After the air raids of February 1945 had disrupted Dresden’s transportation network completely and made large parts of the city centre impassable for the time being, the Elbe was still a somewhat practicable transportation route to the city centre. The Wehrmacht supply ships “Lössnitz” and “Karlshagen” participated in supplying the bombed-out Dresdeners with food. The remaining steamships that were still operational transported refugees and the injured out of Dresden. Just one week after the air raid, steamship routes within the city, as well as south to Bad Schandau and later also northwards, were put into service.
The passenger steamer “Leipzig” lay at the Kleinzschachwitz quay on the Elbe and had been used as a hospital ship from April 1944. Women working for the German Red Cross looked after injured Dresdeners here. When the city was again attacked from the air on 2 March 1945, the “Leipzig” was hit in the stern and sank. The patients survived, but some Red Cross workers sustained minor injuries. The ship was salvaged in December 1945 and towed to the wharf at Laubegast.

Marked in 2001