I’m looking for help from someone in France with experience finding records in the French military archives.

In June 1940, a ship carrying bananas in Bayonne left for Lisbon with hundreds of refugees on board. When the ship arrived in Lisbon on June 27, the refugees were not allowed to get off the ship. Instead a French Navy ship arrived, transferred the refugees to the navy ship, and delivered them to Casablanca where they were put into an internment camp.

I’ve only recently found out the name of the ship and the captain. The ship was the Kalissi, and the captain was Rene Jean Moro.

I have not been able to find any documentation of this event, only several interviews of refugees that mention it. There is documentation after the fact of the ship being in Lisbon, and most of the crew deserting the ship. The captain did not want to return the ship to France, as it was Vichy controlled.

I’d really like to find documentation of the transfer of refugees from Lisbon to Casablanca. The best would be if there is a French Navy record that mentions the event, and even better would be an actual list of the refugees that they took.

Another possibility is that the internment camp in Casablanca had a record of those refugees being delivered to them, which would probably have been in early July.

Besides documenting this event, some of the descendants of the refugees are looking to nominate the captain for Righteous Among the Nations status at Yad Vashem, and we need documentation to show Yad Vashem.

If there is someone willing to help find documentation of this event, I would be very grateful.

Thank you,

Philip Trauring