Fast steamer with two screws

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The British Inman Line put the City of New York (III), the first high-speed steamer with two propellers, into service in 1888 ; it ran at 20 knots. The Hamburg-American Packetfahrt-Actien-Gesellschaft (HAPAG) then decided in favor of this solution, also due to the problems of the water depth of the Elbe. The North German Lloyd (NDL) only decided to order twin-screw high-speed steamers in 1895.

HAPAG (1889-1904)

Since 1883, the HAPAG board of directors has dealt intensively with the question of the ship propulsion system for the future express steamers . The main reason to switch to the two-screw drive was the limited water depth of the Elbe. The critical size was 9,000 GRT, as the Elbe fairway conditions did not allow larger ships. The route from Hamburg to Blankenese presented particular difficulties. The memorandum written for this purpose served, among other things, to receive opinions, technical implementation and offers from the shipyards. The prices of the ships in 1884 were between 3.2 and 3.7 million marks. The current difficult situation of HAPAG, which was currently in a rate war with the Carr line directed by Albert Ballin , prevented the placing of orders. In 1885, however, an agreement was reached with Carr, Ballin became HAPAG's passenger line manager in 1886 and convinced the management board of the necessity of the express steamers.

Therefore, submissions were made to the Hamburg authorities before the ships were delivered. In it, the authorities were asked to create port facilities in Cuxhaven to enable the express steamers to be handled. The passengers were in Cuxhaven to completion of port facilities in 1889 on the roads taken on board. In addition, permission was requested to deploy two buoys in the Elbe near Brunshausen . Here the cargo of the new express steamers was unloaded with barges and new coal was taken up.

In 1887 two of these ships were ordered from the Stettiner Vulcan and one each from Laird Brothers ( Birkenhead ) and Fairfield ( Glasgow ). The first ship was the Normannia as planned for launch, but was then named in honor of the German Empress Augusta Victoria . This ship was launched by the Vulcan shipyard as the first express steamer for HAPAG on December 1, 1888 and put into service on April 24, 1889. The Columbia can be the second ship from Laird Brothers and then the Normannia from Fairfield. The fourth and last express steamer was returned from the Stettiner Vulcan as Prince Bismarck .

North German Lloyd (NDL) (1881–1895)

At NDL, which operated the world's largest fleet of fast steamers around 1886, JG Lohmann was the leading man after HH Meier . With the expansion of the express steamer fleet, he brought the NDL to the world's leading passenger shipping company. However, he was against the two-screw drive in high-speed steamers, which in his opinion was not yet fully developed. In 1887, the NDL received the ninth express steamer in the river class, the Lahn (5,100 GRT, 8,700 PSi , 18 knots). When HAPAG ordered the Schnelldampfer with two screws, Lohmann ordered two more Schnelldampfer ( Spree and Havel , 7,000 GRT, 15,500 PSi, 18.5 knots) with one screw from Vulcan , which were delivered in 1890/91. The Spree was rebuilt after two shaft fractures 1897-1899 in Szczecin Vulcan to the twin-screw ship with three chimneys and Empress Maria Theresia renamed. There was an increase from 7,000 to 8,300 GRT and the output was increased from 12,500 to 17,300 PSi.

Lohmann died in 1892, his successor was Heinrich Wiegand , who in the same year bought the twin screw steamer HH Meier and ordered twin screw ships for the Reichspostdampferlinien ( the Prinzendampfer and the Barbarossa class ). In 1895 he signed contracts with AG Vulcan, Stettin and Schichau-Werken , Danzig, each for one express steamer. Both ships were to have two propellers and, according to the contract, should run an average speed of 21 knots.

The Kaiser Wilhelm the Great , delivered by the Vulcan, met the conditions and was the largest and fastest passenger ship in the world. It was the first of four four-chimney high-speed steamers operated by the NDL, which cemented its reputation as a high-speed steamship shipping company. The Kaiser Friedrich , built by Schichau, did not meet the contractual conditions despite rework and was not accepted by the NDL. Attempts to sell the ship to HAPAG also failed after ten round trips across the North Atlantic. It was not until 1912 that the Kaiser Friedrich could be sold to France.

