Senya Fleshin - Later Career

Later Career

Together with Molly Steimer, Fleshin opened a photographic studio in Berlin. Fleshin was active in the Joint Committee for the Defense of Revolutionaries (1923-1926) and the Relief Fund of the International Working Men's Association for Anarchists (1926-1932).

When Adolf Hitler came to power Fleshin and Molly Steimer were forced to flee to Paris. On May 18, 1940, Steimer was arrested by the French government and interned at Camp Gurs. In 1939, the French government had commenced interning radicals at the camp, in particular leftist refugees from the Spanish Civil War. After the Vichy government signed an armistice with the Nazis in 1940, it became a concentration camp for Jews of any nationality except French, as well as people considered dangerous by the government. After seven weeks of imprisonment, Steimer, aided by French anarchist friends including May Picqueray, the anarchist editor of Le Réfractaire, managed to escape Camp Gurs during its chaotic turnover to Vichy French government control. Picqueray helped smuggle Fleshin and Steimer out of the country to Mexico, where they settled, running a photography studio.