SMS V 116
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V 116 was the last large torpedo boat that the Imperial Navy put into service during the First World War . The design also marked the climax of German torpedo boat construction up to the end of the war and was used to test the French and Italian large destroyer projects.
Type history
The war experience prompted the Imperial Navy in 1916 to have a new type of torpedo boat developed. The new, in comparison very large designed boats should not only be superior to the modern Allied destroyers in all areas, but should even be able to take up delaying battles with light cruisers . In order to be able to fulfill this tactical role, a strong armament with 15 cm guns, 60 cm torpedo tubes and a speed of over 34 knots was specified as a framework.
On April 15, 1916, the Navy then placed orders with four shipyards to build three boats each, making a total of twelve units: S 113 to S 115 at the Schichau works in Elbing, V 116 to V 118 at AG Vulcan Stettin , G 119 to G 121 at the Germania shipyard in Kiel and B 122 to B 124 at Blohm & Voss in Hamburg. Due to the worsening war situation, there were delays in construction. Almost all of the boats were launched in the last months of the war, but only V 116 was completed. Commissioning took place on July 31, 1918.
Of the remaining boats, another one could be completed after the end of the war: S 113 , which came into service on August 5, 1919. The other boats were scrapped.
Technical specifications
V 116 was 107.5 m long, 10.4 m wide and 3.8 m deep. Fully equipped, the " Large Torpedo Boat 1916 " displaced 2,360 tons. The steel hull was made in longitudinal and transverse framing and divided into 13 watertight compartments. Four oil-fired double boilers generated the pressure for two AEG volcano turbines, which each acted with 45,000 hp on the two propellers and enabled a top speed of 34.5 knots. With a maximum oil supply of 660 m³ and a cruising speed of 20 kn, the range was at least 2500 nm.
The armament consisted of four rapid-loading cannons 15 cm L / 45 UToF C 16 in stand-alone installation, on the raised forecastle, on the deckhouse behind the second chimney, on the deckhouse on the stern and at the stern. The increase in caliber from 10.5 cm to 15 cm actually moved the new type into the realm of British light cruisers, whose main artillery consisted of 15.2 cm guns. Comparable British destroyers, on the other hand, had 12 cm cannons as standard. 40 mines could be taken on board.
In addition, V 116 was equipped with two pivoting 60 cm double torpedo sets, the front one being set up between the two funnels and the rear one between the two deckhouses. Four reserve torpedoes were also on board.
The crew was 189 men.
Whereabouts
Immediately after its commissioning, the boat belonged to the newly erected XII until the end of the war in 1918. Torpedo boat flotilla, then until its delivery the so-called " Iron Flotilla " - a voluntary association of former members of the Imperial Navy under the supervision of the Admiralty of the Provisional Imperial Navy .
In response to the self-sinking of the deep sea fleet on June 21, 1919 in Scapa Flow , the Allies demanded a replacement from Germany. In addition to extensive amounts of civilian shipping space, not only other ships of the line, but also the remaining modern cruisers and torpedo boats were affected. This also included V 116 , which was delivered to Italy on May 23, 1920 and remained in service until 1937 under the name Premuda .
In the Italian service
In 1920 the V 116 was one of three torpedo boats of the Imperial Navy that came into service with the Royal Italian Navy ( Regia Marina ). The other boats were the SMS B 97 (1915, 1374/1843 t) and the SMS S 63 (1916, 919/1170 t), which only entered service with the Regia in the mid-1920s as Cesare Rossarol and Ardimentoso, respectively Marina came.
V 116 received the name of the Yugoslav island of Premuda near Zadar . In the Italian Navy it was associated with the sinking of the Austro-Hungarian battleship Szent István on June 10, 1918 by the MAS torpedo boat commander Luigi Rizzo . Rizzo was raised to the rank of Count of Grado and Premuda, numerous streets in Italy were named after Premuda and June 10th became the "Day of the Italian Navy".
On June 1, 1920 the Regia Marina took over the German large destroyer as a light "Esploratore" (~ Spähkreuzer ). The armament was reinforced by two 40 mm Vickers Terni cannons and two machine guns and the ship was sent to Constantinople for the "Divisione del Levante".
During the Corfu incident , the Premuda was one of the Italian naval units that fired on the island's “fortress”, actually just a refugee camp, on August 30, 1923, and then occupied the island until the end of September. The Italian measures followed the murder of an Italian border commission on the Greek-Albanian border, which, from the Italian perspective, was at least due to the negligence of the Greek authorities.
1924 came with the three ships of the Leone class (1721/2690 ts, 34 kn, 4 × 2 120 mm L / 45 guns, 2 × 76 mm L / 40 flak, 2 × 3 torpedo tubes) Ships from our own development in the service of the Regia Marina, whose plans also go back to 1917. The construction had been postponed due to the steel shortage during the World War. In the following years the Premuda served the Italian fleet in the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Adriatic Sea , but mainly in the Aegean Sea . In 1938 the Premuda was only a destroyer (cacciatorpediniere); their large torpedo tubes were replaced in 1932 by new ones with a diameter of 450 mm. At the beginning of 1939 the ship was separated and then scrapped.
Cesare Rossarol ( B 97 ) in the 1930s
Ardimentoso ( S 63 ) 1926
The Pantera of Leone Class of 1924
The second Premuda in 1941 ex Dubrovnik
Remarks
- ↑ Whether the heavier gun was really able to demonstrate its superiority in action cannot be assessed due to a lack of war experience. The Navy of Nazi Germany has 20 years later with the same caliber of the destroyers of Narvik class collected more negative experiences because the caliber proved to be too cumbersome, too slow and too heavy for use on ships of destroyer size.
- ↑ see the attack on the Corfu incident (English WP) and Crisi di Corfù (Italian WP)
literature
Harald Fock: Z-before! - International development and war missions of destroyers and torpedo boats 1914 to 1939. Koehler, Hamburg 2001, p. 60 ff.