Numancia (ship, 1864)
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The armored frigate Numancia was the first ironclad in the Spanish Navy and also the first of its kind to circumnavigate the world . For a quarter of a century (until the Pelayo was commissioned ), the Numancia was the strongest battleship in the Spanish Navy. In total, she was in service for half a century.
history
The Numancia was from the French shipyard Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée in La Seyne-sur-Mer built and launched on 19 November 1863 from the stack . It took about another year to complete the ship. On 20 December 1864, the completed ironclad reached after 43 hours transfer drive from Toulon from Cartagena .
On February 4, 1865, the Numancia set sail from Cádiz for a circumnavigation, which she ended there again after two years, seven months and six days. During this circumnavigation of the world, she took part in the bombing of Valparaíso as part of the Spanish-South American War in 1866 . In the subsequent bombing of Callao, the Numancia was badly damaged by enemy fire and Admiral Casto Méndez Núñez was seriously wounded.
In the following years, the ironclad was involved in various missions by the Spanish Navy. In 1870 they were brought to Cartagena by King Amadeus I of La Spezia .
It played a key role during the First Spanish Republic . As the flagship of the cantonalists of Cartagena fighting against the central government , it was used in 1873 to bombard Alicante and other Spanish cities. In a sea battle off Cartagena she fought against her "sister ship" Vitoria . After their defeat, the cantonalists broke through the Spanish blockade of Cartagena with the Numancia in 1874 and escaped to Algeria thanks to higher speed.
In October 1893, took Numancia at war for Melilla part and bombed some surrounding villages of the city besieging Moroccans. In the years 1897 and 1898, the Numancia, along with the Vitoria and the Pelayo, was at the shipyard in La Seyne for modernization. As a result, she came too late to serve in the Spanish-American War .
Together with two French warships, the Numancia took part in a fleet demonstration off Tangier at the end of 1906 . She remained in service with the Spanish Navy until 1912 and was finally back in Tangier. After the decommissioning, the completely outdated ironclad was offered for sale for scrapping. However, the sale was initially postponed due to public pressure, as efforts were made to preserve the ship as a historical heritage. This was ultimately unsuccessful, so that the Numancia was sold to Bilbao for scrapping in 1916 . After two attempts to transfer the ship from Cádiz to Bilbao had failed, the Numancia stranded on the Portuguese coast on December 17, 1916 on the third call . The ironclad was partly scrapped on the spot as a result.
technology
The Numancia was equipped with an iron hull. It was 96.01 m long and 17.37 m wide. With a displacement of 7189 t, her maximum draft was 8.22 m. The crew of the ship had a nominal strength of 500 men.
The Numancia was powered by a steam engine , which gave an indicated output of 3700 hp to a screw with a diameter of 6.35 m. The steam drive enabled the ship to reach a top speed of 10 knots, and the fuel supply was 1100 tonnes of coal. During the renovation in 1897/98, the ironclad received a new machine system with which a maximum speed of 13 knots was possible. As is typical of the time, the Numancia also had a fully - fledged full ship rigging . The sail area measured 1846 m², which was described as average and sufficient in contemporary literature.
Originally there were 40 68-pounder smooth -barreled cannons on board the Numancia . By 1890 these were replaced by guns of various calibres . This year, the armament consisted of the ship mainly drawn muzzle of Armstrong , eight of the caliber 25.4 cm and seven of the caliber 20.3 cm. The 25.4 cm guns were all set up on the main deck, as were four of the 20.3 cm guns. The other three cannons of the smaller caliber found their place on the upper deck. The armament was supplemented by a 20.0 cm rear loading cannon from Hontoria , eight machine guns and two torpedo tubes with a diameter of 35 cm. During the conversion, the Numancia again received a different armament, which consisted of rapid-fire guns of the caliber 16.25 cm (four pieces), 14 cm (six pieces) and 12 cm as well as twelve machine guns and the torpedo tubes already on board.
The Numanica had iron armor. The battery was protected with 120 mm thick armor. The belt armor, however, was 14 cm thick, but decreased by 10 mm at the bow and stern. The total mass of the armor was 1355 t.
literature
- Gardiner, Robert (Ed.): Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships 1860-1905 . Conway Maritime Press, London 1979, ISBN 0-85177-133-5 , pp. 380 .
- Iriondo, Eduardo: Impresiones del viaje de circunnavegacion de la fregata blindada Numancia . Madrid 1867 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
Footnotes
- ↑ a b c d e f Gardiner, Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships , p. 380.
- ↑ Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 13.
- ↑ Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 18.
- ↑ a b c Fragata Blindada Numancia ( Memento from June 14, 2019 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ Fidel Pagés Miravé: Es descubrimiento de la epidural tras la batalla , In: Javier Santamarta del Pozo: Siempre tuvimos héroes - La impagable aportación de España al humanitarismo , Chapter 1. EDAF, Madrid 2017
- ↑ a b Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 16.
- ↑ Gardiner, Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships , p. 380. Iriondo, however, gives 34 guns, cf. Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 14.
- ↑ Gardiner, Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships , p. 380. According to Iriondo, the armor thickness was only 130 mm, cf. Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 15.
- ↑ Iriondo, Impresiones , p. 15.