ship was sunk by the Soviet submarine S-13 on 30 January 1945 (coincidentally the 50th anniversary of her namesake's birth) in the Baltic Sea while carrying civilian refugees and military personnel from the advancing Red Army. About 9,400 people died, the greatest death toll from the sinking of a single vessel in human history. The disaster remains relatively unknown. In 1933 the Nazi Party created the Wilhelm-Gustloff-Stiftung ("The Wilhelm Gustloff Foundation"), a national corporation funded by properties and wealth confiscated from Jews. It ran the Gustloff Werke ("Gustloff Factories"), a group of businesses that had been confiscated from their Jewish owners or partners. The small arms factory Berlin Suhler Waffen und Fahrzeugwerke was renamed Wilhelm Gustloff Werke in Gustloff's honour in 1939. See also Assassination in Davos, a 1975 Swiss feature film concerning the assassination. Crabwalk – the assassination of Gustloff is an element of the plot of this 2002 novel, even though its main subject is the sinking of the passenger ship named in his memory. Herbert Norkus Horst Wessel List of Nazis who died in the Beer Hall Putsch References Further reading Peter Bollier, 4. Februar 1936: das Attentat auf Wilhelm Gustloff; in: Roland Aergerter (Hrsg.), Politische Attentate des 20. Jahrhunderts, Zürich, NZZ Verlag, 1999 Matthieu Gillabert, La propagande nazie en Suisse, L'affaire Gustloff 1936, Lausanne, Presses polytechniques et universitaires romandes, 2008 Emil Ludwig; Peter O. Chotjewitz; Helmut Kreuzer (Hrsg.), Der Mord in Davos, Herbstein, März, 1986 Roger Weston: Fatal Return, 2012. Novel linked to the history and sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. External links The "Reichskristallnacht" Pogrom of the 9/10 November 1938. A Survey of Nazi and Pro-Nazi Groups in Switzerland: 1930-1945 1895 births 1936 deaths Assassinated Nazis Assassinated German politicians Deaths by firearm in Switzerland German conspiracy theorists German expatriates in Switzerland German people murdered abroad Nazi Party members Protocols of the Elders of Zion People from Schwerin People from the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin People murdered in Switzerland Swiss Nazis 1936 murders in Switzerland