SMS was a light cruiser of the in the German (Imperial Navy). Her class included three other ships: , , and . was built at the shipyard in Wilhelmshaven from 1910 to October 1912, when she was commissioned into the High Seas Fleet. The ship was armed with a main battery of twelve SK L/45 guns and had a top speed of .
spent the first year of her service overseas, after which she was assigned to the reconnaissance forces of the High Seas Fleet. She saw significant action at the Battle of Heligoland Bight in August 1914 and participated in the raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby in December 1914. By 1916, the ship was transferred to the Baltic to operate against the Russian Navy. She saw action during Operation Albion in the Gulf of Riga in October 1917, including screening for the battleships and during the Battle of Moon Sound. She returned to the North Sea for the planned final operation against the British Grand Fleet in the last weeks of the war, and was involved in the mutinies that forced the cancellation of the operation.
The ship served briefly in the new in 1919 before being transferred to Italy as a war prize. She was formally transferred in July 1920 and renamed for service in the Italian Navy. In 1936–1937, she was rebuilt for colonial duties and additional anti-aircraft guns were installed. She saw no significant action during World War II until the Italian surrender, which ended Italy's participation in the war. She was scuttled by the Italian Navy, captured and raised by the Germans, and sunk by Allied bombers in October 1943. The Germans raised the ship again, which was sunk a second time by bombers in September 1944. was finally broken up for scrap in 1946–1947.
Design
The s were designed in response to the development of the British s, which were faster than all existing German light cruisers. As a result, speed of the new ships had to be increased. To accomplish this, more powerful engines were fitted and their hulls were lengthened to improve their hydrodynamic efficiency. These changes increased top speed from over the preceding s. To save weight, longitudinal framing was adopted for the first time in a major German warship design. In addition, the s were the first cruisers to carry belt armor, which was necessitated by the adoption of more powerful guns in the latest British cruisers.
was long overall and had a beam of and a draft of forward. She displaced normally and up to at full load. The ship had a short forecastle deck and a minimal superstructure that consisted primarily of a conning tower located on the forecastle. She was fitted with two pole masts with platforms for searchlights. had a crew of 18 officers and 336 enlisted men.
Her propulsion system consisted of two sets of Marine-type steam turbines driving two screw propellers. They were designed to give , but reached in service. These were powered by sixteen coal-fired Marine-type water-tube boilers, although they were later altered to use fuel oil that was sprayed on the coal to increase its burn rate. The boilers were vented through four funnels located amidships. These gave the ship a top speed of . carried of coal, and an additional of oil that gave her a range of approximately at .
The ship was armed with a main battery of twelve SK L/45 guns in single pedestal mounts. Two were placed side by side forward on the forecastle, eight were located on the broadside, four on either side, and two were side by side aft. The guns had a maximum elevation of 30 degrees, which allowed them to engage targets out to . They were supplied with 1,800 rounds of ammunition, for 150 shells per gun. She was also equipped with a pair of torpedo tubes with five torpedoes; the tubes were submerged in the hull on the broadside. She could also carry 120 mines. In 1915, was completely rearmed, replacing the 10.5 cm guns with seven SK L/45 guns, two SK L/45 guns, and two deck-mounted 50 cm torpedo tubes.
was protected by a waterline armor belt and a curved armor deck. The deck was flat across most of the hull, but angled downward at the sides and connected to the bottom edge of the belt. The belt and deck were both thick. The conning tower had thick sides.
Service history
was ordered under the contract name , and was laid down at the (Imperial Shipyard) in Wilhelmshaven in October 1910 and launched on 24 August 1911, and Rudolf Schwander, the major of her namesake city, gave a speech at her launching ceremony. After her launching, fitting-out work commenced, including the installation of her engines, which were the first set of turbines designed by the . She was commissioned into active service on 1 October 1912 under the command of (FK—Frigate Captain) Wilhelm Tägert. After completing initial sea trials, she was assigned to the Reconnaissance Unit on 23 December, taking the place of the older cruiser . At that time, Tägert was replaced by FK Wilhelm Paschen. On 6 January, was accidentally rammed by the Danish steamer , which was passing through the wrong side of the canal entrance. This delayed s arrival for training exercises with the rest of her unit until 23 February.
spent the first year of service overseas, from 1913 to 1914. She was first sent abroad on 6 April, when she sailed in company with the light cruiser for the Mediterranean Sea. She arrived in Valletta, Malta, on 13 April, where she joined the Mediterranean Division, commanded by (Rear Admiral) Konrad Trummler aboard the battlecruiser . From there, steamed to visit Alexandretta in the Ottoman Empire, followed by a stop in Constantinople, the Ottoman capital, in early May. By early June, she had entered the Adriatic Sea and stopped in Venice and Naples, Italy, and Pola in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Later in June, the ship moved to the Aegean Sea and later cruised in the eastern Mediterranean, including off the coast of Ottoman Syria. Having stopped in Alexandretta again in early September, got underway to return to Germany on 9 September. She arrived in Kiel two weeks later, anchoring in the harbor on 23 September.
She was then dry docked for an overhaul after her voyage abroad, during which FK Heinrich Retzmann relieved Paschen. The work was completed by 8 December, when she was selected to participate in a long-distance cruise to test the reliability of the new turbine propulsion system in the battleships and . The three ships were organized in a special "Detached Division", under the command of Hubert von Rebeur-Paschwitz. got underway on 8 December and met the two battleships at sea the following day; they proceeded to the German colonies in western Africa by way of the Canary Islands. The ships visited Lomé in Togoland, Duala and Victoria in Kamerun, and Swakopmund in German South-West Africa. They then sailed south to Cape Town in British South Africa. From there, the ships sailed to St. Helena in the South Atlantic and then on to Rio de Janeiro, arriving on 15 February 1914. Rebeur-Paschwitz came aboard , which was detached to visit Buenos Aires, Argentina for an official visit. While there, Rebeur-Paschwitz fell ill and had to go ashore to be hospitalized, so departed without him on 12 March to meet the two battleships in Montevideo, Uruguay. After Rebeur-Paschwitz returned from the hospital, the three ships sailed south around Cape Horn and then north to Valparaíso, Chile, arriving on 2 April and remaining for over a week.
On 11 April, the ships departed Valparaíso for the long journey back to Germany. On the return trip, the ships visited several more ports, including Bahía Blanca, Argentina, before returning to Rio de Janeiro. On 16 May, the two battleships left Rio de Janeiro for the Atlantic leg of the journey to sail directly back to Germany; they arrived in Kiel on 17 June 1914. was detached to proceed independently, by way of the West Indies. She assisted the German steamer , which had run aground in the area, and then proceeded to the Dominican Republic to pressure the Dominican government over a disagreement with Germany. In the course of the voyage, the ships traveled some . She was anchored at Saint Thomas on 20 July when she received orders to return home. She reached Horta in the Azores on 27 July, and the next day sailed at top speed to pass through the English Channel with her lights dimmed owing to the July Crisis that threatened to instigate a major war in Europe. arrived in Wilhelmshaven on 1 August, the day the German military mobilized at the start of World War I.
World War I 1914
joined II Scouting Group at the start of the conflict. Late on 17 August, some two weeks after the outbreak of World War I, and sortied to conduct a sweep into the Hoofden to search for British reconnaissance forces. They were accompanied by the U-boats U-19 and U-24, which were to ambush any British forces that counter-attacked. Early the following morning, spotted a pair of British submarines, and . She opened fire on the submarines, but they submerged before she scored any hits. The two cruisers then encountered a group of sixteen British destroyers and a light cruiser at a distance of about . Significantly outnumbered, the two German cruisers broke contact and returned to port. joined the cruiser for another sweep on 21–22 August to sink British fishing trawler in the Dogger Bank area.
was heavily engaged at the Battle of Heligoland Bight less than two weeks later, on 28 August. British battlecruisers and light cruisers raided the German reconnaissance screen commanded by Rear Admiral Leberecht Maass in the Heligoland Bight. was at that time moored in Wilhelmshaven, and she was the first German cruiser to leave port to reinforce the German reconnaissance forces, departing at 09:10. She was joined soon thereafter by the light cruiser at 09:30; they were ordered to pursue the British light forces that had by then begun withdrawing. At 11:00, she encountered the badly damaged British cruiser , which had been hit several times by and . attacked Arethusa, but was driven off by the 1st Destroyer Flotilla. She lost contact with the British in the mist, but located them again after 13:10 from the sound of British gunfire that destroyed the cruiser . Along with , she badly damaged three British destroyers—, , and —before being driven off again. In return, was hit by a single shell that struck above her belt armor and exploded, but did little damage. Shortly thereafter, the British battlecruisers intervened and sank and Maass's flagship . As withdrew, she had a close encounter with the British battlecruisers, but the British mistook her for one of their own cruisers in the hazy conditions. and the rest of the surviving light cruisers retreated into the haze and were reinforced by the battlecruisers of I Scouting Group.
In early September, moved to the Baltic Sea for an operation in company with the large armored cruiser that lasted from 3 to 6 September. She then returned to operations in the North Sea, and she participated in the raid on Yarmouth on 2–3 November. The ships of II Scouting Group carried out another sweep into the North Sea on 10 December that failed to locate any British forces. was present during the raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby on 15–16 December, as part of the screening force for the battlecruisers of Rear Admiral Franz von Hipper's I Scouting Group. After completing the bombardment of the towns, the Germans began to withdraw, though British forces moved to intercept them. , two of the other screening cruisers, and two flotillas of torpedo boats steamed between two British squadrons. In the heavy mist, which reduced visibility to less than , only her sister ship was spotted, though only briefly. The Germans were able to use the bad weather to cover their withdrawal.
1915–1916