Rolf Krake (ship)
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 The Rolf octopus in front of Dübbel 1864 |
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| Overview | |
| Type | Tower ship |
| Shipyard | |
| Order | August 1862 |
| Keel laying | 1862 |
| Launch | May 6, 1863 |
| Namesake | Rolf Octopus |
| Commissioning | July 1, 1863 |
| Removed from ship register | June 29, 1907 |
| Whereabouts | sold for demolition |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
1,360 t |
| length |
58.3 m over everything |
| width |
15.5 m |
| Draft |
7.1 m |
| crew |
140 men |
| drive |
Steam engine |
| speed |
10.5 kn |
| Range |
1150 nm at 8 kn |
| Armament |
2 × 26 cm L / 35 Krupp cannons |
| Fuel supply |
265 tons of coal |
| Armored deck |
54 to 240 mm |
|
Armament 1906 |
2 × 26 cm L / 35 Krupp cannons |
The Rolf Krake was a tower ship of the Danish Navy and the only Danish ship of its type. It was planned for defensive use in coastal waters. It was named after Rolf Krake , a historically unrelated king of the early days of Denmark.
General
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The Rolf Krake , which displaced 1,350 tons, was armored with 4.5-inch iron plates and was 57 meters long, was one of the world's first modern tower ships. She was commissioned by Denmark from the British shipyard Robert Napier & Sons in Glasgow in August 1862. The planning was influenced by the findings from the war of 1848/51 , namely from the disastrous battle near Eckernförde , which had shown the Danish fleet to be vulnerable to fire from land; and possibly the course of the naval battle between the Monitor and the Virginia on March 9, 1862 in the American Civil War was already included in the planning. There were great similarities between the Rolf Krake and the Monitor with regard to the construction of the hull and the contours of the deck (but not with regard to the silhouette of the ships).
The Rolf Krake was launched in 1863 and put into service on June 1st of the same year. She had a steam engine with 700 hp, reached a speed of 8 knots with a range of 1150 nautical miles, but also had auxiliary sails. She was rigged as a three-masted schooner .
The Rolf Krake was armed with four 60-pounder (eight-inch) smooth-barreled muzzle-loading cannons in two pivot towers . The turrets spun on a roller conveyor , a principle developed by Cowper Phipps Coles . The Rolf Krake was the first full iron tower ship built in Europe and the first ship in the world whose artillery was built into rotating towers according to the Coles patent.
history
Due to its shallow draft of around 3.30 meters and its relatively low deck height, the Rolf Krake was compared to the older Danish armored ships such as the 5000 tonne Dannebrog , built in 1850 , which initially only had sails and only had a steam engine since 1858 , better suited for coastal operations. The Rolf Krake seemed to be well protected against direct fire from stationary or less mobile artillery from land because of its horse-drawn armor. Due to its turrets, which can be directed independently of the direction of travel, it was in principle able to achieve a strong and demoralizing effect in operations against land troops. Although technically fully up to date, its use in the German-Danish War was largely unsuccessful.
On February 25 and 26, 1864, she tried to prevent the construction of a Prussian pontoon bridge at Egernsund in Vemming Bay by indirect fire from a distance of 500 meters over a headland. In doing so, she herself came under direct fire. Although she received 150 hits, there were only three wounded on board. None of the hits penetrated the armor. Captain Hans Peter Rothe (1813–1905) broke off the bombardment of the pontoon bridge after an hour and a half and fired 57 rounds out of concern for his ship.
On March 28, the Rolf Krake fired 38 rounds at Prussian positions near Düppel and received several smaller hits. After the Prussian attack on the ski jumps failed, it turned away. The Prussians tried unsuccessfully to paralyze the ship with fishing nets that were supposed to wrap around the propeller. On April 18, the Rolf Krake shelled the storm trenches of the Prussian siege troops in front of the Düppeler Schanzen , but without being able to prevent the storming of the fortress. At that time, in contrast to the Prussian artillery , the Rolf Krake did not have high explosive shells, as they were considered unsuitable for naval warfare against the mostly wooden enemy ships. On that day, a 24-pounder HE shell from the ballistically firing Prussian artillery penetrated the poorly armored deck and exploded below deck, with Lieutenant WB Jespersen being the only Danish naval officer who died in this war. This made a structural weak point of the ship clear. After firing 95 rounds, the Rolf Krake turned away and arrived in Augustenborg on April 19, out of reach of the Prussian batteries.
After a layover in Augustenburg, which was used for repairs, the Rolf Krake was placed under the command of Rear Admiral Carl Edvard van Dockum (1804-1893) on June 12 of the Baltic Sea Squadron . On June 29, the ship under Captain Rothe tried to prevent the passage of the Prussian troops to the island of Alsen , which had started at two o'clock at night with 160 mostly small boats, which in total crossed about 600 times.
