The Wilhelm Gustloff Stiftung (Wilhelm Gustloff Foundation) was a state-owned trust set up by the government of

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

in 1933. Named after Wilhelm Gustloff, a leader of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

's Swiss branch who was later assassinated, it was funded by money and property confiscated from German Jews.

Overview

The Foundation ran the ''Gustloff Werke'' ("Gustloff Factories"), a group of businesses confiscated from their Jewish owners or partners. By 1938 it had been organized into five major branches.

Factories

Gustloff Werk Weimar was formerly ''Bautzener Waggon- und Maschinenfabrik AG'', a branch of Simson & Co. Suhl and was situated in Weimar, Thüringen. The company originally made wagons and tools. Under the new management it expanded into making ammunition crates, ammunition trailers, light infantry mortars (50mm caliber), anti-tank artillery (50mm, 75mm and 88mm caliber), anti-aircraft cannon (20mm caliber), military vehicles, and machine tools. It also assembled complete

Kar98 The Karabiner 98 kurz (; "carbine 98 short"), often abbreviated Karabiner 98k, Kar98k or K98k and also sometimes incorrectly referred to as a K98 (a K98 is a Polish carbine and copy of the Kar98a), is a bolt-action rifle chambered for the 7.92×57 ...

Mauser rifles from component parts made by Gustloff Werk Suhl and subcontractors from Thuringia and Saxony (called the ''Sachsengruppe'', or "Saxon Group"). It was renamed ''Gustloff Werk Weimar (Fritz Sauckel Werk)'' after Fritz Sauckel, the '' Gauleiter'' and ''Reichsregent'' of Thüringen. Originally employing German laborers, wartime manpower demands allowed them to be replaced with forced and slave laborers. It ran Gustloff-Werke II, a satellite camp of Buchenwald concentration camp that used slave labor to make G43 self-loading rifles. Gustloff Werk Suhl, or ''Waffenfabrik Suhl'', was formerly Simson & Co. Suhl, located in

Suhl Suhl () is a city in Thuringia, Germany, located SW of Erfurt, NE of Würzburg and N of Nuremberg. With its 37,000 inhabitants, it is the smallest of the six urban districts within Thuringia. Together with its northern neighbour-town Zella- ...

, Thuringen. They made small arms, motorcycles, and bicycles and were the official arms manufacturer for the Weimar Republic. It was confiscated from the Simson family in 1936. In 1939 rifle production was shifted to ''Gustloff Werk Weimar'' so ''Waffenfabrik Suhl'' could concentrate on

MG34 The MG 34 (shortened from German: ''Maschinengewehr 34'', or "machine gun 34") is a German recoil-operated air-cooled general-purpose machine gun, first tested in 1929, introduced in 1934, and issued to units in 1936. It introduced an entirely ne ...

and MG42 machinegun production. All finished rifle parts and components were sold to the Army, who sent them to supply depots as spares. Gustloff Werk Hirtenberg (also known as '' Otto Eberhardt Patronenfabrik'') was located in Hirtenberg, Austria. It was a cartridge manufacturer. The Nazi Party invested heavily in modernizing and expanding its facilities. Gustloff Werk Meuselwitz or ''Maschinenfabrik Meuselwitz'' was formerly ''Heymer & Pilz GmbH Maschinenfabriken'' situated in Meuselwitz, Thuringen, Germany. It was a machine tool maker that had been founded in 1910 and was confiscated in 1939. Thüringen-haus, previously ''Zweigniederlassung'' (German > "Branch Office"), was situated in Berlin. This was the foreign sales office.

References

{{Authority control Germany in World War II Unfree labor during World War II Economy of Nazi Germany