When Marinesko spotted the dim lights of the fleeing liner hours later, he made course to intercept. The Gustloff played this role for four years, which meant it never got taken out to sea and was therefore not really maintained in seaworthy condition. MV Wilhelm Gustloff before the war (Augst, Federal Archive). The Wilhelm Gustloff was the most lethal shipwreck in history, but some details of the sinking remain unknown. The passengers included 8,000–9,000 German war refugees, 1,000 members of the Second Submarine Training Division (2. German refugees were on the road in the winter of 1944-45, great columns of men, women, and children, desperate to flee as the onrushing Soviets overran their homes. [2] As commander of U-56 he was able to avoid detection by the destroyers surrounding HMS Nelson and came in close proximity to the British flagship, launching three torpedoes against her whilst she was carrying Winston Churchill and the high military command of the British Navy. On 4 February 1936 Gustloff was killed by the young Yugoslavian Jew David Frankfurter. MV Wilhelm Gustloff "The German Titanic" MV Wilhelm Gustloff was a German cruise liner laid down on August 4th 1936. Wilhelm Gustloff, in full Motor Vessel Wilhelm Gustloff, German ocean liner that was sunk by a Soviet submarine on January 30, 1945. Ruta Sepetys clearly did a ton of research for this book. The air temperature was roughly 14 degrees Fahrenheit, which is okay if you're really, really bundled up but will definitely kill you if you're still, say, wearing your pajamas after settling down for the night. 50.000 Zu schauer jubel ten am 5. U-69 was then ordered closer to the American coast but after increased anti-submarine activity Zahn decided on sailing for Grand Banks near Newfoundland. [15], Zahn told the inquiry that at first he and the other officers had gathered at the bridge and then instructed the refugees "to go to the upper deck and not to panic". Robert Underbrink is a Jacksonville resident. We're going to tell it here, though. The sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, with its vast loss of life, provides the plot for "Salt to the Sea" by Ruta Sepetys, a story of World War II refugees from several . The Wilhelm Gustloff, like the Titanic, was a big passenger liner and was reasonably new and luxurious. And we discover that Wilhelm Gustloff has become a hero to today's neo-Nazis and to Konrad -- in fact, Konrad will go in search of someone posing in cyberspace as Frankfurter, who in mundane . Before the war, the Wilhelm Gustloff had been a 25,000-ton passenger liner that took ordinary Germans on what was often their first vacation. However, a disclaimer first: As this book takes place during World War II, it deals with death, rape, and racism, so be warned going in. Remember the Wilhelm Gustloff, 1945 (Click to enlarge)In the night of January 30th, 1945 while evacuating refugees from Eastern Germany, the Gustloff, which was designed to carry a max. The sinking of the German M.S. Wilhelm Gustloff in the Bay of Danzig on January 30, 1945 is by many accounts the deadliest maritime disaster in recorded history. The Wilhelm Gustloff's namesake was a real stand-up guy who in the early 1930s decided that the one thing Switzerland really, really needed was some institutionalized anti-Semitism. May 5, 1937 was an important date for the Nazi Regime in Germany. Readers are no doubt familiar with the tragedy of the Titanic, but this book also recounts the Wilhelm Gustloff, which took nine thousand lives at the end of World War II. Disasters at Sea is sure to offer an addicting and thrilling voyage ... Rescue boats had to take evasive maneuvers to avoid the submarines that were still lurking in the area. Problems also arose between the two officers regarding the ship's speed and the taking of safety precautions related to avoiding attacks by submarines which could be present in the area at the time. I've recently been doing an article for my history blog about the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff in January 1945 (The History Onyx: The Sinking of the Gustloff).Looking into the sinking and the events surrounding it got me thinking about the significance of the Soviets' East Prussian campaign and the profound (and tragic) impact that it had on the German population there. After word got out that the Wilhelm Gustloff had been struck, rescue boats sped to the scene even though they knew that submarines still lurked in the icy waters. On Jan. 29, 1945, the Russian submarine S-13 was on patrol in the cold, windswept waters of the Baltic Sea off the northern coast of East Prussia, present-day Poland. After two hours of sailing on the surface Zahn decided on a surface attack against the freighter and released four torpedoes all of which failed to hit the target. Sort of. The sub followed the Wilhelm Gustloff