The adventurous story of the "Gorch Fock" (I)
The "Gorch Fock" predecessor "Gorch Fock" (I) was built in Hamburg in 1933, later sunk and raised again. Today she is a museum ship in the port of Stralsund.
Anyone who hears the ship name "Gorch Fock" in Germany usually thinks of the well-known training ship of the German Navy, which was built in 1958 and has its home port in Kiel. What many do not know:There is a predecessor with an eventful past - the "Gorch Fock" (I). The sailing ship was built in 1933 by Blohm + Voss in Hamburg on behalf of the Reichsmarine in just 100 days. The "Gorch Fock" (I) was launched on May 3, 1933 and was used as a training ship until 1939. During the Second World War she served as a residential ship at various locations, most recently in Stralsund.
Sunk, lifted and back to Stralsund
When the end of the war became apparent, the ship was stripped and decommissioned. On the afternoon of April 30, 1945, the crew sank the "Gorch Fock" (I) in the Strelasund. In 1947 the Soviets raise the ship in the fourth attempt and repair it in Rostock and Wismar until 1950. It then sailed the world's oceans under the name "Towarischtsch" as a training ship, came under the Ukrainian flag in 1992, was brought to Wilhelmshaven in 1999 and there became one of the major attractions of the "EXPO 2000 at sea". In 2003, Tall-Ship Friends e.V. bought the ship and transferred it to Stralsund, where it was extensively restored.
"Gorch Fock" renovation costs millions
Today the "Gorch Fock" (I) is a museum ship in the Stralsund harbor. The ship would again urgently need to be renovated so that it remains buoyant in the long term. But the club doesn't have the money for it. According to an expert report, around seven million euros would have to be invested. In November 2018, the Stralsund city parliament decides to buy the ship and wants to pay 950,000 euros to the association. The state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is to provide financial support for the renovation. The club will continue to be the operator of the ship.
"Gorch Fock" (I) part of a family of six ships
The "Gorch Fock" (I) belongs to a family of six sailing training ships, which are not completely identical in construction, but are similar. This also includes the "Gorch Fock II". The other four ships are the "Eagle" (formerly "Horst Wessel"), which now belongs to the US Coast Guard and is in its new home port of New London (USA) nine months a year, the "Sagres" (formerly "Albert Leo Schlageter "), which has sailed under the Portuguese flag as a sail training ship since 1961, and the "Mircea", a Romanian sail training ship. The "Herbert Norkus" was never finished. After the war she was confiscated by the Allies, loaded with poison ammunition in 1947 and sunk in the Skagerrak.
Gorch Fock was actually called Johann Kinau
The "Gorch Fock" (I) and the training ship of the same name, built in 1958, were named after the writer Gorch Fock, whose real name was Johann Kinau. He was born on August 22, 1880 in Hamburg-Finkenwerder and wrote poems and stories in High and Low German. His work "Seefahrt ist not", published in 1912, became a classic of seafaring literature. Kinau died in 1916 in the Battle of the Skagerrak as a sailor on the sinking cruiser "SMS Wiesbaden".