Augusta class
.jpg) SMS Augusta 1864 (illustration)
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The Augusta class was a class of two smooth-deck corvettes that were acquired by the Prussian Navy in the 1860s . The two ships were SMS Augusta and SMS Victoria . The ships were named after the wife of the Prussian king and that of the crown prince. The corvettes of the class were acquired by France as part of the modernization of the Prussian Navy and were intended to serve in the war against Denmark and later on extended trips to overseas areas of interest for Prussia and the German Confederation . The main armament consisted of a battery of eight 24 pounder guns. The ships were considered modern steam corvettes and had full sailing equipment to supplement the steam engine on long mission trips overseas. In 1884 the ships were reclassified as cruiser corvettes .
history
The Confederate States had ordered two warships from L'Arman Frères in Bordeaux for use in the Civil War . In order to disguise this and to prevent international entanglements, the ships were built under the (apparently Japanese) names Yeddo and Osakka . The actual name of the Yeddo would have been Mississippi , while the Osakka would have been baptized Louisiana . However, in order to avoid the involvement of France in the war, the delivery was made through the personal intervention of Emperor Napoleon III. prevented.
When the delivery to the client was no longer possible, the ships were purchased by the Kingdom of Prussia on May 13, 1864 during the German-Danish War to strengthen their fleet. The Yeddo was commissioned as Augusta , named after Augusta von Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach , and the Osakka as Victoria , named after Victoria . However, the Augusta did not arrive in the North Sea until July and the Victoria in September 1864, after the end of the war.
The ships were originally intended to be used as blockade breakers , but when they were put into service it turned out to be too slow to be used in that capacity.
In the German war in 1866 have not been used, but began after a series of operations overseas, where they spent most of their service. The reason was that, in the late 1860s, German trade interests expanded in overseas markets in Asia, Central and South America, and the Pacific, while other European powers began to exclude German companies from activities in their overseas areas of interest. Accordingly, the naval command decided that the ships of the Augusta class, which in addition to the technical innovation of steam power also had traditional sailing systems with a correspondingly large radius of action, as so-called stationary ones to protect German interests and for further power projection , often also in the sense of a gunboat policy , deployed at marine stations established overseas .
Within this role, Augusta caused a minor diplomatic incident with Costa Rica and the United States in 1868 over an attempt to secure a Prussian naval base in the Caribbean . Victoria joined her there later that year. During the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, the Augusta was used in the cruiser war and had some successes off the French Atlantic coast. Victoria was not used during the war. Both ships continued to be used abroad in the mid and late 1870s, including in the Caribbean, the Mediterranean and the Pacific.
In the early 1880s, the ships were withdrawn from active service. Victoria was decommissioned in 1882 and was intended to be a training ship . However, the naval command decided that they could not perform the task adequately, which is why she was temporarily used as a fisheries protection ship in the remainder of the 1880s . In 1885 Augusta was sent to the South Pacific with replacement crews for other German warships. However, she sank in a cyclone in the Gulf of Aden , with no one on board surviving. Victoria was in service until 1890. It was struck from the marine register in 1891 and sold for scrapping in 1892.
properties
Augusta and Victoria were 75.2 m long at the waterline and 81.5 m long, with a width of 11.1 m and a draft of 5.03 m forward and 5.62 m aft. The design displacement was 1827 t, with a full load the ships displaced up to 2272 t. The hulls were a wooden construction that was covered with copper plates to prevent bio-corrosion during longer missions overseas, where shipyard facilities were not readily available.
The ship's crew consisted of 15 officers and 215 men . Both ships had a number of dinghies of unspecified types.
drive
The ships of the Augusta class were equipped with a horizontal 2-cylinder steam engine that propelled a two-bladed propeller with a diameter of 4.28 m. Steam was provided by four coal-fired boilers made by Mazeline in Le Havre . The exhaust gases were directed amidships into a single retractable chimney . Upon completion were Augusta and Victoria with a full-rigged ship - rig equipped. When Augusta but in 1871 the main mast was removed and Victoria's rig was in 1879 on a Bark reduced.
The ships had a planned speed of 12 knots (22 km / h) at 400 kW rated power . In tests, however, both ships reached a speed of 13.5 knots (25.0 km / h) with an induced power of 1300 PS (1300 PS). The engine output was generally insufficient, as the ships were not particularly fast and thus particularly unsuitable for their role as blockade breakers. They had a bunker capacity for 340 tons of coal, which gave them a travel radius of 2600 nautical miles (4600 km) at a speed of 12 knots (22 km / h).
The design of the ships, as well as the maneuverability under sail, was insufficient. They suffered from considerable windward and leeward eagerness , had a tendency to pitch and had a strong bow wave . Maneuverability improved considerably under steam power. It was steered by means of a single rudder.
Armament
The Augusta-class ships were armed with a battery of eight 24-pounder and six 12-pounder cannons, all of which were muzzle-loaders . After 1872, these weapons were four 15-cm- ring guns of the caliber length replaces L / 22, six 12-cm-ring guns L / 23 and a single 8-cm L / 23 cannon. These were more modern breech loaders . A total of 440 shells were carried for the 15 cm cannons, which had a range of 5000 m. The 12 cm cannons had a maximum range of 5900 m and 660 rounds of ammunition on board. Then another six were in the later period of service Hotchkiss - 3.7 cm revolver cannon installed.
Ships
| ship | Original name | shipyard | Keel laying | Launch | sale |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SMS Augusta | Yeddo | L'Arman Frères , Bordeaux | 1863 | 1864 | May 13, 1864 |
| SMS Victoria | Osaka | 1863 | 1864 | May 13, 1864 |
literature
- Gröner, Erich / Dieter Jung / Martin Maass: The German warships 1815-1945 . tape 1 : Armored ships, ships of the line, battleships, aircraft carriers, cruisers, gunboats . Bernard & Graefe, Munich 1982, ISBN 3-7637-4800-8 .
- Hildebrand, Hans H. / Albert Röhr / Hans-Otto Steinmetz: The German warships . Biographies - a mirror of naval history from 1815 to the present . 10 volumes. Mundus Verlag, Ratingen (licensed edition by Koehler's Verlagsgesellschaft, Hamburg, approx. 1990).
Footnotes
- ↑ Hans Jürgen Hansen: The ships of the German fleets 1848-1945. Bechtermünz publishing house. Approved license issue for Weltbild Verlag GmbH. Augsburg. 1998. ISBN 3-86047-329-8 . Page 46.