Unebi

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Unebi
The Unebi in Le Havre (1886).
The Unebi in Le Havre (1886).
Ship data
flag JapanJapan (naval war flag) Japan
Ship type Protected cruiser
class Single ship
Shipyard Forges et Chantiers de la Gironde , Lormont , France
Order 1883
Keel laying May 17, 1884
Launch April 6, 1886
Commissioning October 18, 1886
Removal from the ship register October 19, 1887
Whereabouts Ship is considered lost. Presumably sunk in mid-December 1886.
Ship dimensions and crew
length
101.22 m ( Lüa )
98.00 m ( KWL )
width 13.11 m
Draft Max. 5.72 m
displacement Construction: 3,615 ts
Maximum: 4,074 ts
 
crew 280 men (planned)
174 men (transfer)
Machine system
machine 9 Du Temple steam boilers
2 (vertical) three-cylinder triple expansion machines
2 shafts
Machine
performance
6,083 PSi
Top
speed
18.5 kn (34 km / h)
propeller 2
Armament
Armor
  • Belt armor: 125 mm
  • Deck : 62 mm
  • Barbettes (main artillery): 150 mm
  • Swallow nests: 150 mm
  • Front side tower shields: 150 mm
  • Armored shields middle artillery: 62 mm

The Unebi ( Japanese 畝 傍 ) was a protected cruiser of the Imperial Japanese Navy . The construction contract for the 1883 approved single ship , which after in Nara prefecture located mountain Unebi was named, was abroad at the French shipyard Forges et Chantiers de la Gironde in Lormont ( Gironde awarded). The keel was laid on May 17, 1884. After being launched on April 6, 1886, the cruiser - so far the only ship in the history of the Japanese Navy to carry the name Unebi - was put into service on October 18, 1886. As early as December 1886, as part of the transfer voyage from France to Japan, the ship and the entire crew sank in the storm and is considered lost.

Technical aspects

The Unebi had a steel hull divided into 18 watertight compartments and was a maximum of 101.22 meters long and 13.11 meters wide. The average draft was 5.20 meters, but could rise to 5.72 meters when fully equipped. (This value is also used in the adjacent information block.)

Armament

For its size, the cruiser had very powerful armament. The main artillery consisted of four 25.4 cm guns , each weighing around 32 tons , which had been supplied by the British Elswick Ordnance Company (EOC). These cannons were capable of firing an armor-piercing shell weighing 227 kilograms over a maximum distance of 10,560 meters - at 35 degrees of elevation of the tube. The rate of fire was about one shot every two minutes. Two of these guns were located in armored swallow nests on both sides of the hull - one roughly at the level of the navigating bridge, the other between the main and mizzen mast - so that two guns could be brought to bear on one broad side .

The middle artillery consisted of seven individually mounted 15.2 cm guns (which had also been supplied by the EOC), with three of the cannons protected by 62 mm thick armor shields on the main deck on either side of the funnels. Another of these guns stood individually and in the midship line on the aft deck behind the aft mast (to combat possible pursuers). These guns fired a 45.3 kilogram shell over a maximum distance of around 8,800 meters. In addition, the Unebi had two 5.7 cm Hotchkiss cannons and ten four-barreled Nordenfelt mitrailleuses (25.4 mm caliber). There were also four Gatling repeater guns stored below deck , but they should only be used by the crew for land missions.

Machine system and drive

According to the planning specifications, the machine system, consisting of nine coal-fired steam boilers of the Du Temple type and two three-cylinder triple expansion engines, should have achieved 5,500 PSi and enabled the ship to reach a top speed of 17.5 knots . During test drives, however, this requirement was slightly exceeded and the Unebi reached a top speed of 18.5 kn (approx. 34 km / h) (with a maximum engine output of 6,083 PSi). With a coal supply of 710 tons or only with the inclusion of the engine - and thus without the sailing option - the cruiser had a calculated range of 4,500 nautical miles (at a speed of 10 knots).

In addition, the possessed Unebi three masts with a Bark - rigging . The total sail area was around 1,800 square meters . The maximum speed under sails was around 10 kn (approx. 18.5 km / h), although the sails were only viewed as a pure supplement (for the purpose of saving coal in favorable weather). In addition, they should also be used in the event of machine damage. In comparison to the protected cruisers of the Naniwa class , which were built almost at the same time and were commissioned by Japan in Great Britain , this sailing-steam concept was already considered obsolete.

