G had ründgens the end of the season 1962/63 resigned as director of the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg to take a trip around the world, in the "off chance [...] learn to live." He appeared on this trip in September 1963. Differently than they had hoped, but it should prove to be trip to the death.
The world tour began in England and led him Duch, the Mediterranean and the Suez Canal to Ceylon, Singapore and finally to the Philippines. From there, he wanted to travel via Hong Kong and Japan to San Francisco and Mexico continue.
The journey ended abruptly in Manila. There Gründgens had in the "Manila Hotel - The Aristocrat of the Orient" quartered. On 7 October of 1963 he died in the bathroom of his hotel room at a gastric hemorrhage, probably as a result of many years of regular use of painkillers and sleeping pills in ever-higher dose. It is often rumored, Gründgens had died from an overdose of sleeping pills, it was speculated why even about suicide . However, since there is a lack of evidence for it, it remains a speculation. Speaking against, that the journey Gründgens yes - as mentioned - reportedly undertook to "live to learn." Can speak for the accident theory, moreover, that at the longer stomach ulcers regularly taking strong painkillers and lead resulting stomach bleeding.
Gustaf Gründgens was eight days before the start of his world tour from a stay in Madeira returned to Hamburg to undergo a dental procedure. As he had feared that a hotel could not adequately protect his anonymity, he had asked to be allowed to stay for the duration of treatment in the clinic. Michael also practiced in this clinic Winzenried, a professor of neurology and psychiatry at the University of Hamburg, who reported that during his hospital stay Gründgens have repeatedly sought his presence.
Gründgens' state Winzenried describes as follows:
He was outgoing, cheerful, stuffed full with travel plans seemed so "unpsychiatrisch" that we gave him little attention. He was "under the address" furnished Mr.. Only afterwards did I realize, as he repeatedly asked for visit - apologetically, "I know that you have little time, but you buy me a half hour ... You can therefore listen well ... Should I start writing down my memoirs? The concept is finished in the brain ... but I'm superstitious - maybe so does my life force ... My life story has been a series of appearances, it is a relationship or had anything like it? ... Now I'm free ... freedom is power, or am I still lonely? "
The day before his departure: "I am wildly in the world, or should I not prefer to stay here? There was so little joy in my life, and now I am afraid of choking on this morsel ... No, you forgot my chimney oracle ... make me an bites [sic] courage ... Should I take a permanent resident? And where? I have not taken the apartment in Bellevue but, although it is terrible to live out of suitcases, but at least it is all packaged together ... The true traveler is the break alone, to break up ... "
And so it came unprepared death, although expected constantly. He overtook him at an unusual time in a strange place, at the farthest point from his home, where these masters of the German language was in a linguistic problem. Seeking the refreshing sleep, habit agents used in dose tested, he wanted to escape the monsoon and the solitude for hours. But the body does not obey the usual measure, the Achilles heel of this athletic body, its blood vessels, vomit in the stomach with the force of a hemorrhage. The death Perhaps knowing he was trying to control the disaster and rushed alone, without support to subscribed face. [...]
I think I've taken too many sleeping pills, I kinda [sic] funny let me sleep in G.
