.

We returned to Haifa and were at our mooring when the Exodus was towed into port and the 5 000 survivors of the Holocaust transferred to three British ships to be taken back to the camps in Germany which they had so recently left. I learned afterwards that all eventually made their way back to Israel. At night Haifa harbour was alive with activity. Police launches patrolled the harbour dropping depth charges against Jewish frogmen. Charges went off with a tremendous clang against the hull of the ship at intervals all through the night. Searchlights constantly swept the harbour. Despite all that, at least one British ship used for transporting Jews to Cyprus was sunk at the wharf.

We had been aboard the Drom Afrika for six months when we set out for our last fishing trip. We left Haifa in the afternoon. Shortly after we returned from the trip, five of the Jewish crew were taken off by the Hagana and replaced with crew from Kibbutz Sde Yam. A month or two later “Solly” Chait and Sam Wulfson were also taken off, and not long after joined a newly-formed paratrooper unit. The War of Independence was upon us. Sam, an ex air-gunner in the SAAF, had begun a great morale booster aboard ship. He lost a leg in the War of Independence, after which he settled on Moshav Habonim. He later died in South Africa.

Chaim Chait settled in Timorim and was killed on Reserve duty when his parachute failed to open. “Piet” Groenewald joined Kibbutz Ma’ayan Baruch.

Tuvia Ozen, Yaakov Shirk, Ben Hayam Hirshon and I joined Kibbutz Shuval in the Negev. Tuvia died in South Africa; Yaakov lives on Moshav Timorim, and Hirshon returned to South Africa.

My last contact with Drom Afrika was in 1948 during the War of Independence. Returning from Czechoslovakia on the aircraft accompanying Spitfires flying to Israel, I learned that the Drom Afrika, now serving legally in the Israeli Navy, was somewhere below us ready to give aid and succour. There are other ways of getting to Israel today – eight hours by El Al can only be a moving experience. I am grateful I came with the Drom Afrika.