Long before the Allies landed in Normandy in June 1944 and began their advance across France, preparations were underway for what to do about the civilians who had been displaced by the German occupiers. What everyone feared was a repeat of the chaos that followed the first world war, when refugees and returning prisoners of war brought with them typhus and a flu epidemic which, by the time it had spent itself, had killed more people than all the casualties of the war itself. What no one had envisaged, however, was either the number of displaced people adrift across Europe, nor the state that they would be in. And, as the Allies advanced, causing more destruction, so the numbers and the confusion grew.
There have been several recent books on the liberation of Europe, most notably William Hitchcock’s Liberation: Europe 1945, but Ben Shephard has kept his focus closely on the story of the 15 million people who needed repatriating and looking after. Many of these either could not or would not go home, either because they had no home to go to, or because the borders and the ideologies of their countries had changed, or because their countries did not want them back. The organisation set up to deal with them was UNRRA, the UN Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, dominated by American money and interests, but constantly buffetted by changing political constraints, self-important administrators and rivalrous officials. No more then than now did international organisations committed to saving lives seem able to function harmoniously.
The needs of the displaced people proved ovewhelming. However much money was raised, it was never enough. While in Washington, London and Moscow the major powers wrangled over funds, jockeyed for influence and bickered over priorities, a remarkably small number of people on the ground battled against formidable odds to open camps and feed, clothe, educate and counsel destitute men, women and children from every European country and every religion, speaking a multitude of languages, each with their own needs, fears and memories.
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