Aries (ship, 1929)
 The sister ship Nordmark as Hapag's freighter
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The Widder was a German merchant ship that was armed and converted for the trade war during World War II . It had been taken over by the Navy as ship 21 for war use. It was used as an auxiliary cruiser under the designation Handelsstörkreuzer 3 ( HSK 3 ) . At the British Royal Navy was Aries as a Raider D known.
history
The auxiliary cruiser Widder was created by converting the Hapag freighter Neumark . The Neumark , launched in 1929 at the Howaldtswerke in Kiel, was the type ship of a class of six freighters named after her, which were mainly used in the shipping company's Far East and Australian service. The 7,851 GRT ship had a dead weight of 12,700 dwt, a length in the waterline of 145 m and over all of 152 m, was 18.2 m wide and had a draft of 8.3 m. She started working for Hapag on March 6, 1930.
The class also included the Nordmark from the Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft and the Kurmark and Uckermark built by Blohm & Voss , all of which were first used in service to the Dutch East Indies . Bitterfeld from Germania shipyard , which came into service in May, and Staßfurt from Bremer Vulkan began their service on the Australian line. All six freighters were propelled by an expanded set of turbines from the four Albert Ballin class ships that had received new propulsion systems in the winter of 1929/30. The other two turbine sets were installed in the combination ships Tacoma (8268 BRT) and Vancouver , which were delivered by the Deutsche Werft in Hamburg-Finkenwerder for service to the North American west coast.
The sister ship Kurmark was also converted into an auxiliary cruiser, the Orion (HSK 1, Raider A).
Calls
The auxiliary cruiser under the command of Korvettenkapitän Hellmuth von Ruckteschell left Bergen on May 12, 1940 and the next day had a brief battle with the British submarine Clyde , which escaped the auxiliary cruiser. This then ran to the island of Raudöy , where it was oiled on May 16 by the supply ship Nordmark and supplied with additional provisions, in order to march into the North Sea and on May 20 through the Denmark Strait into the North Atlantic. In the western mid-Atlantic, the Widder raised a total of ten ships with a total of 58,644 GRT between June 13 and September 9, 1940 , nine of which were sunk and one ship, the Norwegian tanker Krossfonn (9,323 GRT), was taken as a prize .
During her 180-day voyage, the Widder met German ships three times. On June 5, she met the motor ship Königsberg of the North German Lloyd , coming from Belem , which was trying to break through into the German sphere of influence. The Königsberg brought food and received fuel. On July 29th, she met the tanker Rekum sent from Tenerife and received fuel. On September 16, there was another meeting with the Eurofeld , also from Tenerife , which brought fuel and supplies.
When attempting to increase the speed to eleven knots after a repair , damage to the turbine bearing occurred again, which took another five days to repair. Therefore, the Widder had to return to the base after only six months in action, which she announced on October 7th in a radio message to the naval war command. The commander chose the shorter but more dangerous route to France, had to avoid a few opposing and neutral merchant ships on the way and arrived in Brest on October 31, 1940 .
The ram was due to the driving problems for stationary workshop ship Neumark rebuilt and moved to Norway. There she was significantly involved in repairs to the battleship Tirpitz in 1943/1944 .
The commander of the rams was the only commander of a German commercial sturgeon cruiser to be tried in a British military tribunal for violations of international naval law. Ruckteschell, who commanded the auxiliary cruiser Michel in 1942 , was found guilty on three counts and sentenced in May 1947 to 10 years in prison. He died while imprisoned in Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel in 1948.
