Dampfschiff General von Steuben
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

SS ''General von Steuben'' was a German passenger liner and later an armed transport ship of the German Navy that was sunk in the Baltic Sea during World War II. She was launched in 1923 as ''München'' (after the German city, sometimes spelled ''Muenchen''), renamed ''General von Steuben'' in 1930 (after the famous German officer of the American Revolutionary War), and renamed ''Steuben'' in 1938. During World War II, the ship served as a troop accommodation vessel, and from 1944 as an armed transport. On 10 February 1945, while evacuating German military personnel, wounded soldiers, and civilian refugees during Operation Hannibal, the ship was torpedoed by the Soviet submarine ''S-13'' and sank. An estimated 4,000 people lost their lives in the sinking.


Early history

In 1923, ''München'' became the first German trans-Atlantic passenger liner to be launched, and also the first to enter New York Harbor, since the end of World War I. She arrived in July 1923 on her maiden transatlantic voyage."New York City, NY (Hudson River) Liner MUENCHEN Fire"
''Associated Press'', 11 February 1930


1930 fire and sinking

On 11 February 1930, after ''München'' docked in New York City and discharged passengers and most of her crew from a voyage from
Bremen Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...
, Germany, a fire broke out in a paint locker on board and quickly spread to another storage hold. The massive fire and explosion resulted in a five-alarm fire and all of the city's fire equipment was sent to the burning ship. The fire could not be controlled and the ship sank next to the wharf where it had docked. In one of the largest shipping salvage efforts of its time, ''München'' was raised, towed to a
dry dock A dry dock (sometimes drydock or dry-dock) is a narrow basin or vessel that can be flooded to allow a load to be floated in, then drained to allow that load to come to rest on a dry platform. Dry docks are used for the construction, maintenance, ...
, repaired, and returned to service. Shortly afterwards, the ship's owner renamed her ''General von Steuben.''


World War II

The ship, now called ''Steuben'', was commissioned in 1939 as a ''
Kriegsmarine The (, ) was the navy of Germany from 1935 to 1945. It superseded the Imperial German Navy of the German Empire (1871–1918) and the inter-war (1919–1935) of the Weimar Republic. The was one of three official branches, along with the a ...
'' accommodation ship. In 1944, she was pressed into service as an armed transport ship, taking German troops to eastern Baltic ports and returning wounded troops to Kiel.


Operation Hannibal

Along with the and numerous other vessels, ''Steuben'' was part of the largest evacuation by sea in modern times. The Operation Hannibal evacuations surpassed the British evacuation at
Dunkirk Dunkirk (french: Dunkerque ; vls, label=French Flemish, Duunkerke; nl, Duinkerke(n) ; , ;) is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France.Karl Dönitz Karl Dönitz (sometimes spelled Doenitz; ; 16 September 1891 24 December 1980) was a German admiral who briefly succeeded Adolf Hitler as head of state in May 1945, holding the position until the dissolution of the Flensburg Government follo ...
realized that Germany was soon to be defeated. Wishing to save his submariners, he radioed a coded message on 23 January 1945 to the Baltic Sea port of Gotenhafen (the Polish city and port of Gdynia under German occupation) to evacuate to the West, under the code name ''Operation Hannibal''. Submariners at that point were schooled and housed in ships floating in the Baltic ports, most of them at Gotenhafen. Among the ships were , , ''Hansa'', and ''Wilhelm Gustloff''. Notwithstanding the losses suffered during the operation, over two million people were evacuated ahead of the Red Army's advance into East Prussia and Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland). In the winter of 1945,
East Prussia East Prussia ; german: Ostpreißen, label=Low Prussian; pl, Prusy Wschodnie; lt, Rytų Prūsija was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 187 ...
n refugees headed west, away from the city of Königsberg and ahead of the Soviet advance into the Baltic States and East Prussia. Thousands fled to the Baltic seaport at Pillau (now Baltiysk, Russia), hoping to board ships that would carry them to the relative safety of Western Germany. ''Steuben'' was part of the fleet sent for the purpose.


