Built as a passenger ship under yard No 628 by the Vulcan-Werke A.G.in Stettin-Bredow for the German Government. (Reichsverkehrs Ministerium)
17 March 1926 launched as the HANSESTADT DANZIG. Two sisters the PREUSSEN and TANNENBERG.
Tonnage 2,225 gross, 922 net, 1.429 dwt, dim.85.04 x 11.7 x 5.85m. (draught), length bpp.80.3m.
Powered by two MAN four tact diesel engines, manufactured by builder, 6,390 hp, twin shafts, speed 15 knots.
Passenger accommodation for 1,403 passengers during day sailings and during the night sailing could carry 1,158 passengers and during excursions in the haff (bay), 2,061 passengers, crew 67.
Could take also take a large number of bikes and cars.
14 July 1926 completed, homeport Swinemunde (Swinoujscie). Managed by the Norddeutscher Lloyd Bremen.
She was the first ferry in service in East Prussia and used in the fast ferry service between Szczecin, Pillau (now Baltiysk) and Köningsberg (now Kaliningrad).
1933 Lengthened at the Oderwerke in Stettin, tonnage 2,431 gross, length 93.6m
But also used for short cruises.
August 1939 taken over by the German Navy and refitted in a minelayer.
Armament 2 – 8.8 cm L/45 AA guns, four machine guns.
Could carry about 360 mines.
Crew 83.
Commissioned under command of the ex submarine commander of the First World War Captain Hans Howaldt, but he was replaced after two weeks by Captain Wilhelm Schroeder.
07 April 1940 she sailed from Travemünde with the icebreaker STETTIN and the 13 attack flotilla in Operation Weserübung with the troops of the II Battalion Infantry regiment 308 of the 198 Infantry Division for the occupation of Copenhagen, Denmark.
09 April at 05.00 a.m. landed the troops there.
The next day the HANSESTADT DANZIG transported the 11 Battalion of the Infantry Regiment 308 to Rønne, on the Danish island of Bornholm.
January 1941 she and other ships of the German Navy laid the minefield Pomerania in the North Sea and in June 1941 the minefield Apolda in the Baltic.
09 July 1941 she sailed together with her two sisters the PREUSSEN and TANNENBERG east of the southern point of the Swedish island Öland in position 56 15N 16 43 E in a Swedish minefield laid down by the Swedish Navy on a request of the German Government, to block Soviet ships to use the Öland Sound. The Swedish navy informed the German Navy the position of the minefield but the information was not passed on to the three ships.
The Swedish minesweeper SANDÖN stationed outside the minefield warned the German ships of the dangers but the Commander of the three German ships continued his course and entered the minefield.
All three ships hit a mine and all three ships were sunk.
The HANSESTADT DANZIG lost nine crew members.
In the German trial afterwards on this accident only the OKM officer responsible for not passing on the position of the minefield to the ships was sentenced to one year imprisonment, but he got parole till the war ended.
1952 The wreck of the HANSESTADT DANZIG was salvage by the Swedish salvage company Intermarin and scrapped.
Danzig 1938 25pf + 10pf sg279, scottB31
Source: Norddeutscher Lloyd Bremen by Edwin Drechsel. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hansestadt_Danzig_(1926)