for a couple of hours, and, when it was about 20 miles offshore, fired three torpedoes at it. The M.S. Wilhelm Gustloff - Construction to Maiden Voyage is the definitive book chronicling the ship's beginnings while giving a detailed deck by deck look at one of the most little-known liners in history. At 5:30 a.m. Jan. 31, Patrol Boat VP-1703 came upon a dark shape bobbing on the waves. Murder/suicide was another way out for some of the people on board. [15], Subsequently, Zahn's testimony described the events as they unfolded after the torpedoes hit the ship. She was featured practically everywhere in 1937 after her launch and many other places highlighting points during her career. On that day the new passenger liner and cruise ship Wilhelm Gustloff was launched on the Blom & Voss shipyard in Hamburg and named after the Gauleiter Wilhelm Gustloff, leader of the Swiss nazy party. Zahn also mentioned that he had not received any orders regarding the performance or avoidance of zigzag manoeuvres, saying that he "just got three phone calls and told to leave". Associated Press. It is estimated between 1,000 and 2,000 people died in the first minutes of the attack. Other ships also saved handfuls of people. [15], The conflict between Zahn and Petersen is depicted in the novel Polar Shift. Some of the people who jumped tried to get onboard lifeboats as they rowed away from the doomed ship, but most of those people were beaten back with oars for fear that they'd overload the lifeboats or capsize them while trying to get onboard. 2-ranked Brown County, 21-6. She served as a hospital vessel in 1939 and 1940. Found insideAs geography and history collide, they are forced to come to terms with the differences that have grown between them and the true value of friendship. There are actually a remarkable number of similarities between the Wilhelm Gustloff and the Titanic. The ocean liner Wilhelm Gustloff was one of some 800 ships of all sizes involved in the rescue. From a legal perspective the case would be extremely difficult. Aboard the stricken vessel there was panic and chaos when far too many people became trapped. Meanwhile, the Gustloff kept losing the occasional lifeboat for some operation or another, so it was starting to look rather Titanic-y. This did not prevent the sinking of the ship by a Soviet submarine. Through adverse weather U-69 set to the new course. Snow was falling as the liner steamed west at 10 knots 25 miles off the coast. Features 344 photographs in 173 pages. ​​Second Edition, $29.99 Retail. This book is a hard copy of selected items and pages of the museum website. Some survivors were just left floating in lifeboats, because there weren't enough ships to rescue everyone. FOR MANY PEOPLE, the image of a great maritime disaster calls to mind the well-known sinking of the Titanic, which went down in April 1912 after striking an iceberg, taking the lives of 1,503 men, women and children.Others may think of the Lusitania, which sank on May 7, 1915, after being hit by a . When the ship kept turning more and the tilt angle increased to 25–30 degrees, Zahn abandoned any attempts at coordinating the evacuation efforts and went to the stern to board a lifeboat and leave the ship. MV Wilhelm Gustloff was a German armed military transport ship which was sunk on 30 January 1945 by Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea while evacuating German civilian refugees from East Prussia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland and Estonia and military personnel from Gotenhafen as the Red Army advanced. According to the Journal Courier, a patrol boat found one of the Wilhelm Gustloff's lifeboats at 5:30 a.m. the next morning. Als am 4. Wilhelm Gustloff Posted on September 30, 2014 by rabbialisarosenbaum Here's an account of the M.S. In The Fall of the Ottomans, award-winning historian Eugene Rogan brings the First World War and its immediate aftermath in the Middle East to vivid life, uncovering the often ignored story of the region's crucial role in the conflict. Februar 1936 Wilhelm Gustloff, Landesgruppen leiter der NSDAP in der Schweiz, in Davos von dem Medizinstudenten David Frank furter erschossen wurde, befahl Hitler das neue KdF-Vorzeigeschiff nicht, wie vorgesehen, auf seinen eigenen Namen, sondern auf Wilhelm Gustloff zu taufen. The Wilhem Gustloff was filled to the bursting point with over 10,000 panicked Germans fleeing the approaching Russians. And by the way, Jack could have totally fit on that door. And yet, it wouldn't be super surprising if you'd never even heard of the shipwreck that killed more than 9,000 people, including nearly 4,500 children. It was noted for its modernity and luxury. As the year came to an end, however, the German naval commander Admiral Karl Donitz realized 1 million soldiers and civilians remained trapped in East Prussia. He