Stranded in Australia - the Vienna Boys' Choir

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I wrote about a ship being confiscated by Australia after World War II erupted. No doubt there are many stories to be told about such vessels but one concerned the Vienna Boys’ Choir. In 1939, a party of 20 choristers, aged from 8 to 14, dubbed as the ‘Nightingales of Vienna, were on a world tour. After the final concert of the tour in Perth, Western Australia, and due to sail for Vienna next day, they suddenly found themselves ‘enemy aliens’ and were stranded in Australia. Luckily for them, Melbourne’s Archbishop Daniel Mannix, arranged for them to be taken in with local families. They joined the choir of his cathedral. The choirmaster, Dr Georg Gruber, stayed with the visit’s sponsor, Henrietta Marsh, and became a regular in the Melbourne and Sydney musical arenas. However, in 1941, he was arrested and charged with having Nazi links. Along with the choral teacher, Dr Otto Sternberg, he was detained at Tatura Detention Camp until 1947 by which time he was the sole inmate at the camp. He was deported in 1947, cleared by a de-Nazification tribunal, and reunited with his wife and family in Vienna. Shortly after, he emigrated to South Africa to become Professor of Music at Rhodes University. He died in 1979. I’ll write more about a particular choirboy and the tour, as it’s very interesting. The photo is of the Vienna Boys' Choir in Vienna. We were privileged to hear them sing at a Mass there in 2015.