Astraea class
|
|
|---|---|
| Astraea class | |
 HMS Bonaventure |
|
| Overview | |
| Type | Protected cruiser |
| units | 8th |
| Shipyard | |
| Keel laying | 1890-1891 |
| Launch | 1892-1893 |
| Commissioning | 1894-1896 |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
4,360 ts |
| length |
overall: 103.5 m (339.5 ft ) |
| width |
15.1 m (49.5 ft) |
| Draft |
5.8 m (19 ft) |
| crew |
318 men |
| drive |
|
| speed |
18 kn , 19.5 kn with fan |
| Range |
7000 nm at 10 kn (1000 t coal) |
| Armament |
|
|
Armor deck |
|
| Engine room |
125 mm |
| Gun shields |
115 mm |
| Command tower |
76-150 mm |
The Astraea-class was a class of eight armored cruisers in the Royal Navy . They were designed as an improved version of the Apollo-class protected cruisers . All ships were built at the naval shipyards of Devonport , Pembroke , Chatham , Portsmouth and Sheerness and not, as in the previous Apollo class, mainly at private shipyards. The ships were built for use in tropical waters and all had copper-clad hulls. When the First World War broke out , seven cruisers were still in existence. The HMS Astraea and the HMS Fox were still in service as foreign cruisers and remained so until the end of the war. HMS Charybdis , which had been in reserve for a long time , was reactivated and served in the Atlantic until it crashed in January 1915. The other four were only used for inpatient emergency services. From 1920 to 1923 the ships were separated and sold. The HMS Hermione , which was bought by The Marine Society as a stationary training ship and, like its predecessors, was renamed Warspite , escaped demolition . In 1940 the training on the ship lying near Greenwich was given up due to the danger of bombing in the Second World War and this ship was also canceled.
Building history
The eight cruisers were procured in the 1890s as an improved version of the Apollo class based on the decisions of the Naval Defense Act of 1889 . They displaced about 1000 ts more than the previous class, had better sea characteristics and had a somewhat stronger and better placed armament. This was achieved through the additional, continuous deck, which gave the ships a higher freeboard and the weapons a higher location. The improvement was nevertheless criticized because the armament with only two additional 120 mm guns was not significantly reinforced and there was no improvement in the areas of speed and range. The cruisers were all built in state naval yards, with three in Devonport, two in Pembroke and one each in Sheerness, Chatham and Portsmouth.
Calls
All eight ships of the class were stationed overseas, at least for some time, especially in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Despite the fact that they were obsolete, were all except the 1914 sold in the Netherlands to abort Forte in the First World War used.
The cruisers came into service between July 1894 and April 1896 and mostly served on foreign stations. In the summer of 1906, when they had all served over 10 years, Astraea and Flora served on China Station , Cambrian with the Australian Squadron , Fox on East Indies Station, and Forte on Cape of Good Hope Station . Charybdis and Hermione were in the reserves at Chatham and Portsmouth, respectively. The Bonaventure , who returned from the Pacific in the spring, was out of service and was converted into a submarine tender.
The HMS Bonaventure was the first ship of the class to be launched at the end of 1892. It was used at the Pacific Station on the American west coast and the China Station until spring 1906 and was converted into a submarine mother ship by 1907. She also spent World War I in this role and was sold for scrapping in 1920.
The HMS Cambrian came into service as the second ship of the class in 1894. Since 1905 she served with the Australian squadron, the last flagship of which she became in January 1913, before the Australian Navy took over this area in the summer after the arrival of its newbuildings and it returned to Great Britain in October 1913 to be retired and sold there. The outbreak of the First World War postponed the sale and she became a training ship for stokers under the name HMS Harlech . Renamed Vivid in 1921 , it was finally sold for demolition in 1923.
The namesake of the class, the HMS Astraea , was only launched as the third ship of the class on March 17, 1893. The Astraea served on the China Station and in India from 1908 before being assigned to the reserve in the Nore in 1912 . In 1913 it was moved to the Cape of Good Hope . She stayed there during the war. On July 31, she followed in vain off Dar es Salaam the SMS Königsberg , which was leaving for cruiser warfare in the Indian Ocean, together with the British Cape Squadron, which still included HMS Pegasus and the flagship HMS Hyacinth . Later she took part in the bombardment of Dar es Salaam and the blockade of the Koenigsberg in the Rufiji Delta . After its end, it was used temporarily off Cameroon . After the war it was retired and sold for demolition in 1920.
The HMS Fox , which was the last ship of the class to enter service in April 1896, mostly served in India, where it remained continuously from 1908. After the hunt for German merchant ships, she moved to East Africa and also took part in the blockade of the Königsberg . In 1917 it was used in the Red Sea to support the Arab uprising against the Turks, bombarded Turkish positions and ports and transported Arab troops.
