President Masaryk

President Masaryk

Ship data flag  Czechoslovakia other ship names Bechelars Ship type Monitor (1932-1944) class separate class Shipyard Shipyard in Komárno Launch October 19, 1930 Commissioning August 1932 Decommissioning officially May 11, 1945 military use until 1949 Whereabouts Scrapped in 1978

Ship dimensions and crew length 47.5 m ( Lüa ) width 6 m Draft Max. 1.07 m displacement 214 tons   crew 38-46

Machine system Machine performance 1800 hp Top speed 31 kn (57 km / h) propeller 2

The President Masaryk was a Czechoslovak warship that was used as a patrol boat or river monitor (1932-1944) on the Danube . Named after Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk , the ship was first in Czechoslovakian ownership and from 1939 to 1944 under the name of Bechelaren in German ownership. After the Second World War , the ship was demilitarized and used civilly. In 1978 it was scrapped.

history

The pattern for the manufacture of the patrol boat were Austro-Hungarian ships. After the stabilization of Czechoslovakia , which was established in 1918 , the ship was laid down in the Škoda shipyard in the Slovak town of Komárno in 1929 . Due to the good economic situation, the high construction costs were not a problem. The ship was equipped with four 6.6 cm L30 ship guns, four heavy machine guns caliber 7.92 mm and ten contact mines . The propellers came from the Hamburg company Zeise .

The launch of the President Masaryk took place on October 19, 1930. After several tests it turned out that the ship did not meet the expected performance. However, due to the global economic crisis, renovation was not carried out. The ship was finally put into operation on the Danube in August 1932.

After the destruction of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, the ship went to German ownership of and was for a figure of Nibelungensage in Bechelaren renamed. The ship was added to the Danube Flotilla of the Navy . In November 1939, the shipyard in Korneuburg began to renovate . In May 1940, the ship was towed to Linz in an unfinished state . The Bechelaren was not ready for action until the beginning of May 1941. From the summer of 1943 she was used as a guide ship in the security operation against partisans on the Danube between Baziaş at the Iron Gate and Novi Sad . At the beginning of September 1943, the ship had to be taken out of service after repeated damage to its steam turbines. In January 1944, new diesel engines were installed in Linz. In addition, two Czech 6.6 cm cannons , a 3.7 cm cannon and a 2.0 cm anti-aircraft gun were installed. On April 30, 1944, the Bechelaren was put back into service. During a renewed conversion from January to March 1945, the Czech 6.6 cm cannons were replaced by German 8.8 cm cannons.

literature

• Miroslav Hubert, Hlídková loď President Masaryk v pohledu techniky (Patrol boat President Masaryk from a technology perspective), Spolek přátel plavby a ARES, Prague and Děčín 2004, ISBN 80-86158-41-1
• Miroslav Hubert, Karel Pavala: Vojenské lodě Československa 1918–1959 (warships of Czechoslovakia 1918–1959), Spolek přátel plavby a ARES, Prague and Děčín 1999 P 53, ISBN 80-86158-11-X

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hlídkova loď President Masaryk. Československá Armada 1938, 2009, archived from the original on September 23, 2015 ; Retrieved May 26, 2014 (Czech). 
2. ↑ Renato Schirer: The Danube monitors of the German navy. Naval Historical Archives, 2008, accessed May 22, 2014 .