Express steamer as an auxiliary cruiser (1898–1905)

The single-screw express steamers Spree and Havel of the NDL and the four express steamers of HAPAG, including the Normannia and Columbia built in Great Britain, were designed and built with deck reinforcements and girders in such a way that guns could be set up in a short time due to the wishes of the German government was.

The Reich did not reimburse the additional costs, but had advantages, as the Normannia and Columbia were sold to Spain in 1898 for a good profit. When the Spanish-American War broke out (April 25, 1898 - August 12, 1898), Spain needed fast ships as auxiliary cruisers . The ships were armed and ran with a Spanish relief squadron to Port Said, where the squadron was refused the necessary coal for the onward journey to the Philippines "for reasons of neutrality". After the war ended, the ships were still used to repatriate Spanish troops from Cuba .

It was good business for HAPAG, which Columbia was able to buy back in July 1899 at a low price. The Normannia was sold from Spain to France and was used as L´Aquitaine from December 1899 to September 1905 for the French Compagnie Générale Transatlantique on the North Atlantic.

In 1904 Russia acquired four twin-screw express steamers from Germany: Augusta Victoria , renamed Auguste Victoria after an extension in 1897 , the Columbia and Fürst Bismarck of HAPAG and the Empress Maria Theresia formerly Spree of the NDL, to use them as auxiliary cruisers in the Russo-Japanese war to use.

The former Empress Maria Theresa was sunk as an auxiliary cruiser Ural on May 27, 1905 in the sea ​​battle near Tsushima . It was the first ship in the world with a radio system with a range of around 750 km, which was supplied by Telefunken . A large part of its crew could, however , be rescued by the escort ship Anadyr .

Kuban (ex. Auguste Victoria ) and Terek (ex. Columbia ) had been detached before the battle to disrupt trade routes to Japan. The Kuban returned to Libau independently in 1905 . The Terek was interned in Batavia , was in Vladivostok in the winter after the peace treaty and only returned to the Baltic Sea in 1906. Considerations of using the ships civilly could not be implemented and they were sold for demolition in early 1907.

Fate of Prince Bismarck

The Fürst Bismarck had the longest service life of the first German twin-screw high-speed steamers. During a control voyage as an auxiliary cruiser Don in the Atlantic in the summer of 1904, considerable problems with the ship's boilers had occurred, which prevented a march to the Far East. It was disarmed and was used as Moscow at the end of April 1907 on the Libau-Rotterdam-New York route. After only four round trips, it was shut down as it was not economically successful. In July 1909, the Austro-Hungarian Navy took over the ship in Stettin to use it as a mother ship for destroyers . After a renovation, the former Fürst Bismarck came into service as Gäa in May 1910 . In 1915 she became the mother ship for submarines in Cattaro . During the sailors' uprising in Cattaro in February 1918, the Gäa was one of the main ships of the rebels. In November 1918 she brought Czech and Austrian sailors from the navy taken over by the South Slav National Council to Fiume and Pola , where she was confiscated by the Italians.

As San Giusto , in January 1921 she made one last trip from Trieste via Naples to New York. It turned out that the hull of the ship was in poor condition. No further missions were made and in 1923–24 it was canceled at the Breda company in Trieste.

literature

  • Arnold Kludas : The History of German Passenger Shipping . Volume 1, Ernst Kabel Verlag, Hamburg.
  • S. Wiborg, K. Wiborg: Our field is the world - 150 years of Hapag-Lloyd. Festschrift published by Hapag-Lloyd AG, Hamburg 1997.
  • Arnold Kludas : The ships of the North German Lloyd: 1857-1970. (In two volumes), Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford 1991/1992.
  • HJ Witthöft: Hamburg-America line. Köhler Verlag, 1997, ISBN 3-7822-0695-9 .