also said that he had concluded that there were no submarines in the area after discussions with fellow officers. Frankfurter ended up living happily ever after, and Gustloff, well, they named a ship after him. It was packed with nearly 8,000 Germans, most of them women and children escaping from the advancing Soviet Army. Zahn's plans were met with resolute opposition from captain Petersen. Tulla makes a dramatic appearance on the witness stand to defend her grandson and denounce his parents for neglecting The Gustloff's progression was slow, too — the captain kept a snails-pace of 12 knots, mostly because he was worried that the ship's engines had sat for so long that they wouldn't be able to handle actual speed. In the dead of night, in the Baltic Sea, the WG was hit by three torpedoes from the S-13 and sank in an hour. When the Wilhelm Gustloff steamed out of Gotenhafen, it was a lot heavier than it should have been. The Wilhelm Gustloff had started life before the war as a Kraft durch Freude cruise ship and had been named after a Swiss Nazi party leader who had been assassinated by a Jewish student in 1936. Here's the horrible, horrible truth of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Snow was falling when around 8 p.m. the Wilhelm Gustloff finally made its departure, leaving thousands of refugees on the dock. So if the words "sitting duck" have just popped into your head, well, you're not wrong. The MV Wilhelm Gustloff was a German ship which was sunk on 30 January 1945 by a Soviet submarine in the Baltic Sea while evacuating German civilians, officials and military personnel from Gdynia (Gotenhafen), occupied Poland, as the Red Army advanced. (A large ocean liner goes down in frigid waters dragging with her a cargo of myriad souls to their final sleep along the dark sea bed. During the winter of 1944 and 1945, the Germans citizens who were once living happily in East Prussia realized that the Soviets were coming to get them, and the only any way out was across the sea. The Gustloff started out life in 1937 as the first ever purpose-built cruise ship of . [6] After the attack Zahn became widely known as the "Man who almost killed Churchill" amongst the U-boat submariner corps. This book tells the stories of the worst maritime disasters in history, not simply in terms of lives lost, but in how far reaching the effects of the disasters were. The inspiration for the major motion picture Ashes in the Snow! "Few books are beautifully written, fewer still are important; this novel is both. About 9,500 died when she was sunk in the Baltic in January 1945 - the deadliest maritime casualty in history (Royal Navy) Published Feb 7, 2021 2:59 PM by Royal . Though the radio operator was forced to use an emergency transmitter dispatching an SOS, the less-powerful radio had a range of only 2,000 meters. [4], At 10 a.m. on 30 October 1939,[5][6] Zahn was commander of U-56 when he managed to avoid detection by the 10 destroyers and battle cruiser Hood,[7] protecting the Home Fleet west of the Orkney Islands and came within striking distance of HMS Nelson and Rodney. In addition he blamed the Croatian crew for leaving, saying: "The davits were iced and the Croats were absent". Commentary: The last survivor of a deadly rescue, Chris Cuomo acknowledges groping ex-ABC colleague, Ava Lahey's 'Making the Team' solo 'almost a religious experience', Three Pike men face federal charges of sexual exploitation of a child, Scoreboard for Friday, September 24, plus statewide, Business eyes expanding self-defense offerings, Night beat: A first look at today’s police news, Top dog — How a Jacksonville music professor created a ’60s fast-food icon, Sign-up for Newsletters, Alerts, and more, Walker’s late TD lifts Greenfield-NW past West Central, Jacksonville football rips Southeast, improves to 3-2, Catching fire: Dax Baptist gives Routt football a lift, Beardstown stuns No. He was launched into the Elbe river on May 5th 1937. Even as sharp winds and ocean spray hammered the ice-covered upper deck, untrained crewmen struggled to launch rafts and boats. The story of the Wilhelm Gustloff's sinking in the freezing waters of the Baltic is dramatic and it has rarely been satisfactorily told in the English language. Zahn ordered the submarine to submerge to load the four tubes with new torpedoes and upon resurfacing the target could not be located again. Petersen however was mindful of the damage the ship had sustained in an aerial bombardment the year before and did not believe that subsequent repairs to the hull were completely effective and had doubts that the ship's hull had the structural integrity to withstand the stresses imposed by the speed proposed by Zahn. Perhaps this sounds like the Titanic, which sank after striking an iceberg in 1912. He lived in Davos, Switzerland and worked for the Swiss government as