Swordfish class (1931)

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Swordfish class
Royal Navy Koninklijke Marine (Royal Dutch Navy)
HMS Swordfish around 1939
General data
Ship type : Submarine
Construction series: S-class
Navies :

Royal Navy
Dutch Navy

Builder : Chatham Dockyard ( Chatham )
Units: 4th
Technical specifications
Crew : 36 men
Displacement :

surfaced: 730  ts
submerged: 927 ts

Length : 61.7 m
Width : 7.28 m
Draft : 3.4 m
Drive  :

Diesel engines : 1550  HP (1156  KW )
Electric motors : 1300 HP (969 KW)

Speed :

surfaced: 13.75  kn (25  km / h )
submerged: 10 kn (19 km / h)

Driving range :

popped up:

  • 3700  NM (6852 km) at 10 kn
Diving depth : 95 m
Alarm dive time: 25-30 seconds
Armament
Artillery : 1 * 3 ″  L / 50 (76 mm) deck gun
Air defense : 2 *  .303 ″ (7.7 mm) MG
Torpedoes :

6 * 21 ″ (533 mm) tubes in the bow

The Swordfish class was the first sub-assembly of the British S-class . The four submarines were used in World War II .

Building history and structural features

see: Construction history of the S-Class and structural features of the S-Class

The submarine class named after the type ship HMS Swordfish was the first construction lot of the British S class .

The submarines were developed as the successor to the H-Class in the late 1920s . The medium-weight submarines were designed for use in confined waters such as the North Sea or the Mediterranean .

Heavily armed for their size, the submarines were agile and could submerge very quickly. For alarm diving, the boats only needed half the time of comparable German Type VII submarines.

The building contract was awarded in 1929. The first boat was laid down on December 1, 1930. Between 1930 and 1933, the four Swordfish class submarines were built at the Chatham Naval Yard.

The main differences to the later construction lots were that the Swordfish boats were smaller, had a lower diesel propulsion power than the third and fourth lots, were not equipped with radar and did not have an external stern torpedo tube.

As with the second construction lot, the hull was not completely welded , but partially riveted . The submarines of the third and fourth batches built during the war were completely welded and could therefore dive deeper.

history

see: History of the S-Class and Detailed History of the S-Class

After the war began on September 1, 1939, the four U-boats patrolled the North Sea .

On September 14, 1939, the Sturgeon mistakenly attacked her sister boat HMS Swordfish 50 nautical miles east-southeast of Aberdeen with three torpedoes, but missed its target. Since the HMS Oxley ( Odin class ) was lost four days earlier in a similar incident , the Admiralty subsequently increased the distances between the patrol areas of British submarines from originally 4 to 16 nautical miles.

The first combat success of a British submarine in World War II was achieved by HMS Sturgeon when she torpedoed and sank the German outpost boat V 209 / Gauleiter Telschow 100 nautical miles west of Heligoland on November 20, 1939 .

The first losses occurred in January 1940. On January 7, 1940, the HMS Seahorse was sunk northwest of Heligoland with depth charges. There were no survivors. The crew of the HMS Starfish had better luck . The submarine was badly damaged by enemy submarines on January 9, 1940 after an unsuccessful attack on a German minesweeper and was forced to surface. The entire crew survived and went into German captivity .

The HMS Swordfish sank with all sailors in November 1940, presumably as a result of a mine hit .

Thus, three of the four submarines were lost in combat in the first 14 months of the war. Together with the eight boats of the second construction lot, the Royal Navy had 12 S-class submarines at the start of the war on September 1, 1939. By January 1942, eight of these boats were destroyed by enemy action. The enormous losses could only be compensated for by the units of the third and fourth construction lots, which started running continuously from spring 1942.

As the only boat of the Swordfish class , the HMS Sturgeon survived the war. Between 1940 and 1942 she sank several German transporters off the coast of Norway. She was taken over by the Royal Netherlands Navy on October 11, 1943 . The Dutch used the submarine under the name Zeehond in the North Sea until the end of the war and returned it to the British in September 1945, who scrapped the submarine in 1947.

Boats of the class

see also: Group 1 of the S-Class .

