Ch 647, PL 774) authorized, for a limited period of time, the admission into the United States of 200,000 certain European displaced persons (DPs) for permanent residence.

The United States helped fund temporary DP camps, and admitted large numbers of DPs as permanent residents.

[3] Historians Phil Orchard and Jamie Gillies hail Truman's "atypical leadership" in helping refugees.

The first DPs brought to the US under the Act arrived in New York City on October 30, 1948, crossing from Bremerhaven, Germany on the Army transport ship General Black.

The ship carried 813 displaced persons from eleven nations, including 388 Poles, 168 Lithuanians, 53 Czechoslovaks, 32 Latvians, 17 Ukrainians and 6 Hungarians.

)[13][14][15] The displaced persons' countries of birth were as follows: Poland 34%, Germany 15%, Latvia 9.3%, USSR 8.7%, Yugoslavia 7.9%, Lithuania 6.4%, Hungary 4%, Czechoslovakia 2.7%, Estonia 2.6%, Greece 2.5%, Rumania 2.5%, Austria 2.1% and others 2.3%.