Ernst Moritz Arndt, Steamship in Rostock, Germany

The Ernst Moritz Arndt was a Liberty ship of the EC2-S-C1 type, 441 feet (134 m) long and 56 feet (17 m) wide, with a top speed of 11 knots. Built in Los Angeles in 1943 as the Vernon L. Kellogg, it was renamed several times before becoming the Ernst Moritz Arndt in 1958. It was scrapped in Taiwan in 1971.

Laid down on 20 June 1943 at California Shipbuilding Corp. in Los Angeles, the Liberty ship Vernon L. Kellogg was launched 25 days later and operational by 28 July 1943. It passed through Norwegian owners as Wilfred and Folke Bernadotte, then became Archon Gabriel under the Costa Rican flag. Carrying iron ore to Stettin, it ran aground off Greifswalder Oie on 8 January 1958; after salvage it was confiscated and handed to the GDR's Deutsche Seereederei Rostock on 30 June 1958, renamed Ernst Moritz Arndt, and sold in 1968 as Kypros.

The ship was named after Ernst Moritz Arndt, a writer and deputy in the Frankfurt National Assembly, not a historian. Its sixth renaming came by order of a ministry official, Müller, who rejected the name Johann Gottlieb Fichte outright; two years later a training ship was christened Fichte anyway.

The ship no longer exists as a visitable site: it was sold in summer 1968 to Spiritath Cia. Navigation S.A. of Famagusta, left Rostock as Kypros on 18 June 1968, and was broken up in Taiwan in August 1971. What remains to trace is the 8 January 1958 grounding off Greifswalder Oie, where about 1,000 tons of iron ore were lightened onto barges and the coaster Timmendorf.

The sixth and final renaming came in July 1958, when a ministry official named Müller wrote to the Rostock shipping company that the name Johann Gottlieb Fichte must not be used under any circumstances. The company's protests were rejected. Two years later a GDR training and cargo ship was christened Johann Gottlieb Fichte after all, and later became known through the television series "Zur See".