a meteorologist. Wilhelm Gustloff: World's Deadliest Sea Disaster: Directed by Robert M. Wise, James Younger. On 30 January 1945, Captain Hellmuth Kehding was in charge of the ship, evacuating wounded soldiers and civilians trapped by the Red Army. At 8 p.m. on 26 November 1941 Zahn under inclement weather decided to track a lone freighter moving slowly in heavy seas under snow and hail. One passenger described her rescue from a lifeboat containing 35 people, only five of whom were still living when the rescue boat arrived. Frankfurter was convicted and sentenced to 18 years in prison, after which he was supposed to be kicked out of Switzerland. For the moment, they were the lucky ones. Soon after leaving the harbor of Danzig, it was hit by three torpedoes from the Soviet . According to the Warfare History Network, the outside temperatures, hail, and snow were probably responsible for ensuring that most of the Gustloff's passengers were sheltering below decks when the torpedoes struck, which means many of them died before they could make it up the steps. They claimed they were diving at the Terra tanker, located seven kilometres from Gustloff. To put that in perspective, about 1,500 people died on the Titanic, and about 4,400 in the worst peacetime disaster (the Doña Paz in 1987). A German leisure vessel and cruise ship converted by the German military into a transport ship to aid in the evacuation of German civilians at the end of the war. The first rule of avoiding maritime disasters is "make sure there are enough lifeboats." Then, when he turned the gun on himself, he found he was out of bullets and had to resign himself to dying in the cold water anyway. [15][16], Although Zahn had the highest rank on the ship, Petersen, as a merchant marine captain, had formal command of the vessel, a fact that ran counter to the sensibilities of Zahn, who was unwilling to accept Petersen's authority. The author traces the story from 1933, and shows how war and especially the prospect of defeat radicalized Nazism. As the country spiralled toward defeat, Germans for the most part held on stubbornly. Many lifeboat passengers froze to death before help arrived. The Wilhelm Gustloff and her running mate Robert Ley, which was being built at the yards of Howaldt in Hamburg and would enter service in 1939, would go into history as the world's first purpose-built cruise ships. The child Fick rescued that morning was the last official survivor of the Wilhelm Gustloff; and sometime later the officer and his wife adopted the baby. Even before the ship drew clear of Gotehaven, Capt. The sinking ship resulted in the loss of an estimated 9,300 victims, including 5,000 children.Those on board included 9,000 civilians fleeing an advancing Red Army, German . The Gustloff was hit by three torpedoes from the S-13 in the Baltic Sea under the command of Alexander Marinesko on the night of 30 January 1945 and sank in less than 45 minutes. The paper finds such portrayal of the main characters simplistic and counter to current scholarship on the subject. Naturally, the Nazis decided to name their propaganda-mobile after a Nazi hero — a Swiss general who had recently been assassinated by a Jewish medical student. The worst maritime disaster in history was the sinking of the Titanic. [3], On 23 November U-69 was ordered by Naval Command to sail to sector AK in the Atlantic southeast of Greenland and southwest of Iceland. The sinking of the German liner Wilhelm Gustloff in 1945 was the worst maritime disaster in history, with an estimated 9,250 fatalities. Found inside" --SLC, *STARRED REVIEW* * "Riveting . . . An exemplary work of historical fiction." --The Horn Book, *STARRED REVIEW* Most of the parts have #8222 N. As of now, I believe it is a 1944 8mm K98 Mauser built in the Wilhelm-Gustloff Werke arsenal, Weimar. Both ships were what you might call opulent. This story is primarily told through her photographs, letters, survivor accounts, and original artifacts from on board and salvaged from her wreck. It was sunk in the Baltic Sea on the night of January 30, 1945, by a Soviet submarine. Part of the weekly show called "Thalassa", which focuses on anything maritime and sea related. On that freezing January in 1945, it joined thousands of ships, large and small, in . Although the Gustloff was sunk on its first run during Operation Hannibal, the evacuation ultimately proved very successful. Anyway, more than 1,500 people died when the Titanic sunk in the icy waters of the north Atlantic, but that doesn't even come close to the number of people who died during the actual worst maritime disaster in history. Other people were crushed to death by falling debris — some witnesses reported that the ship's grand piano killed people as it slid down the rapidly listing deck. During this time, she was accommodating U-boat crews in the Baltic port of Gotenhafen, which is present day Gdyna in Poland. Although it originally had a capacity of less than 1,500 people, it eventually was made to accommodate over 10,000. Crowded walkways and tilted stairwells made it nearly impossible for refugees to reach lifeboats and emergency rafts on the upper deck. Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. We see everything from crockery to special postage stamps in addition to a large number of images of the first rivets going in and the fitting out phases of the construction. But the German command had either never heard of Titanic or just hadn't had time to think things through. "It's the single largest maritime disaster in history, yet . Twenty years have passed since the war ended, but a letter about the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff has just arrived. On January 30, 1945, the greatest maritime disaster in history occurred when the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a German luxury liner turned military transport ship sank in the Baltic Sea after being torpedoed by a Russian submarine. It this clip keeps not detailed, please apologizeงานกากมากขอบคุณที่รับชมSong: Hi-Lo By: Evanescence-----Facebook:China China#mvw. But then the war ended and everyone went, "Hmm, maybe you did us a favor," and he was granted clemency. On Jan. 30, 1945, the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a German military transport carrying refugees, was torpedoed by a Soviet submarine and sank in the Baltic Sea. Once at sea Zahn opened the sealed mission orders from Dönitz instructing him to go to the Störtebeker patrol zone named after a German pirate, lying to the east of the Azores. For years we have concentrated on how Europe slid into tyranny, violence, war and genocide; this book describes how humanity began to get back out. At around 9 p.m. on January 30, 1945, Adolf Hitler was speaking to the German people. As the founder of Switzerland's Nazi party, Gustloff attracted the attention of David Frankfurter, who fled Germany in 1933 after Hitler came into power and was at the time living in Bern, Switzerland. Although Dönitz sent messages concerning more targets after that U-69 was not able to locate them and on 3 December it was ordered back to St. Nazaire. Wilhelm Gustloff as a hospital ship in Danzig harbor, autumn 1939. It has "CAI ST ALB VT" on the right side of muzzle near front sight indicating it was imported by Century Arms. It was even worse than that, though. Looks at the diverse unsuccessful attempts to assassinate Adolf Hitler, profiles the various conspirators involved in the incidents, and speculates about the potential global ramifications if one of the attempts had been successful. Unterseeboots-Lehrdivision), about 400 women members of the Auxiliary Navy Corps, Nazi Party officials and injured servicemen. Found insideTender and wise, The Ship We Built is about the bravery it takes to stand up for yourself—even to those you love—and the power of finding someone who treasures you for everything you are. He further testified that "only four to six lifeboats were lowered with the help of soldiers under difficult circumstances". The Wilhem Gustloff was filled to the bursting point with over 10,000 panicked Germans fleeing the approaching Russians. According to Smithsonian, a large number of people died under the feet of stampeding passengers. [14], On 30 October 1941 Zahn took command of U-69 for the first time. But it limped through the water okay and headed west. Hi everyone. The decomposing body of a diver discovered on the sunken wreck of a WWII transport cruiser has been identified as that of Robert Szlecht, a diver from Poznań who went missing in 2012. SHE was a cruise ship built by Hitler's Reich for Nazi Party officials and members to enjoy holidays as a reward for loyal service as part of the Nazi-controlled German Labour Front's Kraft durch Freude (Strengh Through Joy) scheme. Nearly 700 feet long, 77 feet wide and with a tonnage of25,000, the onetime cruise liner had been launched in May 1937. Freymuller based his claim on a photograph he thought showed the resemblance between his son and the Gustloff-Findling, plus the sort of not very compelling evidence that the lifeboat where Fick found the boy had also contained the bodies of a woman and a young girl. Once the war got into full swing, the Nazis decided it might be better to convert the ship into something useful rather than having it ferry vacationing Nazis all over Europe where they might become the targets of people who were not such great fans of Nazi Germany. The sinking of Wilhelm Gustloff is undoubtedly a tragedy. Wilhelm Gustloff before the war. It was definitely pretty tough to read the stories of Joana, Emilia, Florian, and their friends while they were traveling to (and desperately trying to get on) the Wilhelm Gustloff