SMS was a protected cruiser of the , built for the German Imperial Navy () in the 1890s, along with her sister ships , , , and . was laid down at the Imperial Dockyard in Danzig in 1895, launched in April 1897, and commissioned into the Navy in October 1898. The ship was armed with a battery of two 21 cm guns and eight 15 cm guns and had a top speed of . Though the five -class cruisers proved to be disappointing in some ways, they marked the beginning of a decade of German cruiser construction.
served as a gunnery training ship for the German fleet for the initial years of her career, unlike her sister ships, all of which served abroad on foreign stations. As a result, she led a fairly uneventful career; in addition to conducting shooting practice, she also participated in training exercises with the fleet between 1901 and 1904. After a modernization in 1905–1907, was used as a school ship for cadets, and over the next several years embarked on training cruises. Two major cruises to the Mediterranean took place in 1908 and 1909, and in 1910, crossed the Atlantic to visit Mexico, along with islands in the Caribbean Sea.
Another major refit followed between 1911 and 1913, after which she was placed in the reserve fleet. At the outbreak of World War I, was mobilized into V Scouting Group, but served in front-line duty only briefly. After a serious accident that nearly sank the ship in August 1914, she was returned to use as a training ship, a role she filled for the rest of the war. She was ultimately sold for scrapping in 1921.
Design
In the early 1890s, elements in the German naval command structure grappled with what type of cruiser ought to be built to fulfill the various needs of the fleet. The (RMA—Imperial Navy Office) preferred to build a combination of large cruisers of around along the lines of and significantly smaller vessels of about to support them, while the (Naval High Command) argued that a uniform force of cruisers was preferable. In the event, the RMA carried the day and three 6,000-ton cruisers were authorized in 1895; this was in part due to the intervention of Kaiser Wilhelm II and in part due to comparisons with foreign contemporaries, like the United States' and the Austro-Hungarian . The experience of Japanese cruisers during the contemporaneous First Sino-Japanese War showed the benefit of larger guns, which were adopted for the main battery of the class.
They resembled the larger s, designed at the same time, albeit at reduced scale. The new cruisers proved to be unsatisfactory as fleet cruisers, because they were too slow and they lacked sufficient armor protection. They nevertheless provided good service as overseas cruisers and later as training ships. They (along with the contemporaneous armored cruiser ) nevertheless marked the beginning of a trend of German cruiser construction that lasted through the s built a decade later.
Characteristics
was long overall and had a beam of and a draft of forward. As designed, she displaced , and at full load, her displacement rose to . The ship's superstructure included a large conning tower forward and a smaller deck house further aft. She was fitted with a heavy military mast atop the conning tower and a lighter pole mast further aft. Her hull featured a flared clipper bow combined with a pronounced ram. The ship had a crew of 31 officers and 446 enlisted men.
Her propulsion system consisted of three vertical 4-cylinder triple-expansion steam engines, each driving a single screw propeller. Steam was provided by twelve coal-fired Niclausse boilers, which were vented through three funnels. Her engines were rated for , and provided a top speed of . Coal storage amounted to if all available spaces were used. The ship had a range of approximately at the more economical speed of .
The ship was armed with a main battery of two SK L/40 guns in single gun turrets, one forward and one aft. The guns were supplied with 58 rounds of ammunition each. They had a range of . also carried a secondary battery of eight SK L/40 guns. Four were mounted in turrets amidships and the other four were placed in casemates, two abreast the conning tower and the others abreast the mainmast. These guns had a range of . She also carried ten SK L/30 guns for defense against torpedo boats. The gun armament was rounded out by ten Maxim machine cannon. She was also equipped with three torpedo tubes with eight torpedoes, two launchers were mounted on the broadside and the third was in the bow, all below the waterline.
The ship was protected with Krupp armor; her deck was on the horizontal with sloped sides that were thick. Her main and secondary battery turrets had 10 cm thick sides and the secondary casemates had the same level of protection. The conning tower had 15 cm thick sides.
Modifications
Between 1905 and 1907, underwent a major reconstruction at the (Imperial Shipyard) in Wilhelmshaven to convert her into a training ship for naval cadets. Her military mast was removed to reduce the top-heaviness of the ship, which improved her handling in turns. Two of the 15 cm guns and all of the Maxim guns were removed, and an eleventh 8.8 cm SK L/30 gun was installed, along with three 8.8 cm SK L/35 guns. Some parts of the ship, including the casemates for the 15 cm guns that were removed, were converted into berthing spaces for cadets.
She underwent a second major refit in 1911–1913 at the in Danzig. This included replacing her boilers with new Navy-type models, and the funnels were reduced to two. In 1916, all of the ships of the class were disarmed, with the exception of , which was re-equipped with a single 15 cm gun, four 10.5 cm SK L/45 guns, and fourteen 8.8 cm guns of both the L/30 and L/35 versions, for use as a gunnery training ship. In April 1918, her torpedo tubes were removed. By that time, her gun armament had been revised to two 15 cm guns and four 10.5 cm guns.
Service history Construction and fleet service was ordered under the contract name " ", and was laid down at the in Danzig on 2 January 1896. She was launched on 27 April 1897; Prince Heinrich of Prussia gave a speech at the ceremony and Queen Charlotte of Württemberg christened the ship. After completing fitting-out work, she began builder's sea trials, which revealed significant problems with her boilers, prompting the navy to issue a formal complaint to the manufacturer, Friedrich Krupp Germaniawerft, which was forced to provide replacements. Additional problems led the navy to turn to the British Thornycroft boiler, which the design staff of the RMA developed further, leading to what would become the Marine-type boiler. These would be used on most German warships thereafter. was commissioned on 20 October 1898 for additional sea trials, conducted by the navy. During this period, she was officially assigned to II Division of I Battle Squadron, replacing the old ironclad warship , though she was not yet ready for active service. In March 1899, was lightly damaged in a collision with a vessel under construction for the Ottoman Empire, after the latter vessel broke free from her moorings. The ship's first commander, (KzS—Captain at Sea) Hugo Westphal, arrived aboard the ship in October 1900. occasionally took part in training exercises with other elements of the fleet through mid-1901, though she remained on trials until 8 June, when she was decommissioned. She was now, finally, ready for active service.
In the interest of developing the capabilities of the fleet's gunners, the navy established the Artillery Testing Command on 14 December 1901, and on 3 May 1902, was recommissioned to join the new establishment as its core unit, replacing the ancient training ship , which had been built in the 1870s. (Frigate Captain) Hermann Jacobsen took command of the vessel at that time. She began training activities on 15 May, based in Kiel. Later that year, she was allocated to the training fleet for use as a scout for the annual large-scale maneuvers held every August and September. During the exercises, suffered damage to her boilers that necessitated repairs that were completed on 15 September. The ship's boilers would prove to be a continued nuisance throughout her career, but because she was only being used for training, the navy deemed it acceptable. She thereafter resumed her gunnery training duties, along with her tender, the old armored gunboat . The two vessels accidentally collided on 13 November but suffered no significant damage. The year 1903 passed much the same as the previous one, with gunnery training interrupted only by the fleet maneuvers in August and September. On 11 January 1904, was again decommissioned in Wilhelmshaven.
Cadet training ship By this time, the naval command had decided to convert the -class ships into dedicated training ships for naval cadets and apprentice seamen, as they were no longer suitable for front-line service. They would replace the old screw corvettes that had been in use for that purpose for some time and were by then badly worn out. In 1905, went into drydock at the in Wilhelmshaven for modernization. Despite the problems with her boilers, she did not receive new models; unlike her sister ships, which had their original three funnels reduced to two, kept her original funnels. The refit was finished in early 1907, and she was recommissioned on 4 April, now under the command of KzS Franz von Holleben. She completed a short trials period, operating from Wilhelmshaven and then Kiel, before embarking her first class of trainees in early May. then went on a short cruise in the western Baltic Sea before participating in the Kiel Week regatta.
next embarked on a major training cruise on 19 July that included visits to Norway, various ports on the Atlantic coast of Europe, and the Canary Islands before entering the Mediterranean Sea. There, visited a number of cities, including Venice, Italy, Beirut in the Ottoman Empire, and Alexandria in the Khedivate of Egypt. The ship arrived back in Kiel on 18 March 1908. After embarking a new contingent of cadets and a new captain, KzS Leberecht Maass in April, began the next training cruise, which started with maneuvers off Apenrade and in the North Sea, before crossing the Atlantic to visit North America. In August, represented Germany at celebrations in Halifax, Canada, commemorating the 150th anniversary of the opening of the Canadian Parliament. While entering the port at around midnight on 9 August, she inadvertently rammed a schooner in heavy fog. Nine sailors were killed in the accident. thereafter steamed south to visit ports in the Caribbean Sea. She arrived back in Kiel on 8 March 1909, where KzS Carl Schaumann relieved Maass.
s third major cruise began on 2 June 1909, first with a visit to Norway, followed by a short return to Cuxhaven and then Wilhelmshaven, to make preparations to go abroad. From Wilhelmshaven, she got underway for the Mediterranean, stopping in Funchal in Madeira and Tenerife in the Canaries on the way. She steamed as far as the eastern Mediterranean, visiting Alexandria again, where she rendered assistance after a major fire in the city, along with ports in the Levant. arrived back in Wilhelmshaven on 28 March 1910, where she went into dry dock for an overhaul that lasted until 2 May. She then moved to Kiel, where she took on another crew of cadets for a short training cruise to Norwegian waters that ended in Wilhelmshaven on 20 July.