On 5 May 1945, the day Denmark was liberated from German occupation during World War II, a barge with 370 starving prisoners from the Stutthof concentration camp near Danzig was brought into Klintholm Havn. When Russian forces moved into the areas close to Stutthof on 25 April 1945, those in control of the concentration camp forced the remaining prisoners to march to the coast and then commanded them to board river barges. After a few days, they were taken ashore in Rügen, Germany, but then were again forced onto another barge on 3 May. This was allowed to drift across the Baltic Sea until it was finally towed into the harbour at Klintholm Havn by a German tug two days later. Fortunately the local inhabitants managed to rescue 351 of the prisoners. The other 19 could not be saved and died of disease or starvation during the next few days. Some of them are buried in nearby Magleby churchyard.
Many different nationalities
The prisoners on the barge were nearly all political prisoners, most of whom had been involved in resistance operations. There were also several members of Jehovah's Witnesses which had been banned by the Nazi regime. Danish Red Cross archives, which draw on an analysis undertaken by Zygmunt Szatkowski, show that the majority of the prisoners were Poles followed by a large number of Russians. There were also small numbers of Czechoslovakians, Germans, Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Turks and Frenchmen as well as a few citizens from the Free State of Danzig. One of the Poles had a U.S. passport.
Danish assistance
Shortly after the barge was towed into the harbour, Rasmus Fenger, the local doctor, boarded the vessel and assessed the health of the prisoners. They were nearly all suffering from diseases such as dysentery, typhus, tuberculosis and the effects of malnutrition. In addition, they all had fleas. The top priority the first day was to find emergency food supplies for them all. Bread, milk and butter were found in the surrounding area and large quantities of fresh water were provided. A rescue committee was then set up consisting of members of the Red Cross and the Danish resistance movement. The most critically ill prisoners were moved to Stege hospital or to Hotel Søbad, a few hundred metres from the harbour. The remainder stayed on the barge for up to 10 days until accommodation could be found for them in community centres or hostels. The local Red Cross organised the rescue operation assisted by Danish doctors and nurses and by those prisoners who were fit enough to help. Within a few days, the spirits of the prisoners improved as they received nutrition and medical care.
A memorial stone now stands on the shore of Klinthom Havn at the point where the barge came in. It was erected on 5 May 1995, commemorating the 50th anniversary of the event. The Danish inscription on the stone reads: which, roughly translated, means: The board beside the stone carries explanations in four languages including English. The English reads:
A personal testimony
In her autobiography Unfettered Joy, Hermine Schmidt, a German woman who had been a prisoner at Stutthof because of her religious beliefs as a member of Jehovah's Witnesses, tells her own story of the desperate voyage across the Baltic Sea. She recounts how on 25 April 1945 she and 370 other inmates from Stutthof were pushed out into the Baltic in a derelict barge. For 10 days the barge drifted around the sea north of Germany and south of Denmark. But on the 10th day the vessel was sighted from a little Danish island. It was soon brought into Klitholm Havn harbour on Møn. The date was 5 May 1945, Denmark's liberation day. "It was unbelievable how they welcomed us. We had lice and fleas and looked like walking skeletons but they came down to the harbour and hugged us. The following day you could read in the local paper: Go down to the harbour and see the floating coffin."
The following article, drafted by prisoners Szatkowski, Wysocki and Sister Hilda, appeared in Møn's local newspapers and in one national Danish paper between 25 and 30 May 2009:
