SMS Falke (1891)
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SMS Falke was the second ship of the Bussard class , a class of six cruisers IV class of the Imperial Navy . In 1899 the ship wasreclassifiedas a small cruiser .
construction
The Kaiserliche Werft Kiel commissioned with the construction of the cruiser IV. Class D began work on the ship in January 1890. The new building was ready for launch on April 4, 1891 . After a baptismal address by the sea captain Prince Heinrich of Prussia , his wife, Princess Irene , named the ship the Falke .
commitment
Stationary in West Africa
The falcon was first put into service on September 14, 1891. From October 7, the ship carried out test drives. In thick fog it ran aground off Bornholm the next day , but was released again on its own. After completion of the trials, the falcon was decommissioned on October 31, 1891.
The next commissioning took place on August 14, 1892. The falcon was intended to replace the goshawk in West African waters, but was initially used for the autumn maneuvers of the fleet that began on August 23. After its end, the ship left Kiel on October 16 and took over the station business on November 3 . The falcon then ran at Dahomey , where there had been riots due to the French conquests. Among other things, two German merchants were also captured. The cruiser's commander, Korvettenkapitän Gottlieb Becker , negotiated unsuccessfully about their release in the second half of December. On December 31, the falcon reached Duala in the German protected area of Cameroon and met the hyena , the second station ship at the West African station.
The German Empire concluded border treaties with Portugal in 1886 and with Great Britain in 1890, in which the coast of German South West Africa was laid down in the area between the Kunene in the north and the Orange in the south. In the following years, the station ships had the task of systematically surveying the coastal area. At the same time it was necessary to find a suitable port for the connection with Windhoek . The falcon left Luanda on January 23, 1893 and arrived at the Cape Cross four days later . During the investigation of the cape and the cross bay, which was carried out until January 30, an old Portuguese coat of arms column was discovered, which had been erected by Diogo Cão at the end of January 1486 . The column should serve both as a control mark and to secure Portuguese ownership claims. Since 1482 ships looking for the sea route to India had these prefabricated stone pillars on board. Captain Becker had the column, which he considered unsuitable as a control mark , brought on board the falcon to protect it from further weathering. It was replaced by a wooden cross, which was replaced two years later by a stone replica of the coat of arms column. The original column was later disembarked in Duala and shipped to Germany on October 29, 1893 on the Stettin steamer operated by Norddeutscher Lloyd .
The further investigation of the coast between the Kunene and the Swakop was carried out until mid-March without a suitable port being found. The falcon therefore ran back through several intermediate ports to Duala, which it reached on April 29th. Due to internal political tensions in Liberia , the cruiser left Cameroon on May 27 and anchored off Monrovia on June 9 to offer protection to German nationals. Joseph James Cheeseman , President of Liberia, stayed aboard the Falcon at times to avoid rebels. After the unrest subsided, the ship returned to Duala by July 22nd. An overhaul that began in Cape Town at the end of November had to be interrupted on December 5, as the German protection force in German South West Africa requested help in the fight against the Witbooi . The falcon went to Lüderitz , but was able to return quickly to Cape Town, as intervention turned out to be unnecessary. In Cape Town the ship was ordered to transfer to the South Sea station.
Stationary in the South Seas
The falcon reached Melbourne on February 8, 1894 and later met in Sydney with her sister ship Bussard and the seagull , which were also used as station ships in the South Seas . After the three ships held joint target practice, the falcon continued its voyage to Apia , where it arrived on April 16. Samoa became the cruiser's primary operational area for the next five years. The ship stayed in Apia until the beginning of October and then went to Sydney to repair and replace the crew . After another stay in front of Apia, a major overhaul was carried out in Sydney from early March to early July 1895. The falcon was back in Apia on July 29th . In the following period, among other things , the natural harbor of Saluafata on the north coast of Upolu was precisely measured. On November 10, the cruiser set off on a round trip through the station area, initially calling at the Marshall Islands . After a visit to the Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land at the end of December, a meeting with the seagull took place in Matupi at the beginning of January 1896 . The round trip ended in Sydney at the end of January, where an overhaul of the ship and another replacement of the crew took place from February 4th to April 4th.
