THE ALIENS PROBLEM
Sne,—The following facts about a refugee for whom I am guarantor and who was an inmate of my house until his internment three weeks ago, deserve publication as an instancy of the cruelty inflicted by the promiscuous internment of friendly aliens who had the misfortune first to be born in Austria and then to seek refuge from their Nazi persecutors in this country.
Dr. Leo Hornung is an Austrian Jew, who was headmaster of a boys' school in his own country and had been a teacher for thirty years. He was at once imprisoned when Hitler annexed Austria, and suffered five different periods of imprisonment before he escaped to England last August, just in time to avoid being sent to Dachau. His wife, an " Aryan," was separated from him and she and his daughter are still—most unwillingly—in Austria. Dr. Hornung arrived here, through the good offices of the Friends Emergency Committee, in a state of nervous collapse and was subsequently found to be suffering from a duodenal ulcer which necessitates strict dieting and the avoidance of mental worry.
His state of health was slowly improving until the fear of intern- ment caused a relapse last May. Now he has been for three weeks in Prisoners of War Camp No. 3, where he is presumably in contact with his Nazi enemies and without the diet and medical attention he requires if he is to survive. At any rate, he writes that things are " going worse and worse " with him.
I may add that at the Aliens' Tribunal my friend was given the C endorsement without hesitation by the presiding officer, Mr. K.C. There was and is no question of his hatred of the Hitler regime. There is surely every reason for his immediate release from what is tantamount to a death sentence. Failing that he should at least be removed to hospital in a camp where there are no Nazis. Perhaps your publication of this letter may help to save him before
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