people have commented on the fact that in 1933 the first year of nazi rule, while over 30,000 german umax immigrated but in the following years the numbers leading drop to around just 20,000 a year. they only top in 1933 level in 1938, the year. with a melancholy hindsight reduced flow of immigrants when the nazis still about immigration, seen evidence of german jews refusal to see that the era of german jewry had come to an end. but the following contemporary letter from, and thousands others like it, throws a different light on events. in 1933, and like following years, a great many of those german jews left did so by illegally crossing the borders of foreign countries, mainly france and the netherlands. there, they were in a foreign country with no rights and no opportunity to work. the jewish press, including the zionist press, was full of horror stories of german jews stranded in was a broad and full of warning against leaving without the legal right to live somewhere else. many of the immigrants were in fact insisted to return to germany so they might at least or anything, or be loo