SMS Moltke (1910)
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SMS Moltke was a large cruiser ( battle cruiser ) of the Imperial German Navy and type ship of the Moltke class . On April 7, 1910, the ship was launched at Blohm & Voss and it was put into service on September 30, 1911.
The ship was named after the Prussian Field Marshal Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke .
history
From May 11th to June 29th, 1912, the Moltke undertook a trip to North America with the small cruiser SMS Stettin . They ran from Kiel via Ponta Delgada to Cape Henry , where they met the station cruiser SMS Bremen . The cruisers entered the Hampton Roads together , where they were received on June 3 by the US Atlantic fleet in the presence of US President William Howard Taft . On 8./9. June moved the division under the command of Rear Admiral Hubert von Rebeur-Paschwitz to New York, where Moltke and Stettin began their march back to Germany via Vigo on June 13th .
First World War
The Moltke experienced its first war missions on November 3 and December 16, 1914. Here, together with the Seydlitz, it shelled the English cities of Yarmouth and Hartlepool . On January 24, 1915, she took part in the battle on the Dogger Bank. On August 19, 1915, the Moltke was torpedoed in the Baltic Sea by the British submarine E1 during the second advance into the Riga Bay . After restoration, she was involved in the bombardment of Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth on April 24 and 25, 1916 .
On May 31, 1916, the Moltke was the fourth ship of the 1st reconnaissance group under Vice Admiral Franz von Hipper to take part in the sea battle on the Skagerrak . After the failure of his flagship SMS Lützow and after hours on a torpedo boat, Hipper finally switched to the Moltke .
When the Baltic Islands were occupied by German troops ( Albion Company ) in October 1917, the Moltke was the flagship of the large association formed for this purpose under the command of Vice Admiral Ehrhard Schmidt . On October 12, 1917, the Moltke, in association with the III. Squadron (four ships of the König class and SMS Bayern ) from 5:45 a.m. on the Russian battery No. 46 (four 15.2 cm guns) on Cape Ninnast (Estonian Ninase) on the east side of Tagga Bay (Estonian Tagalaht ) the north side of the island of Ösel to support the main landing of the army troops scheduled for 6 a.m.
On November 17, 1917, the Moltke arrived late on the battlefield during the second naval battle near Helgoland in association with the new battle cruiser Hindenburg . They were supposed to support the two large-line ships Kaiser and Kaiserin , which had rushed to the aid of the small cruiser Königsberg , which was hit by a 38 cm shell . The British then withdrew.
On April 23, 1918, the Moltke suffered a serious turbine accident before attempting to attack a British convoy in the North Sea near Norway. She had to be dragged back from the Oldenburg to Wilhelmshaven . On the way back, the Moltke was torpedoed by the British submarine E42 , but reached the port with 2100 t of water in the ship. The Moltke was in the shipyard until August .
Whereabouts
After the war, the Moltke was interned in Scapa Flow and sunk by its own crew on June 21, 1919 with the rest of the ocean-going fleet . The wreck was lifted in 1927 and towed in a remarkable towing trip from the German sea rescue tug Seefalke to Rosyth , where the Moltke was scrapped in 1929.
Commanders
| September 1911 to January 1913 | Sea captain Ernst Ritter von Mann Edler von Tiechler |
| January 1913 to January 1916 | Sea captain Magnus von Levetzow |
| January to September 1916 | Sea captain Johannes von Karpf |
| September 1916 to December 1918 | Sea captain Hans Gygas |
| May to September 1918 | Corvette captain Hans Humann and corvette captain Schirmacher (substitute) |
| December 1918 to June 1919 | Captain Wilhelm Crelinger |
Known crew members
- Bernhard Rogge (1899–1982), was from 1957 to 1962 as Rear Admiral in command of Defense Area I.
photos
The Moltke on a visit to New York in 1912
Visit to the port of Hampton Roads in 1912
The Moltke also on her visit to the USA in 1912
The Moltke steams behind the Seydlitz for internment at Scapa Flow
After the lift in Rosyth dry dock
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. 82 .
Web links
- http://www.deutsche-schutzgebiete.de/sms_moltke.htm
- (engl.)
- Film recordings of the lifting of the wreck of the Moltke in 1927 [1]
Individual evidence
- ↑ accessed on August 17, 2015 ( Memento from June 12, 2010 in the Internet Archive )