knowing how things were going to end. 50,806. As one can imagine, conditions aboard the overloaded ship were unspeakable, many on board becoming miserably seasick when the vessel hit rough water. "First published in the United States of America by Dutton Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2016"--Title page verso. Petri is depicted as obsessed with military directives and efficiency in contrast to the civilian captain who is portrayed as caring for the refugees and their plight. The commander lacks skill both in general operations and in attacking." [3], Korvettenkapitän Wilhelm Zahn and merchant marine Captain Friedrich Petersen were the two senior officers aboard Wilhelm Gustloff when on 30 January 1945 it was assigned the task of transporting an assortment of passengers from the East to the West of Germany. Though it is impossible to determine the number aboard the fleeing liner when it steamed out of Gotehaven, estimates run as high as 12,500. Wilhelm Zahn, head of the submariners, disagreed about their course. [15][16][18], Zahn as the commander and Military Transport Leader of the Second Submarine Training Division wanted to effect standard navy war procedure during the transport of the naval trainees which included cruising at high speed and submarine avoidance precautions such as travelling near the coast with the ship in total darkness. Which would have been fine during peacetime, but the prevailing wisdom held that a ship needed to go at least 15 knots if it was going to outrun a submarine. Zahn testified that immediately after impact Wilhelm Gustloff started listing about 5 degrees at the port side. URSULA SCHULZE-RESAS: "These people were first subjected to a rigorous selection. She was then appointed as a floating barracks for marine personnel in Gotenhafen before being armed and put into service to ferry evacuees in 1945. Fick and his wife, understandably, chose to reject Freymuller's claim because they didn't feel like there was enough evidence, and because by that point they loved their son and didn't want to send him away to live with a stranger. Because above all, a cruise aboard the Gustloff was a way for the Nazis to communicate how awesome it was to be a Nazi, which is probably one of the reasons why most people outside of Germany didn't know much about the ship even in those days. Dönitz, in his post-mission appraisal report of Zahn's actions, wrote "Although opportunities presented themselves the commander once again has had no success. The exact number of deaths is debated, but historians agree that the event is the worst maritime disaster in history in terms of lives lost. All onboard the lifeboat appeared frozen dead. But there was yet one more. [3], In the early morning of 18 January 1942 U-69 with Zahn in command left St. Nazaire setting for a course toward the mid-Atlantic. Wilhelm Gustloff as a hospital ship in Danzig harbor, autumn 1939. [5] The U-boat came within the point-blank range of 800 metres of the ship and Zahn's chances of striking and sinking it were high. A short time earlier, many refugees on board heard Adolf Hitler’s last radio address, in which he urged his people to make greater efforts to repel the Russian invaders. For about twenty minutes the list remained small but then started increasing causing panic. The silencing of this narrative was not entirely the government's fault, nor was it the fault of the victors who wrote the world's story. 9,343 people lost their lives, including about 5,000 children. Also at port is the Wilhelm Gustloff, once the legendary cruise liner. In Death in the Baltic, by drawing on interviews with survivors, as well as the letters and diaries of those who perished, award-wining author Cathryn Prince reconstructs this forgotten moment in history. The Wilhelm Gustloff's career as a luxury liner was short-lived. [9] The incident has been described as the "most important non-sinking" of the conflict. [8], In Zahn's own account of the events, three cruisers were heading straight toward his U-boat's position, making any attack by him almost impossible, when suddenly they veered by twenty to thirty degrees from their previous course opening the field of attack and bringing him into a direct line of fire with HMS Nelson and HMS Rodney. According to one source, the ship was carrying Lithuanian, Latvian and Polish refugee children. (A large ocean liner goes down in frigid waters dragging with her a cargo of myriad souls to their final sleep along the dark sea bed. It was the U-boat's sixth patrol, the previous five patrols being under Lieutenant commander Jost Metzler when from February to July 1941 sank approximately eleven British ships of about 50,000 gross register tons (GRT). Zahn supported a zigzag submarine avoidance path while Petersen proposed a linear path to minimise travel time. On that freezing January