Rasa Aleksiunas and her son, Linas, generously shared the amazing story (with all of the original documents and even the strap from the life vest) of her father, Eduardas Markulis, a twenty-two-year-old Lithuanian from ?iauliai who survived the sinking.
Ann Māra Lipacis and her brother, J. Ventenberg, from Riga, Latvia, both survived the sinking. They were six and ten years old. Mrs. Lipacis and Mr. Ventenberg shared firsthand accounts and memoirs not only of the sinking, but of losing their beloved mother, Antonija Liepins, who remained on deck to allow children into the lifeboats.
Lorna MacEwen in the UK shared personal details and photos with me. Her mother, Marta Kopaite, was a young Lithuanian nurse who walked over minefields to Gotenhafen and boarded the Wilhelm Gustloff. She survived.
Lance Robinson in South Africa shared the story of his mother, Helmer Laidroo, a fifteen-year-old Estonian girl who survived the sinking of the Gustloff.
Mati Kaarma in Australia shared the story and background of his family who fled from Estonia. His parents took a train to Germany and his grandparents, who opted for passage on the Gustloff, did not survive.
Gertrud Baekby Madsen in Denmark shared a detailed account of her evacuation from Tilsit and the treacherous trek across the ice.
Edward Petruskevich, curator of the Wilhelm Gustloff Museum, patiently answered many of my questions. His incredible website provided invaluable source material: www.wilhelmgustloffmuseum.com.
Author and journalist Cathryn J. Prince answered countless e-mails and generously shared her research findings, contacts, and knowledge.
Charlotte and William Peale organized research material and read early drafts.
This novel was built with bricks from the following books, films, and resources. I am enormously indebted to them:
Abandoned and Forgotten: An Orphan Girl’s Tale of Survival During World War II, by Evelyne Tannehill.
The Amber Room: The Fate of the World’s Greatest Lost Treasure, by Adrian Levy.
Battleground Prussia: The Assault on Germany’s Eastern Front 1944–45, by Prit Buttar.
Before the Storm: Memories of My Youth in Old Prussia, by Marion Countess D?nhoff.
Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin, by Timothy Snyder.
The Captive Mind, by Czeslaw Milosz.
Caveat Emptor: The Secret Life of an American Art Forger, by Ken Perenyi.
Crabwalk, by Günter Grass.
The Cruelest Night: The Untold Story of One of the Greatest Maritime Tragedies of World War II, by Christopher Dobson, John Miller, and Ronald Payne.
The Damned Don’t Drown: The Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, by Arthur V. Sellwood.
Death in the Baltic: The World War II Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, by Cathryn J. Prince.
Die gro?e Flucht: Das Schicksal der Vertriebenen, by Guido Knopp.
Die Gustloff-Katastrophe: Bericht eines überlebenden, by Heinz Sch?n.
Forgotten Land: Journeys Among the Ghosts of East Prussia, by Max Egremont.
God, Give Us Wings, by Felicia Prekeris Brown.
Handmade Shoes for Men, by László Vass and Magda Molnar.
Lwów, A City Lost: Memories of a Cherished Childhood, by Eva Szybalski.
Oral History Sources of Latvia: History, Culture and Society Through Life Stories, edited by Māra Zirnīte and Maija Hinkle.
The Painted Bird, by Jerzy Kosinski.
The Rape of Europa: The Fate of Europe’s Treasures in the Third Reich and the Second World War, by Lynn H. Nicholas.
Rose Petal Jam: Recipes and Stories from a Summer in Poland, by Beata Zatorska and Simon Target.
Shoes: Their History in Words and Pictures, by Charlotte Yue and David Yue.
Sinking the Gustloff: A Tragedy Exiled From Memory, by Marcus Kolga.
Token of a Covenant: Diary of an East Prussian Surgeon 1945–47, by Hans Graf Von Lehndorff.
The Vanished Kingdom: Travels Through the History of Prussia, by James Charles Roy.
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The following people and organizations contributed to my research and writing efforts:
Henning Ahrens; the Bihrs; Dr. Richard Butterwick-Pawlikowski; Ulrike Dick; Angela Kaden; Helen Logvinov; Jeroen Noordhuis; Jonas Ohman; Xymena Pietraszek; Julius Sakalauskas; Carol Stoltz.
Ancestry.com; the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture; Bornholms Museum; Der Spiegel; the Federal Foundation of Flight, Expulsion, Reconciliation in Berlin, Germany; Historical Museum of the City of Kraków; Inkwood Books, Kresy Siberia Virtual Museum, Letters of Note, the Museum of Genocide Victims in Vilnius, Lithuania; the Museum of Occupation in Riga, Latvia; the Regional Historical Center of Eindhoven, Holland; the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center; Steuben Tours; the Wilhelm Gustloff Museum: www.wilhelmgustloffmuseum.com.