Cap Arcona

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Partial model of Cap Arcona (before 1940).
Partial model of Cap Arcona (before 1940)
Career (Germany) Weimar Republic Merchant Marine War Ensign of Germany 1938-1945
Builder: Blohm and Voss shipyard, Hamburg for Hamburg-Südamerikanische Dampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft (HSDG)
Laid down: 1926
Launched: May 14, 1927
In service: October 29, 1927 (maiden voyage)
Homeport: Hamburg, Germany
Fate: Sunk on May 3, 1945. Wreck dismantled in 1949.
General characteristics
Displacement: 11,500 Long Tons (12,880 US tons)
Gross tonnage: 27,561 BRT, 15,011 NRT
Length: 205.9 meters (675.52 ft)
196.2 m (floating)
Beam: 25.8 m (84.6 ft)
Draught: 12.8 m (8.7 m)
Propulsion: Two steam turbines, two propellers. 17,500 kW
Speed: Service: 20 knots, Hamburg-Buenos Aires in 15 days
Capacity: 1,315 (1927)
Complement: 475

The Cap Arcona was a large German luxury ocean liner, formerly of the Hamburg-South America line. It was sunk in 1945, with the loss of many lives while laden with prisoners from concentration camps.

Contents

[edit] History

The 27,561 gross ton Cap Arcona, named after Cape Arkona on the island of Rügen in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, was launched in 1927. It was considered one of the most beautiful ships of the time. It was the largest German ship on the South American run. It carried upper-class travelers and steerage-class emigrants, mostly to South America.[1]

In 1940, it was taken over by the Kriegsmarine and used in the Baltic Sea as an accommodation ship. In 1942 it was used as a stand-in for the doomed Titanic in the German film version of the disaster. In early 1945, the Kriegsmarine reactivated it for Operation Hannibal, and it was used to transport 25,795 German soldiers and civilians from East Prussia to western Germany.[2][3]

[edit] Situation before the British air-raid

In the last few weeks of the war in Europe, the Swedish diplomat Count Folke Bernadotte, vice-president of the Red Cross, was organising the removal of Danish and Norwegian prisoners from German concentration camps to neutral Sweden — a scheme known as the White Buses. In practice, the scheme also included other nationalities.

Aerial shot of the Neuengamme concentration camp taken by British aviation on April 16, 1945.
Aerial shot of the Neuengamme concentration camp taken by British aviation on April 16, 1945.

On April 26, 1945, the Cap Arcona was loaded with prisoners from the Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg and was brought into the Bay of Lübeck along with two smaller ships, Athen and Thielbek.

On April 30, 1945, two Swedish ships Magdalena and Lillie Matthiessen sailed from Lübeck, the first with 223 western European prisoners, for the most part French-speaking, who were transferred from the Thielbek to the Magdalena, and the second with 225 women from Ravensbrück on board for transportation to hospitals in Sweden. This first rescue operation possibly used information from British Intelligence, indicating possible knowledge of the prisoners on board.

On May 2, 1945, Second Army reached the towns of Lübeck and Wismar. No.6 Commando, 1st Special Service Brigade commanded by Brigadier Derek Mills-Roberts, and 11th Armoured Division commanded by Major-General George P. B. Roberts entered Lübeck without resistance. The International Red Cross informed George P. B. Roberts that 7,000-8,000 prisoners were on board ships in Bay of Lübeck.[4]

Bay of Lübeck, three kilometers from Neustadt (left at the top): Position of the sinking of Cap Arcona.
Bay of Lübeck, three kilometers from Neustadt (left at the top): Position of the sinking of Cap Arcona.

[edit] Attacks

On May 3, 1945, four days after Hitler's suicide but four days before the unconditional surrender of Germany, the Cap Arcona, the Thielbek, and the passenger liner SS Deutschland, possibly converted to a hospital ship but not marked as such, were attacked by RAF Typhoons of 83 Group of the 2nd Tactical Air Force commanded by Sir Arthur Coningham as part of general attacks on shipping in the Baltic.

Typhoon 1 B with four 20 mm cannons.
Typhoon 1 B with four 20 mm cannons.

The attacks were by No. 184 Squadron, based at RAF Hustedt, led by Squadron Leader Derek L. Stevenson, by No. 193 Squadron, based in Ahlhorn (Großenkneten), led by Squadron Leader D. M. Taylor, by No. 263 Squadron, based in RAF Ahlhorn, led by Squadron Leader Martin Trevor Scott Rumbold, by No. 197 Squadron RAF, led by Squadron Leader K. J. Harding also at Ahlhorn, and by No. 198 Squadron based at Plantlünne led by Group Captain Johnny Baldwin. These Hawker Typhoon Mark 1B fighter-bombers used High Explosive 60 lb rocket projectiles, bombs, and 20 mm cannons.

Unknown to the RAF[5], the ships were carrying between 7,000-8,000 prisoners from the German concentration camps in Neuengamme, Stutthof and Mittelbau-Dora, half of whom were Russian and Polish prisoners-of-war, along with others from 24 nations, including French, Danish, and Dutch.[6]

The survivors of the attack who reached the shore were shot by SS troops, although 350 prisoners managed to escape the massacre. Allan Wyse, formerly of 193 Fighter Squadron, said "We used our cannon fire at the chaps in the water … we shot them up with 20 mm cannons in the water. Horrible thing, but we were told to do it and we did it. That's war."[7] Among the survivors was Erwin Geschonneck, who later became a notable German actor, and whose story was made into a film in 1982.

About 490 of the guards, SS, and crew were rescued by German boats.

Photos of the burning ships, listed as Deutschland, Thielbek, and Cap Arcona, and survivors swimming in the cold Baltic Sea (seven degrees Celsius), were taken on a reconnaissance mission over the Bay of Lübeck by F-6 aircraft of the USAAF's 161st Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron around 5:00 PM, shortly after the attack.[citation needed] The capsized hulk of the Cap Arcona later drifted ashore, and the beached wreck was broken up in 1949.

For weeks after the attack, the bodies of victims washed ashore, where they were collected and buried in a single mass grave at Neustadt in Holstein.[8] For nearly thirty years, parts of skeletons continued to wash ashore, until the last find, by a twelve-year-old boy, in 1971.[9]

According to documents at the Dutch Institute of War Documentation (NIOD), the government of Sweden had warned the British government that prisoners were aboard the ships.[citation needed]

Memorial to Cap Arcona victims [2] at Neustadt in Holstein.
Memorial to Cap Arcona victims [2] at Neustadt in Holstein.

The prisoners were of 28 different nationalities: American, Belgian, Canadian, Czechoslovakian, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Luxembourger, Norwegian, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swiss, Ukrainian, Yugoslavian and others.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ http://www.arteprintas.ch/postkarten/caparcona.jpg
  2. ^ Williams, David, Wartime Disasters at Sea, Patrick Stephens Ltd., Nr Yeovil, Somerset, UK, 1997, pp.235-36.
  3. ^ Koberger, Jr., Charles W., Steel Ships, Iron Crosses, and Refugees, Praeger, NY, 1989, p. 87.
  4. ^ Noel Till, Report on Investigations, WO 309/1592
  5. ^ From the Till report of June 1945: "The Intelligence Officer with 83 Group RAF has admitted on two occasions - first to Lt H. F. Ansell of this Team (when it was confirmed by a wing commander present) and on a second occasion to the Investigating Officer when he was accompanied by Lt. H. F. Ansell - that a message was received on 2nd May 1945 that these ships were loaded with KZ prisoners but that, although there was ample time to warn the pilots of the planes who attacked these ships on the following day, by some oversight the message was never passed on...
    From the facts and from the statement volunteered by the RAF Intelligence Officer, it appears that the primary responsibility for this great loss of life must fall on the British RAF personnel who failed to pass to the pilots concerned the message they received concerning the presence of KZ prisoners on board these ships".
  6. ^ Welcome to the Imperial War Museum : The sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, 30 January 1945: the greatest maritime disaster in history
  7. ^ China Daily, 2000-03-07.
  8. ^ Flemish Belgian Web site. [1]
  9. ^ Günther Schwarberg: Angriffsziel "Cap Arcona", Steidl Verlag, 1998 Göttingen.

[edit] Sources

  • Roy Nesbit, "Cap Arcona: atrocity or accident?". Aeroplane Monthly, June 1984
  • Benjamin Jacobs and Eugene Pool, The 100-Year Secret: Britain's Hidden World War II Massacre. The Lyons Press, October 2004. ISBN 1-59228-532-5.
  • Benjamin Jacobs, "The Dentist of Auschwitz", University Press of Kentucky, Reprinted April 2001, ISBN 0813190126, chapters 17, 18.
  • Günther Schwarberg: Angriffsziel "Cap Arcona", Steidl Verlag, 1998 Göttingen, ISBN 3-88243-590-9
  • Lawrence Bond, "Typhoons' Last Storm" documentary film 2000
  • Drawing
  • Wilhelm Lange, Mythos und Wirklichkeit - Eine "publikumswirksame" Präsentation der Cap-Arcona-Katastrophe vom 3. Mai 1945 (page 27) 2/2000, in Schiff und Zeit, Panorama maritim N° 52

[edit] External links