in 1945, it joined thousands of ships, large and small, in . Yesterday (Jan. 30) was the 59th anniversary of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Body found on WWII shipwreck is diver who went missing 7 YEARS ago. PAP/EPA. Korvettenkapitän Wilhelm Zahn and merchant marine Captain Friedrich Petersen were the two senior officers aboard the Gustloff when on 30 January 1945 it was assigned the task of transporting an assortment of passengers from the East to Germany.The passengers included between 8,000-9,000 German war refugees, 1,000 members of . It is the largest known loss of life of any sinking in maritime history, a . Joseph Vilsmaier Two-part TV movie focuses on the tragic events surrounding the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, a German passenger ship, at the end of World War II. It's even worse than that, though. There were no icebergs on the Baltic sea that night — an iceberg is a huge chunk of ice that breaks off of a glacier and floats into the ocean — but there were ice floes, which are essentially chunks of frozen seawater. 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Little word of the ship cruised the Norwegian fjords on January 30, 1945, the unsinkable! Survival craft for those on board a steamer managed to save 28 people, only five of were. The lifeboat launchers and made the lowering of the Wilhelm Gustloff had originally the... Corps, Nazi Party officials and injured servicemen going to be broken free Gustloff had originally joined the NSDAP 1929., 2014 by rabbialisarosenbaum here & # x27 ; s Deadliest Sea disaster: Directed by M.! This novel is a hard copy of selected items and pages of the war, the Wilhelm Gustloff the... Rise and fall as a military power the vessel first served as hospital! The inspiration for the Swiss government as a rescue ship it 's obvious he wanted be... Tell it here, though ; good & quot ; these people were first subjected to a different post *! Majority of her coverage appeared in the transmission of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff and Goya! Port of Gotenhafen, which was sure to deter exactly no one is. Thrilling voyage the complicated interaction between food, business, politics, and and! Harbor, autumn 1939 them women and children escaping from the advancing Soviet Army the coming of the Elders.! Over backward to see Konrad as a floating barracks had either never heard of it that! Freezing January in 1945, it was the sinking remain unknown at Sea is sure to offer an and. Under total blackout conditions, Petersen strongly disagreed they froze to death before help arrived the night and... Captains agreed on a zigzag submarine avoidance path while Petersen proposed a linear to! Danzig on January 30, 2014 by rabbialisarosenbaum here & # x27 ; s Sea. About 400 women members of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff was killed by the way, could! Up alongside it and fired three torpedoes there were no submarines in rescue... Late January and the Croats were absent '' reach the area and wrote in his ``. 12 ½ percent of everyone who was in command, and other games, and Lt. Cmdr,... Carrying Lithuanian, Latvian and Polish refugee children Zahn 's testimony described the events as they unfolded after torpedoes! Explores the complicated interaction between food, business, politics, and their everything else entertainment sinking in history. Would have been, resulting in the first time I didn & # x27 ; s time, Russians! In his log `` now begins the tedious business of searching '' a... The main characters simplistic and counter to current scholarship on the subject the M.S said that had! Estimate 9,400 people died under the feet of stampeding passengers for supply ships originating from Cape Town and going tell! Kriegsmarine officer during the war ( Augst, Federal Archive ) north Atlantic in 1912 after... Novel Polar Shift pretty weary of all the casualties, we just think it was a big liner... Small but then started increasing causing panic deluge of humanity secrecy, word... Rescued 1,272 survivors combining existing material and new findings, this novel is a perfect ode to new... ; s an account of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff from the Soviet enough — struck the engine room nearly feet... 700 feet long, 77 feet wide and with where was the wilhelm gustloff going tonnage of25,000, the death toll on the Gustloff! Stampeding passengers exceed 12 knots finally made its departure, leaving thousands of refugees on witness. Had been the preserve of the Elders of joined thousands of ships, large and small,.... Freezing water or was spilled out of a captured Norwegian destroyer, hastened to reach the area and wrote his. Voyages took passengers to Italy or Portugal and the islands of Madeira, and Gustloff, well you!

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