From April 15, 1896, the falcon was back in front of Samoa. After the three station ships met off Auckland in late August, the cruiser left Samoa again in early November for the Marshall Islands. There had been riots on one of the islands, which made it necessary to use the ship. This was followed by a tour of the station area, which ended on February 18, 1897 in Sydney. The falcon left the port there on April 23 and ran back to Apia by May 16, with Auckland and the Tonga Islands as intermediate destinations. On June 24th the cruiser ran again to Sydney to take over a new commander with Corvette Captain Johannes Wallmann . In August the falcon was ordered to Stephansort in New Guinea to take action after the violent death of Governor Curt von Hagen . Several villages were bombed and the locals intimidated, which is still unforgettable on the island today. The cruiser then brought a police force from Herbertshöhe to Berlin-Hafen , in the vicinity of which a seagull surveying team had been ambushed. The falcon's landing corps took action against the perpetrators there together with the police. As a result, the cruiser had to intervene at various points in the protected area against unrest among the local population and due to the murder of Germans. On November 10, the ship reached Apia, but left two days later to go to Sydney via Auckland.
After repairs were carried out in Sydney and a crew change was made, the falcon ran again on April 25, 1898 for a tour of the station area. The Carolines , which at that time still belonged to Spain , were also called at . At the end of August the ship was back in Sydney, where Corvette Captain Victor Schönfelder took command on September 1st. A month later the cruiser left Australia. The falcon then went to the New Hebrides , the Tonga Islands and the Fiji Islands and reached Apia on October 15. Since the conflict over Samoa was coming to a head at this time, the presence of a German warship off Samoa was of great importance for the German Empire. The Bussard's journey home on November 15 worsened the situation, as the Falke was the only German warship in the station area for several months. Corvette Captain Schönfelder had the difficult task of preventing the conflict from escalating in March 1899, despite attacks on German islanders and a shelling of Apia by British and American warships. After its temporary calming down - the disputes were finally settled with the Samoa Treaty in November 1899 - and the arrival of the Cormorant in front of Apia, the falcon began its journey home on July 1, 1899, during the Sydney, Batavia , Colombo , Mahé and Lisbon were started. The cruiser arrived in Hamburg on October 14th . A landing maneuver was carried out there in the presence of Kaiser Wilhelm II . The falcon reached Gdansk on October 27th and was decommissioned there on November 3rd. As a result, the Imperial Shipyard Danzig carried out a basic repair and modernization of the cruiser, whereby the chimney was lengthened by 2.5 m.
Use in South America
Tensions that had arisen between Colombia and Venezuela made it necessary to protect German citizens in Venezuela in 1901. To support the Vineta , which was already in the sea area of the East American station , the falcon was put back into service on October 2, 1901. Just three days later, the ship left Gdansk for South America and arrived in Castries on November 14th . In the following months the cruiser called at various ports and met with the training ships Moltke and Stein as well as the Gazelle . The Orinoco estuary was also called.
In March 1902 the falcon arrived off Trinidad . From there, the ship took a trip to the Amazon , which led to San Ignacio and thus to Peruvian territory. From Manaus onwards , which was approached by HAPAG and NDL ships, imprecise maps and poor knowledge of the pilots made the journey more difficult . On April 30th the falcon reached the mouth of the Amazon again and continued to Port of Spain .
The Montagne Pelée volcano erupted in Martinique at the beginning of May . The falcon therefore went to Fort-de-France with food and medical supplies to help the affected population. On the orders of the commander of the Vineta , the sea captain and Commodore Oscar Stiege , the cruiser then ran at the Venezuelan city of Carúpano . Persistent unrest in Venezuela made it necessary to protect local Germans. A group of caudillos had been revolting against President Cipriano Castro there since December 1901 . From May 20 to June 3, the falcon stayed in front of Carúpano and temporarily took refugees on board. Then the ship ran to Charlotte Amalie . The city served as a supply base for the German warships deployed in the Caribbean. During the summer Puerto Cabello , Carúpano, La Guaira and Willemstad were called.
The falcon reached Port-au-Prince on September 30th . Unrest had also broken out in Haiti , which made it necessary to protect the Germans there. The German consulate in Gonaïves was briefly guarded by a landing corps of the cruiser. The ship stayed off Haiti until the end of October before leaving the island for Venezuela. In mid-December the falcon got stranded when leaving Willemstad and could only be freed with the help of the Stosch .
Since Venezuela has only sparingly undertaken the repayment of its foreign debts since Castro took office and finally stopped it completely, an agreement was reached between the countries mainly affected, Great Britain , the Netherlands and the German Reich, regarding joint action against Venezuela. From December 20th, the Venezuelan ports were blocked by British and German warships. For this purpose, the German ships had already been combined into the East American Cruiser Division four days earlier . The falcon was also involved in the blockade. It was only after a diplomatic solution had been found that the blockade was ended on February 21, 1903.