Criticism of the concept

Despite a strong armament and a comparatively high speed, the construction of the cruiser was criticized by experts as unbalanced because of the relatively small hull platform, as outdated because of the rigging and especially because of the heavy armament as top-heavy . It is believed that this circumstance could at least have greatly contributed to the loss of the ship in the storm at the end of 1886.

Rear view of the Unebi (also taken in Le Havre 1886).

Transfer trip and sinking

After the cruiser was put into service on October 18, 1886, Unebi initially completed test drives on the Gironde until the beginning of November 1886 . On November 4, the ship, still under French command and with a crew of 98 Japanese (including 18 officers) and 76 French on board, left Le Havre and began the journey to the Far East. The voyage ran first via Gibraltar , Malta , the Suez Canal and Aden to Singapore , where the cruiser arrived in early December 1886. The last stage should lead the Unebi to Yokohama . The ship left Singapore on December 3, 1886 and should have arrived in Japan by December 20 at the latest, but never arrived there.

After the Unebi was reported as overdue at the end of December 1886, Japanese, British and Spanish ships - the Philippines were still under Spanish sovereignty at that time - began to search for the ship. However, neither debris nor corpses nor survivors could be found. These efforts were stopped unsuccessfully by the Spanish and British in mid-January 1887. Reports that a ship that is said to have looked similar to the Unebi was sighted off the Batan Islands in northern Philippines in mid-January 1887 could not be verified. At the end of January 1887, the Japanese Navy finally ended the search for the missing cruiser. The Unebi was subsequently deleted from the fleet register on October 19, 1887 and was considered lost .

Monument in honor of the victims of the Unebi in Tokyo's Aoyama Cemetery.

Later research and debris finds

A single reliable trace emerged surprisingly around ten years after the ship's disappearance: In July 1897, reports in the US newspapers New York Tribune and Morning Times announced that years earlier on the Pescadores Islands (which had been under the sovereignty of Japan) floating debris from a Japanese ship was said to have been found by villagers. Subsequent research by the Japanese navy and police units on the islands revealed that fishermen had actually found shipwrecks on the beaches around a decade ago and used them to build wooden huts. During the subsequent examination of the huts, the investigators found, among other things, decorated wooden strips and two cabin doors that bore the weathered Unebi lettering . It was the only trace ever found of the ship.

Nevertheless, it remains unknown to this day where and when the cruiser sank and what the Unebi had become. Presumably the ship got into the foothills of a typhoon in mid-December 1886 in the northeastern South China Sea , overturned in the storm due to the top-heaviness and sank within a very short time with the entire crew of 174 men. To this day, it is one of the worst accidents of the Japanese Navy in peacetime.

monument

To commemorate the death toll on the Unebi was on the Tokyo Aoyama Cemetery , a monument erected.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. Note: The manning number in the event of an incident would have been 280 seafarers; during the transfer from France to Japan, however, there were only 174 men on board (98 Japanese and 76 French).
  2. http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNBR_10-32_mk1-4.php
  3. ^ Osborne, Eric W .: Cruisers and Battle Cruisers. An Illustrated History of their Impact . ABC-CLIO. Santa Barbara (CA) 2004, p. 45.
  4. ^ Evans, David C. / Peattie, Marc R .: Kaigun: Strategy, Tactics, and Technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy 1887-1941 . Naval Institute Press. Annapolis (MD) 1997, p. 545.
  5. http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~un3k-mn/nan-unebi.htm
  6. http://historiareimilitaris.com/index.php/secciones/contemporanea/331-unebi
  7. http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85054468/1897-07-09/ed-1/seq-4.pdf

literature

  • Evans, David C. / Peattie, Marc R .: Kaigun: Strategy, Tactics, and Technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy 1887-1941 . Naval Institute Press. Annapolis (MD) 1997.
  • Jentsura, Hansgeorg / Jung, Dieter: Warships of the Imperial Japanese Navy 1869-1945 . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis (MD) 1976.
  • Osborne, Eric W .: Cruisers and Battle Cruisers. An Illustrated History of their Impact . ABC-CLIO. Santa Barbara (CA) 2004.
  • Wätzig, Joachim: The Japanese fleet. From 1868 until today . Brandenburg publishing house. Berlin 1996.