In 1919 it took part in the Allied intervention in the White Sea before it was also sold for demolition in 1920.
The HMS Charybdis spent most of her service time in British waters and only made occasional voyages in the Indian Ocean and the Far East. In 1902 she was the flagship of the British units off Venezuela , which worked there with ships of the German Navy , including the large cruiser SMS Vineta , during the Venezuela crisis . Since 1906 it was part of the reserve. When the war broke out, she was assigned to the 12th cruiser squadron in the North Atlantic, which also included three cruisers of the (subsequent) Eclipse class . In January 1915 she was badly damaged in a collision. Initially used for port duties in Bermuda , she was converted into a merchant ship in 1917 and loaned to a shipping company in 1918. In 1920 it was returned to the Navy, which it sold for demolition in 1922.
The HMS Hermione was the ship of the class with the longest service life. It served in home waters such as off South Africa and was mostly in the reserve since 1910. It was supposed to be a tender for the first British naval airship and was used for tests with aircraft. In 1914 she was briefly used as a guard ship in Southampton and then from 1916 as a mother ship for motor boats. Decommissioned in 1919, the cruiser was bought by the Marine Society in 1922 and - renamed Warspite - used as a stationary training ship. In 1940 it was canceled.
The HMS Flora had served on Canada's west coast and off China and was for sale in 1914. After the outbreak of war she served as a workshop ship in Devonport, was named Indus II and was sold for demolition in 1922.
The HMS Forte served on the Cape of Good Hope and off West Africa. She was sold for demolition in 1914 as the first ship of the class
Astraea class ships
| Surname | Shipyard | Keel laying | Launch | Commissioning | fate | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bonaventure | Devonport Dockyard | December 1890 | December 2, 1892 | July 5, 1894 | U-boat tender, demolished in 1920 | |||
| Cambrian | Pembroke Dockyard | 1890 | January 30, 1893 | 1894 | Fireman training ship, demolished in 1923 | |||
| Astraea | Devonport Dockyard | August 1890 | March 17, 1893 | November 5, 1895 | Cape Squadron, demolished in 1920 | |||
| Fox | Portsmouth Dockyard | 1891 | June 15, 1893 | April 14, 1896 | East India, on demolition in 1920 | |||
| Charybdis | Sheerness Dockyard | 1891 | June 15, 1893 | January 14, 1896 | 12th cruiser squadron, badly damaged in 1915, demolished in 1922 | |||
| Hermione | Devonport Dockyard | December 1891 | November 7, 1893 | January 14, 1896 | Depot ship, 1922 TS Warspite , demolished in 1940 | |||
| flora | Pembroke Dockyard | 1891 | November 21, 1893 | 1895 | Workshop ship, demolished in 1923 | |||
| Forte | Chatham Dockyard | September 1891 | December 9, 1893 | November 1895 | for demolition in 1914 | |||
| Sources: Conway's 1860-1905, p. 77; Jane's, p. 62 | ||||||||
The seven remaining ships of the class survived the First World War and were sold for scrapping in the years that followed. An exception was the Hermione , which was taken over by the Marine Society after the war and only scrapped in 1940.
literature
- JJ Colledge, Ben Warlow: Ships of the Royal Navy: the complete record of all fighting ships of the Royal Navy. (Rev. ed.), Chatham, London 1969/2006, ISBN 9781861762818 . OCLC 67375475.
- Robert Gardiner, Roger Chesneau, Eugène M. Kolésnik, NJM Campbell .: Conway's All the world's fighting ships, 1860-1905 . Conway, 1979, ISBN 0851771335 .
- Robert Gardiner, Randal Gray, Przemysław Budzbon: Conway's All the world's fighting ships, 1906–1921 . Conway, 1985, ISBN 0851772455 .
- [1919] Jane's Fighting Ships of World War One . Military Press, New York 1990, ISBN 0-517-03375-5 .
Web links
- Astraea- class on battleships-cruisers.co.uk
- Astraea class on historyofwar.org
- Astraea class on worldwar1.co.uk
Footnotes
- ↑ a b c d e f g Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1906–1921 , p. 77
- ^ The Royal Navy, June 1, 1906
- ^ A b Colledge Ships of the Royal Navy. P. 44
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1906–1921 , p. 15
- ↑ Jane's Fighting Ships of World War I. P. 90
- ↑ a b Colledge, p. 58
- ↑ a b Colledge, p. 24
- ↑ Colledge, p. 133
- ↑ Colledge, p. 67
- ↑ a b c Colledge, p. 162
- ↑ Colledge, p. 131