Horst Ludwig Georg Erich Wessel (9 October 1907 – 23 February 1930) was a Nazi Party (NSDAP) activist known for writing the lyrics to the "Horst-Wessel-Lied". His death in 1930 was used by the party for propaganda purposes.
Wessel first joined the German National People's Party (DNVP), but by 1926 was removed for being too extremist. He then joined the NSDAP, where he wrote songs for Nazi events. He rose to command several SA squads and districts. On 14 January 1930, he was shot in the head by two members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). Albrecht Höhler was arrested and charged with his murder. He was initially sentenced to six years in prison, but was executed after the Nazis came to power. Wessel's funeral was given wide attention in Berlin, with many of the Nazi elite in attendance. After his death, he became a major propaganda symbol. His name was used for several civilian and military purposes during the time of the Third Reich.
Horst Ludwig Georg Erich Wessel was born on 9 October in 1907 in Bielefeld, Westphalia, as the son of Wilhelm Ludwig Georg Wessel (born 15 July 1879), a doctor and Lutheran minister at the Nikolai Church, one of Berlin's oldest churches. Wessel's mother, Bertha Luise Margarete Wessel (neé Richter), also came from a family of Lutheran pastors. Wessel's parents were married on 1 May 1906. He grew up alongside his sister Ingeborg Paula Margarethe (born 19 May 1909) and his brother Werner Georg Erich Ludwig (born 22 August 1910). The family lived in the Judenstraße ("Street of the Jews"), which in medieval times had been the centre of Berlin's Jewish community. Wessel's refusal to follow his father into the ministry was the subject of many father and son conflicts.
The USCGC Eagle (WIX-327) (formerly the Horst Wessel) is a 295-foot (90 m) barque used as a training cutter for future officers of the United States Coast Guard. She is the only active commissioned sailing vessel, and one of only two commissioned sailing vessels, along with the USS Constitution, in American military service. She is the seventh Coast Guard cutter to bear the name in a line dating back to 1792, including the Revenue Cutter Eagle, which famously fought the British man-of-war Dispatch during the War of 1812. Each summer, Eagle deploys with cadets from the United States Coast Guard Academy and candidates from the Officer Candidate School for periods ranging from a week to two months. These voyages fulfill multiple roles; the primary mission is training the cadets and officer candidates, but the ship also performs a public relations role for the Coast Guard and the United States. Often, Eagle makes calls at foreign ports as a goodwill ambassador.
Built as the German sail training ship Horst Wessel in 1936, it served to train German sailors in sail techniques until decommissioned at the start of World War II. Given anti-aircraft armament, it was re-commissioned in 1942. At the end of the war, Horst Wessel was taken by the U.S. as war reparations.
"The Horst Wessel Song" (German: Horst-Wessel-Lied; pronounced [hɔʁst ˈvɛsl̩ liːt]), also known by its opening words, "Die Fahne hoch" ("The Flag on High"), was the anthem of the Nazi Party from 1930 to 1945. From 1933 to 1945 the Nazis made it a co-national anthem of Germany, along with the first stanza of the Deutschlandlied.
The lyrics to "The Horst Wessel Song" were written in 1929 by Sturmführer Horst Wessel, the commander of the Nazi paramilitary "Brownshirts" (Sturmabteilung or "SA") in the Friedrichshain district of Berlin. Wessel wrote songs for the SA in conscious imitation of the Communist paramilitary, the Red Front Fighters' League, to provoke them into attacking his troops, and to keep up the spirits of his men.
Wessel – the son of a pastor, with a university education but employed as a construction worker – became well-known among the Communists when – on orders from Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi Gauleiter (regional party leader) of Berlin– he led a number of SA incursions into the Fischerkiez, an extremely poor Berlin district where Communists mingled with underworld figures. Several of these agitations were only minor altercations, but one took place outside the tavern which the local German Communist Party (KPD) used as its headquarters. As a result of that melee, five Communists were injured, four of them seriously. The Communist newspaper accused the police of letting the Nazis get away, while arresting the injured Communists, while the Nazi newspaper claimed that Wessel had been trying to give a speech when shadowy figures emerged and began the fight. Wessel was marked for death, with his face and address featured on Communist street posters, and the slogan of the KPD and the Red Front Fighters' League became "Strike the fascists wherever you find them."