Possibly due to a misjudgment of the confusing tactical situation by the captain in the dark or because he feared the mines of the sound or a runaway - the latter could have led to the boarding of the ship by the Prussians because of the low board - or simply because of the knowledge that the War had already been decided against Denmark and the continuation of the operation would have claimed many victims, Rothe broke off the entry into the Sound after two hours and fired 116 rounds and guided several smaller Danish ships out of the range of the Prussian artillery. Presumably the Rolf Krake , which received powerful counterfire with full bullets and high explosive shells, could have severely hindered the amphibious operation of the Prussians, but hardly prevented it completely. In total, the Rolf Krake fired 306 shots during the war.
Subsequently, the ship was limited to preventing a possible transition of the Prussians to Funen and supporting its own troops in the evacuation there. Because of the Danish naval superiority during the entire war, there was no battle between the Rolf Krake and enemy ships.
After the end of the war, a commission investigated the events of the Battle of Alsen - also at Captain Rothe's own request - and absolved him of all guilt in 1866.
In 1865 the front tower of the Rolf Krake , whose artillery was not very effective against land targets due to the poor accuracy of the smooth barrel, was replaced by a 60-pounder (eight-inch) cannon with a rifled barrel. Later, another conversion took place on two eight-inch and two three-inch breech-loading cannons rifled. The ship was active until the early 1890s. In 1893 a 15 cm high explosive shell exploded in the barrel and caused major damage. But it wasn't until 1907 that the Rolf Krake was finally decommissioned and scrapped in Dordrecht in the Netherlands.
The next generation of tower ships - Lindormen (1869–1907) and Gorm (1871–1912) - were no longer built in England, but in Denmark. They had an even flatter silhouette, but greater draft.
Renewed use of the name
Rolf Krake (F 342) (ex HMS Calpe - L71) was also the name of a 1940-built in England Frigate of Hunt II class , which was delivered in 1952 to Denmark, where from 1954 to 1962 was in the service (scrapped in 1966).
Literary reception
In Theodor Fontane's novel Der Stechlin , published in 1897, the Rolf Krake is mentioned several times in relation to the figure of the village mayor Kluckhuhn, a veteran of the German-Danish War, who, in conversation with other characters, describes how the idea of the eerie ship ”, which Kluckhuhn still appears in a dream, was terrified and traumatized. In his war report on the German-Danish War, Theodor Fontane described the deployment of the Rolf Krake in the Flensburg Fjord and the horror that this ship caused in the Prussians.
literature
- James Phinney Baxter: The Introduction of the Ironclad Warship. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA 1933.
- Richard Hill: The Ironclad War. Brandenburgisches verlagshaus, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89488-139-9 .
- Lawrence Sondhaus: Navies of Europe. 1815-1914. Routledge, Edinburgh 2001, ISBN 0-415-21478-5 .
- R. Steen Steensen: Vore Panserskibe 1863-1943. Marinehistorisk Selskab, Copenhagen 1968.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Lawrence Sondhaus: Navies of Europe. 1815-1914. Routledge, Edinburgh 2001. pp. 92-93.
- ^ Arnold A. Putnam: Rolf Krake, Europe's First Turreted Ironclad. In: Mariner's Mirror. Volume 84, No. 1 February 1998, pp. 56-63.
- ^ Hans Christian Bjerg, Th. Topsøe-Jensen: Hans Peter Rothe . In: Svend Cedergreen Bech , Svend Dahl (eds.): Dansk biografisk leksikon . Founded by Carl Frederik Bricka , continued by Povl Engelstoft. 3. Edition. tape 12 : Rasmussen – Scavenius . Gyldendal, Copenhagen 1982, ISBN 87-01-77482-4 (Danish, biografiskleksikon.lex.dk - as of November 1, 2011).
- ↑ August Trinius: History of the war against Denmark. In: History of the Wars of Unification. Volume 1, G. Hempel Verlag, 1885, p. 381.
- ↑ Johnny E. Balsved: 306 styk 60-punds granater kunne ikke alene redde Sønderjylland og als fra Preussisk invasion , on navalhistory.dk.
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^ A b Theodor Fontane: The Schleswig-Holstein War in 1864. Berlin 1866, p. 160 (drawing); P. 244 f. (Quote from the letter of a battle participant who mentions the ship):
- Further out one looked into the open blue sea; a Danish squadron crossed at the exit of the Wenningbund, also "Rolf Krake", the black monster, slowly moved up and down, but did not venture near our batteries.
- ^ Theodor Fontane: The Stechlin. F. Fontane & Co., Berlin 1899 (first book edition), p. 215 (“the black beast always lay close to us and looked like a coffin”), p. 345 (conversation with Countess Melusine).