Final voyage

On 9 February 1945, the 14,660-ton ''Steuben'' sailed from Pillau, near Königsberg on the Baltic coast, for Swinemünde (now Świnoujście, Poland). Official reports listed 2,800 wounded German soldiers; 800 civilians; 100 returning soldiers; 270 navy medical personnel (including doctors, nurses and auxiliaries); 12 nurses from Pillau; 64 crew for the ship's anti-aircraft guns, 61 naval personnel, radio operators, signal men, machine operators and administrators, plus 160 merchant navy crewmen, for a total of 4,267 people on board. Due to the rapid evacuation ahead of the Red Army's advance, many Eastern German and Baltic refugees boarded the ''Steuben'' without being registered, increasing the number of those on board to approximately 5,200. Just before midnight on 9 February, the Soviet submarine ''S-13'', commanded by
Alexander Marinesko Alexander Ivanovich Marinesko (russian: Александр Иванович Маринеско, uk, Олександр Іванович Марiнеско, ro, Alexandru Marinescu; – 25 November 1963) was a Soviet naval officer and, during ...
, fired two torpedoes 14 seconds apart at the ''Steuben''; both hit her
starboard Port and starboard are nautical terms for watercraft and aircraft, referring respectively to the left and right sides of the vessel, when aboard and facing the bow (front). Vessels with bilateral symmetry have left and right halves which are ...
bow, just below the bridge, where many of the crew were sleeping. Most were killed by the impact of the torpedoes. According to survivors, the ''Steuben'' sank by the bow and listed severely to starboard before taking her final plunge, within about 20 minutes of the torpedo impacts. An estimated 4,500 people died in the sinking. German torpedo boat ''T-196'' hastily pulled up beside ''Steuben'' as she sank; its crew pulled about 300 survivors straight from ''Steubens slanting decks and brought them to Kolberg in Pomerania (today
Kołobrzeg Kołobrzeg ( ; csb, Kòlbrzég; german: Kolberg, ), ; csb, Kòlbrzég , is a port city in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in north-western Poland with about 47,000 inhabitants (). Kołobrzeg is located on the Parsęta River on the south coast o ...
, Poland). A total of 650 people were rescued from the ''Steuben''.


Wreck

The ''Steuben'' wreck was found and identified in May 2004 by Polish Navy
hydrographical Hydrography is the branch of applied sciences which deals with the measurement and description of the physical features of oceans, seas, coastal areas, lakes and rivers, as well as with the prediction of their change over time, for the primary ...
vessel ORP ''Arctowski''. Pictures and graphics appeared in a 2005 ''
National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely ...
'' article. The wreck lies on its port side at about in depth, and the hull reaches up to in depth. The ship was mostly intact when it was found. In July 2021, German news magazine ''
Der Spiegel ''Der Spiegel'' (, lit. ''"The Mirror"'') is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of 695,100 copies, it was the largest such publication in Europe in 2011. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...
'' reported that the wreck had been plundered and severely damaged in the process. The wreck is an official war grave, and entering it is illegal. Due to international treaties, the wreck remains property of the German state, but Poland is responsible for its protection. Over the past decade,
looting Looting is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war, natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting. ...
has become one of the biggest reasons for the deteriorating condition of shipwrecks in the Baltic sea.


See also

* * ''
Iosif Stalin Iosif may refer to: People *Iosif Amusin, Soviet historian *Iosif Anisim, Romanian sprint canoer *Iosif Blaga, Romanian literary theorist and politician *Iosif Bobulescu, Romanian bishop *Iosif Capotă, Romanian anti-communist resistance fighter ...
'' * '' Goya'' * * ''
Thielbek A number of steamships have carried the name ''Thielbek'', including: * * Ship names {{Short pages monitor