SMS Hyena (1878)
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The SMS Hyäne was a German gunboat . The ship was launched on June 27, 1878 in Wilhelmshaven . It had a length of 42 m and a water displacement of 495 tons , a 95 man crew, two cannons of 8.7 and 5 cm caliber and 3 revolver cannons with 3.7 cm caliber. Her sister ships were the SMS Iltis and SMS Wolf .
The ship played a role in the colonial policy of the German Reich .
In 1882, the gunboat visited Easter Island for five days as part of an extensive South Sea expedition . Kapitänleutnant Wilhelm Geiseler was commissioned by the Imperial Admiralty to carry out scientific studies for the ethnological department of the Royal Prussian Museums in Berlin. The expedition produced, among other things, detailed descriptions of the customs and traditions, language and writing of Easter Island, as well as exact drawings of various cult objects, of moais , of house floor plans and a detailed map of the Orongo cult site .
In November 1884, under Corvette Captain Langemak, the ship called at ports in the Bismarck Archipelago and New Guinea , which Karl Bartholomäus von Werner had claimed as German possession with the cruiser corvette SMS Ariadne in 1878 in order to hoist the imperial flag there. On October 1, 1886, Langemak undertook an exploration trip along the Somali coast claimed by the German-East African Society .
On August 4, 1892, under the command of Captain Curt von François, a landing point was marked north of the mouth of the Swakop for the construction of a port. This date is considered to be the founding day of the city of Swakopmund in what is now Namibia .
In Cameroon , the ship under Lieutenant Wilhelm Reincke was involved in the suppression of a mutiny by the police force (the so-called Dahomey uprising ) from December 15 to 23, 1893. Kaiser Wilhelm II honored this with the award of medals in February 1894 and the crediting of a war year in February 1914.
Whereabouts
On April 7, 1920, the ship was deleted from the list of warships after it had already been sold to Cuxhaven-Brunsbüttel-Dampfer AG on July 15, 1919 for 200,000 marks . This operated the ship as a three-masted schooner with an auxiliary engine under the name Seewolf until it sank on May 2, 1924 in the port of Dieppe due to a cargo fire. Then it was lifted as a total loss and scrapped.
literature
- Walter Nuhn: Colonial Policy and Navy. The role of the Imperial Navy in the establishment and protection of the German colonial empire 1884-1914. , 360 pages, Bernard U. Graefe Verlag, ISBN 3-7637-6241-8