One week after the end of the blockade, the falcon left Venezuela and reached the Bermuda Islands on March 8 , where it stayed until May 13. During the following year, a tour of the area of the East American station was made, calling at various ports. From May 26 to June 16, 1904, the ship was in front of Newport News , where Corvette Captain Heinrich von Moltke received the order to visit South American ports. The falcon then initially called at nine Brazilian ports and reached Buenos Aires on September 23 . After a four-week stay, the ship first made a few trips on the Río Paraná and the Río Uruguay and then called at other Argentine ports. In mid-November, the Strait of Magellan was crossed and subsequently southern Chilean ports were called. On December 20, the falcon finally reached Valparaíso .
The order from Commodore Ludwig von Schröder stipulated that ports along the West American coast should be called, which had not been visited by a German warship before. Accordingly, the falcon left Valparaíso on January 6, 1905 and initially went to six other Chilean and four Peruvian cities. Via Guayaquil and Buenaventura as well as several Central American Pacific ports , the ship finally reached San Francisco on June 15 , where it was anchored for three weeks. From July 10, the voyage continued along the coast and visited both Canadian ports and those in Alaska .
The return journey started from Alaska, which in turn led along the American Pacific coast. Other ports were called and a trip up the Columbia River and into the Gulf of California was undertaken. At Christmas 1905 and around the turn of the year the falcon lay in front of Mazatlán . A longer stay was made in Callao due to repairs that had become necessary. In early August 1906, the falcon got caught in a severe storm that caused major damage to the ship. Talcahuano was called to repair them . On August 16, Valparaíso was badly hit by an earthquake . The cruiser therefore took food and medical supplies on board before all repairs were completed and stayed off Valparaíso from August 28 to September 2, where the crew came to the aid of the population. This was followed by participation in a ceremony to mark the change of Chilean President and a visit to the Juan Fernández Islands . After the outstanding repairs were carried out in Talcahuano, the falcon continued its journey home.
From December 2nd to 15th the cruiser was in front of Punta Arenas . The falcon spent the turn of the year 1906/07 in front of Montevideo , which it left again on January 17, 1907. This was followed by visiting several Brazilian ports and crossing the Atlantic . Via Dakar and Las Palmas the falcon reached Lisbon, where King Friedrich August III. of Saxony visited the ship. On April 15, Gdansk was finally reached, where the cruiser was decommissioned five days later.
Whereabouts
An examination of the falcon showed that a further basic repair would not be worthwhile. The cruiser therefore initially remained in the reserve and was deleted from the list of warships on October 25, 1912. The following year the ship was scrapped in Danzig.
As a replacement, the Navy built the small cruiser Breslau, launched in 1911 .
Commanders
| September 14 to October 31, 1891 | Corvette Captain Curt Kalau from the court |
| August 14 to September 1892 | Corvette Captain Oscar Staircase |
| September 1892 to October 1893 | Corvette Captain Gottlieb Becker |
| October 1893 to November 1895 | Corvette Captain Heinrich von Moltke |
| November 1895 to June 1897 | Corvette Captain Gottfried Krieg |
| July 1897 to September 1898 | Corvette Captain Johannes Wallmann |
| September 1898 to November 3, 1899 | Corvette Captain Victor Schönfelder |
| October 2, 1901 to October 1903 | Corvette Captain Friedrich Musculus |
| October 1903 to November 1905 | Corvette Captain Paul Behncke |
| November 1905 to April 20, 1907 | Corvette Captain Georg von Ammon |
literature
- Gröner, Erich / Dieter Jung / Martin Maass: The German warships 1815-1945 . tape 1 : Armored ships, ships of the line, battleships, aircraft carriers, cruisers, gunboats . Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Munich 1982, ISBN 3-7637-4800-8 , p. 124 .
- Hildebrand, Hans H. / Albert Röhr / Hans-Otto Steinmetz: The German warships . Biographies - a mirror of naval history from 1815 to the present . tape 3 : Ship biographies from the Elbe to Graudenz . Mundus Verlag, Ratingen, S. 77-82 .
Footnotes
- ↑ Traugott Farnbacher, Community Responsibility “Beginnings, Developments and Perspectives of Congregation and Offices of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Papua New Guinea”, Chapter Governor v. Hagen's killing as evidence of disproportionality, Münster 1999, page 112