EDITORIALS
GERMAN LOSSES IN WORLD WAR II
The following editorials should not be "misunderstood". They are written not to minimize other losses or to make excuses for an evil regime, Hitler's Third Reich. However, they point out that the German Population also suffered tremendous losses and experienced unimaginable suffering during the war. The suffering and tragedies of the German population during the war was largely ignored in and out of Germany. For decades it was considered politically incorrect for Germans to be portrayed as victims of the war. However, it is now time to bring to the attention of the world the German tragedy under Hitler. The editorials in this section also point out that the behaviour of the allies at times was also questionable.
KARL KURT PREISS
PAST PRESIDENT
CLICK ON ONE OF THE FOLLOWING EDITORIALS TO ENTER
1. THE TRAGEDIES ON THE BALTIC IN THE LAST MONTHS OF WORLD WAR II
2. BETWEEN THE VISTULA AND THE ODER RIVERS: JANUARY/ APRIL 1945
3. DRESDEN
4. HAMBURG
5. BERLIN
THE TRAGEDIES ON THE BALTIC IN THE LAST MONTHS OF WORLD WAR II
THE GERMAN “TITANICS”
THE WILHELM GUSTLOFF
Not too many people German or none German alike have heard about the tragic events of the Wilhelm Gustloff. On January 11, 1945 the Russians launched their long awaited offensive in the east. The Russian armies broke through the thinly held German lines on the Vistula River on a number of points. In the north Marshal Rokossovsky (2 Belorussian Front) overran much of the German provinces of East Prussia and East Pomerania.
As the Russians advanced hundreds of thousands of refugees began to flee west. Some of them fled by land while others boarded anything that could float and tried to escape by sea. Thus, started one of the greatest migrations (some people call it ethnic cleansing) of people in the 20th century.
On January 30, 1945 the Wilhelm Gustloff (a former cruise ship) was loaded with over ten thousand refugees (mostly women and children) and many wounded German soldiers. The ship was attempting to cross the Baltic between the Bay of Danzig and the Danish island of Bornholm. A Russian submarine torpedoed the Liner at 9pm that evening. The vessel sank quickly, taking with her 9,000 (yes nine thousand) passengers and crew – six times more than the number who went down with the Titanic. Just 1,200 survived.
This sinking is the greatest maritime disaster in the annals of the sea.
THE GENERAL STEUBEN
On February 8, 1945 the former luxury liner General Steuben pulled back into the port of Pillau. The ship filled quickly with refugees beyond the loading capacity, fuelled by the rumour that the Russians had broken through the Samland front, and that they were within twelve miles of the town. By midafternoon over two thousand wounded and the same number of refugees had come aboard, in addition to the crew of four hundred.
At about three-thirty in the afternoon tugboats pushed the liner into the open waters of the harbour. Between ten and eleven o’clock that evening the Steuben entered the most dangerous waters between the so-called Stolpe Bank and the Pomeranian coast. This was the stretch where the Gustloff was overtaken by disaster. Midnight passed. At one o’clock a muted explosion rocked the vessel. Shortly after that the ship slowly went down into the sea. The screams of the wounded and the women and children were drowned by the cold Baltic Sea.
No one knows the exact number of people that drowned. However, it is estimated that over three thousand lost their lives.
THE STEAMER GOYA
On the morning of April 16, 1945 a convoy of ships was riding at anchor off Hela. Tens of thousands of refugees and wounded soldiers were shuttled by navy barges to the small flotilla of freighters. Refugees and soldiers were clambering up the loading nets. The ships were filled to capacity, but barge after barge came from the pier packed with people pleading to be taken along. More than seven thousand people were already in the holds of the Goya.
The eight ships of the convoy weight anchor at about seven o’clock. The Goya was the outermost vessel on the starboard side. Four minutes before midnight the convoy was some sixty miles off the Pomeranian coast, opposite the port of Stolp. Suddenly the ship received two torpedo hits, midship and astern. The Goya began to sink immediately. Within three or four minutes she disappeared in the water.
An hour later the shadow of a large convoy ship passed near them, circling constantly because of the submarine danger. This ship saved ninety-eight people; other smaller boats saved some eighty-two other people. Some one hundred and eighty lives have been saved out of seven thousand.
Epilogue:
The expulsion of Germans from the eastern territories and their suffering and tribulations is one of the greatest taboos of post-war history. Their tragedy was largely ignored. It is/was considered politically incorrect for Germans to be portrayed as victims of the war.
Recently the Nobel prize-winning author Günter Grass who in 1990, the year of German reunification, said: “Whoever thinks about Germany should not forget Auschwitz”, has now written a novel called “In Retrogression”. This novel tells the story of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Die Welt said that it was ironic, that a left-winger such as Mr. Grass, broke the mould and ended the silence.
I myself lost a relative on the Steamer Goya and I am not ashamed as a German to tell this story. On the contrary much has been said in the press about German U-boat atrocities in both World Wars. In all fairness, if the above-mentioned sinkings are not atrocities then tell me what is an atrocity?
Many of our club members still remember this expulsion of Germans in the east and the many tragedies that occurred in the last months of World War II.
Karl Kurt Preiss
Past President
References:
Perspectives on Canada
and Germany (Vol.9, No.1, Page 15), "Grass's novel lifts lid on German
Titanic"
(Perspectives is the journal of the German Embassy in Ottawa; www.GermanEmbassyOttawa.org)
I “Es begann an der Weichsel” Juergen Thorwald; Steingrube-Verlag, Stuttgart
II “Das Ende an der Elbe” Juergen Thorwald; Steingrube-Verlag, Stuttgart
** The above two volumes have been condensed into an English version “Defeat in the East”; translated into English by Fred Wieck; BANTAM BOOKS
