De Grasse (ship, 1940)

De Grasse

Ship data flag  France Ship type Light cruiser Keel laying August 28, 1939 Launch September 11, 1946 Commissioning 3rd September 1956 Whereabouts Wrecked in 1976

Ship dimensions and crew length 188.3 m ( Lüa ) width 21.5 m Draft Max. 5.54 m displacement 12,350  t   crew 983 men

Machine system machine 2 × steam turbine 4 × steam boiler Machine performance 105,000 PS (77,227 kW) Top speed 33.8 kn (63 km / h)

Armament 16 × Flak 12.7 cm L / 54 model 1948 20 × Sk 5.7 cm L / 60 Bofors Armor Belt: 100 mm Deck: 38 mm Bulkheads: 20–60 mm Torpedo bulkheads: 20 mm

The De Grasse was a French light cruiser that was captured by the Wehrmacht in 1940 while still lying on a pile and was to be completed as a German aircraft carrier . It was named after the French admiral Comte de Grasse .

history

The De Grasse was on August 28, 1939 Lorient placed on the stack. After the German troops marched into Lorient during the French campaign in June 1940, the hull was confiscated as German spoils of war.

In 1942 the navy began to think about how to get an aircraft carrier quickly. Since a usable half-finished new building could be completed into a girder faster than a completely new building, appropriate new buildings were sought and De Grasse was also included in the planning. Appropriate construction plans were drawn up and on December 3, 1942, the order to convert it into an aircraft carrier was given. However, less than two months later, with Hitler's order of January 26, 1943, to stop building all large ships, the construction work on De Grasse , which had hardly started, was ended in early February 1943 .

Due to its relatively small size, the De Grasse could only have carried 23 aircraft, making it a light aircraft carrier .

In May 1945, the German occupation of Lorient ended and the French began to build the ship as a cruiser. De Grasse was launched on September 11, 1946 . Due to lack of money and modern technology, the ship could only be put into service as an anti-aircraft cruiser on September 3, 1956 . The De Grasse was put out of service in 1974 and scrapped 1976th

literature

• War diary of the Naval War Command 1939–1945 in 68 volumes, Verlag Mittler & Sohn, Herford 1988–1996. ISBN 978-3-81320-637-1 .
• Erich Gröner , Dieter Jung, Martin Maass: The German warships 1815-1945, Vol. 1: Armored ships, battleships, battleships, aircraft carriers, cruisers, gunboats, Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Bonn 3rd edition 1998, ISBN 3-7637-4800 -8 .
• Frank Omeda: The German aircraft carriers. From the beginning to 1945. E-Book, Kindle Edition 2012.