SMS was a light cruiser of the built by the German (Imperial Navy). She had one sister ship, . The ship was built by the AG Weser shipyard in Bremen, laid down in 1912, launched in April 1914, and commissioned into active service in January 1915. She was named for the German town of Regensburg. The ship was armed with a main battery of twelve 10.5 cm SK L/45 guns and had a top speed of , though in 1917 she was rearmed with seven 15 cm SK L/45 guns.
served in the reconnaissance forces of the High Seas Fleet during World War I. She saw significant action at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916, where she served as the leader of the torpedo boat flotillas that screened for the I Scouting Group battlecruisers. After the end of the war, she was ceded to France in 1920 and renamed . In 1928 she took part in the Arctic rescue operations searching for the Airship Italia. Removed from service in 1936, she was used as a barracks ship in Lorient until 1944, when she was seized by the Germans and scuttled in the harbor to protect the U-boat pens there.
Design
The two s were designed during the negotiations over the 1912 amendment to the Naval Law, which forced compromises to keep costs down. They were largely repeats of the preceding , with several minor changes. These included removing a pair of boilers (but retaining the same top speed), taller masts (to allow the ships to serve as flotilla leaders), and the introduction of a superfiring arrangement of the aft guns.
was long overall and had a beam of and a draft of forward. She displaced at full load. The ship had a fairly small superstructure that consisted of a conning tower. Her hull had a long forecastle that extended for the first third of the ship, stepping down to main deck level just aft of the conning tower. She was fitted with a pair of pole masts that were taller than standard masts, which allowed them to be used to send wireless telegraph signals, a requirement of their use as flotilla leaders. The ship had a crew of 21 officers and 364 enlisted men.
Her propulsion system consisted of two sets of Marine steam turbines driving two propellers. They were rated to provide . These were powered by ten coal-fired Marine-type water-tube boilers and two oil-fired double-ended boilers, which were vented through three 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 twelve SK L/45 guns in single pedestal mounts. Two were placed side by side forward on the forecastle, eight were located amidships, four on either side, and two in a superfiring pair aft. The guns had a maximum elevation of 30 degrees, which allowed them to engage targets out to . These were later replaced with seven SK L/45 guns and two SK L/45 anti-aircraft guns. She was also equipped with a pair of torpedo tubes with five torpedoes submerged in the hull on the broadside. Four deck-mounted launchers were added when the gun armament was upgraded, and the submerged tubes were removed. She could also carry 120 mines.
The ship was protected by a waterline armor belt that was thick amidships. Protection for the ship's internals was reinforced with a curved armor deck that was 60 mm thick; the deck sloped downward at the sides and connected to the bottom edge of the belt armor. The conning tower had thick sides.
Service history was ordered in May 1912 under the contract name " ", and was laid down at the AG Weser shipyard in Bremen on 14 November 1912. She was launched on 25 April 1914; the mayor of Regensburg, Hofrat Josef Bleyer, christened the ship. It was planned that the ship would replace the cruiser when she was completed, but the outbreak of World War I in July 1914 interrupted those plans. Completion of the ship was accelerated after the start of the conflict, and she was commissioned to begin sea trials on 3 January 1915. The ship was initially commanded by (FK—Frigate Captain) Ernst Ewers, until the end of her trials on 10 March, when (KzS—Captain at Sea) Widenmann replaced him. That day, the ship was assigned to II Scouting Group While the ship was still undergoing trials, Captain Hans Zenker proposed that and the liner —which was to be armed with 15 cm guns—should be sent out into the Atlantic to replace the commerce raiding cruisers that had been destroyed in the early months of the war. The fleet commander, Admiral Friedrich von Ingenohl, argued the ships would eventually be sunk as well, and that any possible successes for the raiders would not equal the loss of a modern light cruiser or a large passenger liner. The suggested plan was therefore abandoned.
1915–1916 On 21 March, she and the rest of II Scouting Group moved to the Baltic, where they took part in operations to defend the German town of Memel over the following two days. They bombarded Russian positions near Polangen and Papensee; the operation lasted until the 24th. While the rest of II Scouting Group returned to the North Sea, sailed to Kiel, where the remaining work to complete fitting out was done at the (Imperial Shipyard) there. She joined the rest of her unit at Wilhelmshaven, the main German naval base on the North Sea on 4 May; over the following months, she participated in the routine of wartime operations, which included patrols in the German Bight, covering mine-laying operations, and reconnaissance patrols into the North Sea to search for British warships. The first of these took place from 17 to 19 May, and saw lay a minefield off the Dogger Bank in the central North Sea.
On 3 August 1915, she and significant portions of the fleet were transferred to the Baltic for the Battle of the Gulf of Riga, a major operation to clear the Gulf of Riga of Russian naval forces. Eight dreadnoughts and three battlecruisers from the High Seas Fleet were detached for the operation. During the first attempt to penetrate the Gulf of Riga, and the rest of II Scouting Group formed part of the covering group that was to prevent any Russian attempt to counter-attack from further east in the Baltic. The ships and the battlecruisers of I Scouting Group carried out a sweep into the Gulf of Finland to search for Russian warships that might intervene in the operation. On 25 August, and the cruiser bombarded Russian positions on the island of Dagö, including the lighthouse in St. Andreasberg and the signal station on Cap Ristna. Two days later, returned to the North Sea.
On 11–12 September, participated in another mine-laying operation, this time off Texel. The commander of II Scouting Group, (KAdm–Rear Admiral) Friedrich Boedicker, transferred to on 14 October, making her the group flagship. She joined the rest of the High Seas Fleet for a sweep into the North Sea on 23 October, which was cancelled the following day due to bad weather. Late in the year, the German navy had begun patrolling for merchant shipping between Britain and Scandinavia in the Skagerrak and the Kattegat, initially using torpedo-boat flotillas. Three of these operations failed to locate any ships, and so on 16 December, and the rest of II Scouting Group sortied to make a sweep for shipping in the area. The ships were joined by II, VI, and IX Torpedo-boat Flotillas, which were led by the cruiser . This attempt to interdict British shipping also failed, and the ships returned to Kiel on 18 December, having found only a single merchant vessel. The cruisers then passed through the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal to return to the North Sea.
next went to sea on 5 March 1916 for the first fleet operation commanded by (Vice Admiral) Reinhard Scheer, which was in the direction of the Hoofden. The sweep lasted for two days and failed to locate any British ships. On 25 March, from the direction of Sylt, British seaplane carriers raided the zeppelin base at Tondern, prompting and other vessels to sortie to try to intercept them before they withdrew. The Germans were at sea into 26 March, but failed to locate the British raiders. Another fleet patrol into the North Sea took place on 21–22 April, this time toward Horns Rev. On 23–24 April, she participated in the bombardment of Yarmouth and Lowestoft in company with I Scouting Group. During the operation, (Commodore) Ludwig von Reuter temporarily took command of II Scouting Group, flying his flag aboard . The cruisers briefly fought the British Harwich Force, but after the battlecruisers returned from bombarding Lowestoft, their gunfire dissuaded Rear Admiral Reginald Tyrwhitt from pursuit; the British quickly turned south and fled. The German ships arrived back in port on 25 April.
Battle of Jutland
In May 1916, Scheer planned to lure a portion of the British fleet away from its bases and destroy it with the entire High Seas Fleet. For the planned operation, , the flagship of Paul Heinrich, was assigned to serve as the leader of the torpedo boat flotillas that screened for the battlecruisers of I Scouting Group. The squadron left the Jade roadstead at 02:00 on 31 May, bound for the waters of the Skagerrak. The main body of the fleet followed an hour and a half later. At around 15:30, the cruiser screens of I Scouting Group and the British 1st Battlecruiser Squadron engaged; was on the disengaged side of the German formation, but steamed to reach the head of the line of battle. As she was moving into position, the opposing battlecruisers opened fire; was some from the German battlecruisers, still on the disengaged side. Her crew noted that the British shells were falling well over their targets, which placed in greater danger than the battlecruisers at which the British were aiming. By 17:10, had reached the head of the line, and the battlecruiser fired several salvos at her, mistaking her for a battlecruiser.
As the battlecruiser squadrons closed on each other, ordered the torpedo boats to make a general attack on the British formation. The British had similarly ordered an attack with their destroyers, which led to a hard-fought battle at close range between the opposing destroyer forces, supported by light cruisers and the battlecruisers' secondary guns. Shortly after 19:00, led an attack with several torpedo boats on the cruiser and four destroyers. She disabled the destroyer and then shifted fire to Canterbury, which turned away into the mist. By 20:15, the British and German main fleets had engaged, and Scheer sought a withdrawal; he therefore ordered I Scouting Group to charge the British line while the rest of the fleet turned away. This was in turn covered by a massed torpedo boat attack, which forced the British to turn away as well. and her torpedo boats were ordered to join the attack, but I Scouting Group had passed in front of his ships, and he realized the British had turned away, which put them out of range of his torpedoes.
Having successfully disengaged, Scheer ordered to organize three torpedo boat flotillas to make attacks on the British fleet during the night. At 21:10, Heinrich dispatched II Flotilla and XII Half-Flotilla from the rear of the German line to attack the British formation. In the night, the High Seas Fleet successfully passed behind the British fleet and reached Horns Reef by 04:00 on 1 June. At 09:45, and three torpedo boats turned around to rendezvous with the torpedo boats carrying the crew of the scuttled battlecruiser . took on 1,177 men from . In the course of the battle, had fired 372 rounds of 10.5 cm ammunition and emerged completely unscathed.
Late-1916 – 1917