Königsberg class (1915)

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Koenigsberg class
Karlsruhe 1919 in Scapa Flow
Karlsruhe 1919 in Scapa Flow
Overview
Type Small cruiser
units 4th
Order 1913
Keel laying 1914-1915
Launch 1915-1916
Namesake Cities of Königsberg , Emden , Karlsruhe and Nuremberg
1. Period of service flag
Commissioning 1916-1917
Whereabouts The Entente's spoils of war
Technical specifications
displacement

Construction: 5440 t
Maximum: 7125 t

length

KWL : 145.8 m
over all: 151.4 m

width

14.2 m

Draft

5.96 - 6.32 m

crew

17 officers and 458 men
as division flagship:
23 officers and 478 men

drive

like Graudenz class
(except Karlsruhe )

speed

27.5 kn

Range

4850 nm at 12 kn

Armament
Volume

4557 BRT
2051 NRT

Armor

like Magdeburg class,
additional mine space:
horizontal: 20 mm
vertical: 30 mm

stock

350 - 1340 t coal and
150 - 500 t heating oil

The Königsberg class , also known as the Königsberg II class , was a class of four small cruisers of the Imperial Navy which were used in the First World War . After the cruiser class of 1905, it is the second class to bear this name .

General

Designed in 1913, the four ships were designated as replacement Gazelle , replacement Nymphe , replacement Niobe and replacement Thetis . When they were launched, they were baptized with the names of small cruisers that were lost in distant waters at the beginning of the First World War .

In contrast to the first Königsberg class , these ships were larger, faster and more heavily armed (15 cm guns). Instead of the battering bow, they had a sloping stem. They were used in the last two years of the war.

After the war, all ships of this class except for the Königsberg were interned in Scapa Flow . When the Imperial High Seas Fleet was sunk on June 21, 1919, Nuremberg and Emden were grounded by the British. The Karlsruhe sank and is still lying there today on the ground.

The Konigsberg served after the war, first as a mail boat for the interned High Seas Fleet. It was then handed over to France as reparation. There she drove for a few years under the name Metz .

List of ships

Surname Shipyard Keel laying Launch Commissioning Whereabouts
SMS Koenigsberg AG Weser , Bremen August 22, 1914 December 18, 1915 August 12, 1916 Decommissioned on November 5, 1919,
French spoils of war and broken up in 1936
SMS Emden AG Weser, Bremen December 2, 1914 February 1, 1916 March 12, 1917 attempted scuttling on June 21, 1919 in Scapa Flow ,
French spoils of war and broken up in 1926
SMS Karlsruhe Imperial shipyard , Kiel May 4, 1915 January 31, 1916 November 15, 1916 self-sunk on June 21, 1919 in Scapa Flow
SMS Nuremberg Howaldtswerke , Kiel December 1914 April 16, 1916 February 15, 1917 attempted scuttling on June 21, 1919 in Scapa Flow , sunk
as a British target ship in 1922

literature

  • Gerhard Koop / Klaus-Peter Schmolke, Kleine Kreuzer 1903-1918, Bremen to Cöln-Klasse , Volume 12 Ship classes and ship types of the German Navy, Bernard & Graefe Verlag Munich, 2004, ISBN 3-7637-6252-3 .
  • Erich Gröner , Dieter Jung and Martin Maass, The German Warships 1815–1945 Volume 1 . Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Munich 1982, ISBN 3-7637-4800-8 .