Bizarre WW2 Shipwrecks WORSE Than The Titanic

The Gustloff

The ship’s namesake was a German-born Swiss and a nasty piece of work who led a small Nazi Party in Switzerland. He and others agitated pressed, threatened, spoke, and politicked for Hitler in the small mountain country, hoping to take over Switzerland from within. In 1936, Gustloff was shot and killed by David Frankfurter, a young Jewish man from Yugoslavia who had begun his college education in Germany in 1931. Frankfurter witnessed the rise of the Nazis to power and saw the hateful changes that had come over Germany in a short time. In 1934, Frankfurter moved to Switzerland to continue his education. In Switzerland, he worked to ensure that the Swiss, especially the Jews of Switzerland, knew what life under the Nazis was like. In 1936, seeing Nazis in the streets in small but growing numbers, Frankfurter went to Gustloff’s house and killed him with a gun he had bought shortly before. Frankfurter was given a life sentence and spent the war in a Swiss prison, but was pardoned just before the end of the war and lived until 1982.

At his funeral in Germany, Hitler promised Gustloff’s widow that her husband would be remembered with a notable honor. A year later, a new cruise ship, which was supposed to be named after the Fuhrer, was named after Gustloff. From 1937 to 1939 and the outbreak of WWII, the Gustloff was the flagship of the “Kraft durch Freude” or “Strength through Joy” ships, one of the few nice things the Nazis did. The “KdF” or “kah-day-eff” was an organization designed to bring Germans together in recreational activities and low-cost vacations for those who could not afford it. However, high-ranking Nazis and their friends who could afford it went on the cheap, too. The KdF ships took primarily working Germans to the tropical Azores, Canaries, and Madeira islands, among other places in warmer European climes, and were quite popular. Tens of thousands people had taken pleasure cruises aboard the Gustloff when WWII began.

For over a year, the Gustloff served as a hospital ship, but fears of the more numerous Allied surface fleet and Allied submarines caused her to be docked in the port of Gydnia, Poland (known to the Nazis as “Gotenhafen”). There the ship acted as a barracks for submarine crews undergoing training.

By January 30th, 1945, Germany was in full-retreat and Soviet troops had already entered the easternmost German state, East Prussia, passing south of Gdynia. Along the Polish and northeastern German coast, the Nazis held the Soviets back, but were in danger of being cut-off against the Baltic Sea if they didn't retreat quickly.

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Scriptwriter:Matthew Gaskill

Video Editor & Motion Graphics: Aditya

Voice-over Artist: Lian Heringman

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