HMS Swordfish
Builder : Chatham Dockyard No.: 61 p
Keel laying : December 1, 1930 Launch : November 10, 1931
Commissioning: November 28, 1932 End of duty: November 7, 1940

The Swordfish ( English : swordfish ) was used in the North Sea and the Biscay . The Swordfish has been missing in the Bay of Biscay since November 7, 1940. The submarine probably ran into a German sea mine. There were no survivors. The wreck was discovered in July in 1983 and is 46 m in depth at position 50 ° 24 '30 "  N , 1 ° 21' 0"  W .

HMS Sturgeon Zeehond
Builder: Chatham Dockyard No.: 73 p
Keel laying: January 3, 1931 Launch: January 8, 1932
Commissioning: February 27, 1933 End of duty: 1947

The Sturgeon (ger .: sturgeon ) was used until 1943 in the North Sea. The submarine was handed over to the Netherlands on October 11, 1943 and put into service by the Royal Netherlands Navy under the name Zeehond ( nld : seal ) and continued to be used in the North Sea until the end of the war. On November 17, 1945, the Sturgeon went back to the Royal Navy and was scrapped in Granton in 1947.

HMS Seahorse
Builder: Chatham Dockyard No.: 96 p
Keel laying: September 14, 1931 Launch: November 15, 1932
Commissioning: October 2, 1933 End of duty: January 7, 1940

The Seahorse (ger .: seahorse ) was used in the North Sea. The submarine was the first loss of the S-Class. It was probably sunk on January 7, 1940 northwest of Heligoland by German depth charges. There were no survivors.

HMS Starfish
Builder: Chatham Dockyard No.: 19 p
Keel laying: September 29, 1931 Launch: March 14, 1933
Commissioning: October 27, 1933 End of duty: January 9, 1940

The starfish (English: starfish ) was used in the North Sea. The submarine was forced to surface on January 9, 1940 near Heligoland at 55 ° 0 '  N , 7 ° 10'  E after depth charges. The entire crew went into German captivity. The submarine sank while being transported away.

literature

  • Erminio Bagnasco: Submarines in World War II. (Technology - Classes - Types. A Comprehensive Encyclopedia). 5th edition. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-613-01252-9 .
  • Robert Hutchinson: KAMPF UNDER WASSER - Submarines from 1776 to today , Motorbuchverlag, Stuttgart, 1st edition 2006, ISBN 3-613-02585-X
  • Anthony Preston: The history of the submarines , Karl Müller Verlag, Erlangen, German edition 1998, ISBN 3-86070-697-7
  • Peter Padfield: The submarine war 1939-1945 , Ullstein Taschenbuchverlag, Munich, 2000, ISBN 3-548-24766-0

Web links

Commons : S Class  - Collection of Pictures, Videos and Audio Files

Footnotes

The PONS large English dictionary, ISBN 3-12-517178-4 , was used as the basis for translations from English to German .

  1. ↑ The uboat.net (see: Weblinks ) specifies 640 GRT for the overwater displacement of the Swordfish class  . Robert Hutchinson (see: literature ) gives 730 ts. Erminio Bagnasco (see literature) gives 737 ts.
  2. ↑ The uboat.net gives 927 GRT for the underwater displacement of the Swordfish class. Hutchinson and Bagnasco give 927 ts.
  3. ↑ HMS is the abbreviation for His / Her Majesty's Ship and the name prefix of British ships. HMS means His / Her Majesty's Ship .
  4. ↑ a b c The uboat.net states that the Seahorse may have been rammed and sunk by the German barrier breaker Oakland southeast of Heligoland on December 29, 1939 .
  5. ↑ The uboat.net states November 28, 1932 for the Swordfish to be commissioned. Hutchinson gives September 16, 1932.
  6. ↑ The uboat.net states February 27, 1933 for the Sturgeon to be commissioned. Hutchinson gives December 15, 1932.
  7. ↑ The uboat.net states October 2, 1933 for the Seahorse to be commissioned. Hutchinson gives July 26, 1933.
  8. ↑ The uboat.net states October 27, 1933 for the Starfish to be put into service. Hutchinson gives July 3, 1933.