HSwMS Tirfing was the third ship of the monitors built for the Royal Swedish Navy in the mid-1860s. She was designed under the supervision of the Swedish-born inventor John Ericsson, and built in Sweden. Tirfing made one foreign visit to Russia (visits to Norway did not count as foreign as that country was in a personal union with Sweden) in 1867, but remained in Swedish or Norwegian waters for the rest of her career. The ship was reconstructed between 1903 and 1905, but generally remained in reserve. She was mobilized during World War I and sold in 1922 for conversion to a barge.

Design and description The John Ericsson-class ironclads were designed to meet the need of the Swedish and Norwegian Navies for small, shallow-draft armored ships capable of defending their coastal waters. The standoff between and the much larger during the Battle of Hampton Roads in early 1862 roused much interest in Sweden in this new type of warship as it seemed ideal for coastal defense duties. John Ericsson, designer and builder of the Monitor, had been born in Sweden, although he had become an American citizen in 1848, and offered to share his design with the Swedes. In response they sent Lieutenant John Christian d'Ailly to the United States to study monitor design and construction under Ericsson. D'Ailly arrived in July 1862 and toured rolling mills, gun foundries, and visited several different ironclads under construction. He returned to Sweden in 1863 having completed the drawings of a Monitor-type ship under Ericsson's supervision.Harris, pp. 22–24

The ship measured long overall, with a beam of . She had a draft of and displaced . John Ericsson was divided into nine main compartments by eight watertight bulkheads. Over time a flying bridge and, later, a full superstructure, was added to each ship between the gun turret and the funnel.Bjoerud, p. 169 Initially her crew numbered 80 officers and men, but this increased to 104 as she was modified with additional weapons.Harris, p. 26

Propulsion The John Ericsson-class ships had one twin-cylinder vibrating lever steam engines, designed by Ericsson himself, driving a single four-bladed, propeller. Their engines were powered by four fire-tube boilers at a working pressure of . The engines produced a total of which gave the monitors a maximum speed of in calm waters. The ships carried of coal, enough for six day's steaming.Harris, pp. 26–27

Armament Tirfing, and her sister ship Thordön, were briefly armed with a pair of M/66 smoothbore gunsHarris, p. 27 before being rearmed in 1873 with two M/69 rifled breech loaders, derived from a French design. They weighed and fired projectiles at a muzzle velocity of . At their maximum elevation of 7.5° they had a range of . An improved version was developed in the 1870s; the guns were heavier, , but had a higher muzzle velocity of . Coupled with the increased elevation of 11.29°, this gave them a range of . Tirfing received her guns in 1885.Bojerud, pp. 169, 177

In 1877 each monitor received a pair of 10-barreled M/75 machine guns designed by Helge Palmcrantz. Each machine gun weighed and had a rate of fire of 500 rounds per minute. Its projectiles had a muzzle velocity of and a maximum range of . These guns were replaced during the 1880s by the 4-barreled M/77 Nordenfeldt gun, which was an enlarged version of Palmcrantz's original design. The gun had a rate of fire of 120 rounds per minute and each round had a muzzle velocity of . Its maximum range was .Bojerud, pp. 177–178

Armor The John Ericsson-class ships had a complete waterline armor belt of wrought iron that was high and thick. The armor consisted of five plates backed by of wood. The lower edge of this belt was thick as it was only three plates thick. The maximum thickness of the armored deck was in two layers. The gun turret's armor consisted of twelve layers of iron, totalling in thickness on the first four monitors. The inside of the turret was lined with mattresses to catch splinters. The base of the turret was protected with a glacis, high, and the turret's roof was 127 millimeters thick. The conning tower was positioned on top of the turret and its sides were ten layers () thick. The funnel was protected by six layers of armor with a total thickness of up to half its height.

Service Tirfing had her keel laid down on 28 January 1865 and was launched 1 June 1866. She was commissioned on 2 July 1867. That same month Crown Prince Oscar, later King Oscar II, inspected Tirfing, , , the steam frigates Thor and , and the Norwegian monitor in the Stockholm archipelago before they departed for port visits in Helsingfors, later known as Helsinki, and Kronstadt in August, where they were visited by Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich of Russia, head of the Imperial Russian Navy. This was the only foreign visit ever made by the ship.Harris, p. 28

Tirfing was commissioned less often than her two older sisters. She was only active in 1867, 1873, 1880, 1885 and 1888–89 before she was mobilized for World War I. The ship was reconstructed in 1903–05; she received a pair of new Bofors M/94 guns that were given elevation limits of −7° and +15°. The ship also received new boilers and eight M/95 quick-firing guns taken from the and s. Tirfing joined her sister Thordön as part of the Gothenburg flotilla during World War I. Both ships were decommissioned in 1922 and sold the following year. Their new owner converted them into barges and used them in Stockholm harbor.Bojerud, pp. 177–178, 180

Footnotes

References