SMS Archduke Ferdinand Max (1865)
SMS Archduke Ferdinand Max was an armored frigate of the KK Kriegsmarine . It was named after the brother of Emperor Franz Joseph , Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian . The Ferdinand Max achieved historical importance as the flagship of Rear Admiral Tegetthoff in the naval battle of Lissa in the Third Italian War of Independence and Austro-Prussian War in 1866. The designation "Armored Frigate" may hide the fact that it was a wooden ship with armor plates. As with all KK warships of that time, the hull of Archduke Ferdinand Max was painted black and had a white battery stripe. Although the ship was officially named " Archduke Ferdinand Max ", it only bore the name " Ferdinand Max " on the ship's side .
Construction and technical data
The Archduke Ferdinand Max was built from 1863 to 1866, it was launched on May 24, 1865. It weighed 5140 tons, reached a maximum speed of 12.0 knots thanks to its 3500 hp and was designed for a crew of 489 men . At the time of the Battle of Lissa, she was armed with 18 smooth 48-pounder cannons. The armor was - as far as completed - 12.8 cm on 66 cm of wood backing. The prefabricated building did not take place until 1867.
Battle of Lissa
The Archduke Ferdinand Max was not yet finished at the time of the battle and had to be provisionally reinforced and equipped with railroad tracks and anchor chains in the weeks before the battle. Because of the outbreak of the Austro-Prussian War , Krupp no longer delivered the guns that had been ordered and already paid for, which is why Tegetthoff had his flagship (as well as the armored ships Habsburg and Kaiser ) equipped with smooth-barreled guns from which "glowing bullets can be shot".
In the roadstead at Fasana , the crews of the fleet were trained and target exercises were carried out on target targets. When the Italian fleet attacked the Austrian island of Lissa on July 16, 1866 , the Austrian fleet was still in Fasana. The Italian fleet was far superior to the Austrian in numbers and artillery. The Italians under Admiral Persano launched several waves of attack against the fortifications of Lissa. On July 18, Tegetthoff received reports of the Italian operation, but initially thought it was a diversionary maneuver to divert the Austrian fleet away from Istria and Trieste . On July 19, based on the news from Lissa, there was no longer any doubt that Persano intended the conquest of Lissa.
When the Austrian fleet left Fasana, the Archduke Ferdinand Max was the last to stay in the roadstead. An eyewitness, the liner ensign Max von Rottauscher at the time, reports: “The admiral's ship stayed in the roadstead to receive or post the last dispatches from Brioni. Of the rest, however, each one tore the anchor from the ground as soon as it was clear. […] A short time later the ships were assembled in See south of Brioni and drove very slowly, waiting for Tegetthoff, towards the Istrian coast. At one o'clock the admiral appeared behind us. Breaking out of the gorse foams of the reef islands, the 'Ferdinand Max' poured the water up the bow. As for the last draft, Tegetthoff was standing on the back of his tank ... So 'Ferdinand Max' whizzed through the Escadre from back to front, similar to the flying Dutchman. […] Suddenly, without an order to do so, all the hatches burst into a clattering crowd, the crew ran out of the depths of every ship, stormed the masts, the higher, the better, hundreds of people crawled up, seemingly lost consciousness have to be just holding out hands and shouting. [...] Tegetthoff pulled his cap off his head. He waved it with wide circles of his arms. "
Immediately before contact with the enemy, Tegetthoff signaled: "Run at the enemy to make him sink!" Another command should have followed “Must be a victory for Lissa!”. As the battle began, only the word “must” ran along the line, which was interpreted symbolically for the concentrated willpower of Tegetthoff and his fleet.
Tegetthoff sent his fleet into battle in a wedge formation , which he hoped to compensate for the artillery disadvantages of his fleet in close combat by using the ramming tactics. In powder smoke, often only the color of the hull made it possible to distinguish between friend and foe. So Tegetthoff gave his officers the order "When battle comes, everything that is gray rams."
In the chaos of battle, Archduke Ferdinand Max's commander , Captain Maximilian von Sterneck , succeeded in avoiding the impact of an enemy ironclad, with both units rubbing against each other. In return, von Sterneck carried out a ram thrust against the armored cannon boat Palestro , but only hit it at an acute angle, with the Palestro only tearing a few armor plates from the ship's side, the cross marshals and sangaffel falling on the front casaret of Archduke Ferdinand Max - and thereby the Italian war flag the Palestro fell into Austrian hands. Towards the end of the battle, the Palestro exploded due to a fire in the powder chamber and sank. It is difficult to reconstruct whether this explosion has a causal connection with the ramming of Archduke Ferdinand Max . In the next instant the Italian flagship Rè d'Italia was stopped in front of the Archduke Ferdinand Max . Captain von Sterneck gave the order “Up to the chimney!” And the Archduke Ferdinand Max rammed her ram two meters into the side of the Rè d'Italia . Von Sterneck maneuvered his ship backwards again, so that a five-square-meter leak in the side of the Re d'Italia opened and suddenly filled with water. The Rè d'Italia went under within a few minutes. As reported by contemporary witnesses, attempts by the Austrians to rescue survivors were thwarted by continuous shell fire from the Italian units.
After the Battle of Lissa
In 1868 the Archduke Ferdinand Max was named the flagship of the KuK Eskadre . In 1870 she accompanied Emperor Franz Joseph to the opening of the Suez Canal . As a sign of victory, the Archduke Ferdinand Max stayed in service longer than was usual for a wooden ship of the time. In 1870 she was overhauled and refurbished, and after further modernization she took part in a naval maneuver off Pola in 1884 in front of Emperor Franz Joseph. In 1877 the ship was transferred to the second reserve and decommissioned in 1885. In 1889 it was on-board the artillery training ship Novara . It was not until 1916 that the Archduke Ferdinand Max was scrapped.
symbolism
The Archduke Ferdinand Max is much symbolism climbs. Rear Admiral Tegetthoff probably chose the ship as his flagship because of the name. He probably wanted to show his solidarity with Ferdinand Maximilian, the great sponsor of the KuK-Kriegsmarine. Last but not least, the Archduke Tegetthoff recognized his talent and supported his ascent.
Archduke heir to the throne Franz Ferdinand wanted to keep the Ferdinand Max as a museum ship in order to guarantee the survival of the symbol of the victorious naval forces of the Danube monarchy. However, this did not happen due to the First World War . In any case, the SMS Archduke Ferdinand Max was and still is in Austrian naval circles as a symbol of the Austrian rebellion against Italian and Prussian aggression.
literature
- K. Gogg: Austria's Navy 1848–1918 . 2nd edition of the Bergland-Buch, Salzburg / Stuttgart 1974.
Web links
- More information at austria-mint.at