Sinks and prizes of the auxiliary cruiser Aries
10 ships:
| Surname | Type | country | Date 1940 |
Tonnage in GRT |
Whereabouts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | British petrol | Tanker |
 United Kingdom
|
June 13th | 6,890 | sunk ( location ), 2 dead |
| 2 | Krossfon | Tanker |
 Norway
|
June 26th | 9,325 | Released on June 29th with 36 men without a captain and chief engineer and a 13-member crew under Lieutenant Rünning to Brest , where she arrived on July 7th, later used as a supply ship Spichern by the Navy. |
| 3 | Davisian | freighter |
United Kingdom
|
10th of July | 6,435 | sunk ( location ), 3 dead, 6 wounded the commander accused of continuing the fire after the ship surrendered
|
| 4th | King John | freighter |
United Kingdom
|
July 13th | 5,230 | sunk ( location ), then 66 prisoners released in lifeboats
to the Lesser Antilles, 240 nm away |
| 5 | Beaulieu | Tanker |
Norway
|
4th of August | 6.115 | sunk ( location ), 4 dead, 28 men in two boats tried to escape and were not taken in, although 1200 miles from the nearest coast Accused of conduct, but no longer convicted in the appeal |
| 6th | Oostplein | freighter |
 Netherlands
|
8th August | 5,060 | sunk |
| 7th | Killoran | Barque |
 Finland
|
August 10 | 1,815 | sunk ( location ), now 116 prisoners from 13 nations on board, including six captains |
| 8th | Anglo Saxon | freighter |
United Kingdom
|
August 21 | 5,595 | sunk ( location ), two lifeboats are not picked up because the Canaries appear to be reachable, only 2 men reach the Bahamas after 70 days , 39 dead Condemnation of the commander for not having done enough to save the castaways; the accusation of having shot at the castaways is not upheld |
| 9 | Cymbeline | Tanker |
United Kingdom
|
September 2nd | 6.315 | sunk ( location ), 7 dead, 3 men still rescued from the sea after a fortnight, Widder took over 26 castaways |
| 10 | Antonios Chandris | freighter |
 Greece
|
September 8th | 5,865 | sunk ( location ), crew sent to the African coast in lifeboats, only 10 men survive |
Whereabouts
In 1946 the Neumark was assigned as spoils of war under the name Ulysses of the British shipping company Ionian Maritime Co. Under the British flag, problems with the propulsion increased, and in 1950 the ship collided with another freighter in Indian waters and had to go to Singapore for repairs. In 1951 the former Widder returned to Germany, was given the new name Fechenheim by the Unterweser Reederei and was converted into a motor ship in 1954/55 with a 3,600 hp 8-cylinder Fiat diesel engine.
For a short time it transported iron ore from Narvik to Emden . On October 3, 1955, she stranded in Maalöysund near Bergen and broke up on October 9 at the scene of the accident.
In 1956 the ship was scrapped on site by Eisen- und Metall-KG from Hamburg .
literature
- Zvonimir Freivogel: German auxiliary cruiser of the Second World War. Motorbuch, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-613-02288-5 .
- Arnold Kludas : The ships of the North German Lloyd 1920 to 1970 . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, 1992, ISBN 3-7822-0534-0 .
- Roger Jordan: The World's Merchant Fleets 1939. Naval Institute Press, 2000, ISBN 1-59114-959-2 .
- Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen: Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. Manfred Pawlak Verlagsgesellschaft, Herrsching 1981, ISBN 3-88199-009-7 .
- Schmalenbach, Paul: The German auxiliary cruisers 1895-1945 . Gerhard Stalling, Oldenburg / Hamburg 1977, ISBN 3-7979-1877-1 .
- Reinhart Schmelzkopf: The German Merchant Shipping 1919–1939 . Verlag Gerhard Stalling, Oldenburg, ISBN 3-7979-1847-X .
Web links
- Technical data and history with reference to the sinking of the Anglo Saxon (English).
- further information on rams and pictures
Individual evidence
- ^ Roger Jordan: The World's Merchant Fleets 1939. p. 64.
- ↑ melt head, p. 135.
- ↑ melt head, p. 137.
- ↑ melt head, p. 138.
- ↑ melt head, p. 136.
- ↑ Rohwer, pp. 53, 64; including the Finnish barque Killoran , the only sailing ship sunk by a German auxiliary cruiser in World War II
- ↑ Rohwer, page 53, which was built in Denmark in 1935 Krossfonn was later on the German side as Spichern used
- ↑ Kludas, p. 14: Königsberg (2), 6,466 GRT, in sea since May 28, June 16 off Vigo sunk when a French auxiliary cruiser approached.
- ↑ World's Merchant, p. 61, Rekum (1939 Reederei Glässel) originally War Shikari , 1919 Lithgow, 5,540 GRT, 8,300 dwt, 10.5 kn
- ↑ World's Merchant, p. 93, (1939) originally RFA Beechleaf , 1916 GB, 5,863 BRT, 9000 tdw, 9.5 kn.
- ^ British Petrol , Motortanker, 1925 Swan Hunter
- ↑ Motor tanker Krossfonn , Victim of Widder 1935 Odense Staalskibsværft
- ↑ demise of Darvisian 1925 D. & W. Henderson & Company Ltd.
- ↑ The Davisian Case
- ^ Sinking of the motor ship King John , 1928 Harland & Wolff
- ↑ Arrival of castaways in the Caribbean
- ^ Motor tanker Beaulieu , 1930 Vickers-Armstrong , Barrow.
- ↑ are picked up on August 13 by the tanker Cymbeline , who a month later becomes the rams' ninth victim
- ↑ demise of Oostplein , 1921 Italy
- ^ Sinking of the Killoran , 1900 Ailsa Shipbuilding Company Ltd.
- ^ Fall of the Anglo Saxon , 1929 Short Brothers Ltd
- ^ Downfall of the Cymbeline , 1927 Hamilton, William & Company
- ^ Sinking of the Antonios Chandris , 1918 Kawasaki Dockyard Co. Ltd.
Map with all coordinates: