Z 12 Erich Giese

Z 12 Erich Giese

The sister boat Hans Lody 1939

Ship data flag  German Empire Ship type destroyer class Destroyer 1934A Shipyard Germania shipyard , Kiel Build number 538 Launch March 12, 1937 Commissioning March 4, 1939 Whereabouts Sunk April 13, 1940

Ship dimensions and crew length 119.0 m ( Lüa ) 116.3 m ( KWL ) width 11.3 m Draft Max. 4.23 m displacement 3190  t   crew 325 men

Machine system machine 6 Benson kettles 2 sets of Blohm & Voss steam turbines Machine performance 70,000 PS (51,485 kW) Top speed 36 kn (67 km / h) propeller 2

Armament 5 × 1 Sk-12.7-cm-L / 45 2 × 2 flak 3.7 cm 6 × 1 flak 2 cm 8 × torpedo tube Ø 53.3 cm 60 sea ​​mines

Z 12 Erich Giese was a destroyer class destroyer 1934 A of the German Navy during World War II . He was in on 3 May 1935 Germania Werft in Kiel on down Kiel and ran on 12 March 1936 by the stack . The commissioning took place after test drives on March 4, 1939. It sank on April 13, 1940 at the Weser Exercise company in Narvik , Norway .
The boat was named after Kapitänleutnant Erich Giese , who fell onboard his torpedo boat S 20 off the Scheldt estuaryon June 5 or 6, 1917 during the First World War .

The destroyer Z 12 Erich Giese belonged to the 4th destroyer flotilla until it was sunk.

Mission history

First months of the war

After the start of the German invasion of Poland and the entry of France and Great Britain into the war on September 3, 1939, the Z 12 was used together with other destroyers and mine ships until September 20 to lay mines in the Siegfried Line. Thereafter, and also in October, Z 12 operated with other German destroyers in the Skagerrak to control merchant shipping there. The boat was then used in November for mine-laying and escorting mine-laying companies in the Skagerrak and off the Thames estuary and for security tasks.

On 6./7. December 1939 Z 12 with Z 10 was laying mines in front of the Thames estuary when they met the two British destroyers HMS Juno and HMS Jersey ; Z 12 hit a torpedo on HMS Jersey , but the Juno was able to tow it.

Weser exercise company

At the Weser Exercise Company in April 1940, the boat belonged to Warship Group 1 of Commodore Friedrich Bonte , which on April 9, 1940 brought 2000 mountain troops under the orders of Major General Eduard Dietl to occupy the local ore port in Narvik in Norway. On April 10, there was a battle with British destroyers off Narvik. Z 12 picked up the survivors of the HMS Hunter from the water.

In the afternoon Grand Admiral Raeder ordered the rest of the unit to withdraw from Narvik. Frigate captain Erich Bey , who had taken command the day before after the death of Commodore Bonte, initially only advanced with the undamaged boats Erich Giese and Z 9 Wolfgang Zenker , sighted the light cruiser HMS Penelope with eight destroyers, which the Royal Navy was in the process of of April 10 to block the entrance to the fjord and reported to Berlin that an eruption was impossible.

During the second British attack on the port of Narvik on April 13, 1940, the German destroyers lying in the port or in the Ofotfjord were shot at and sunk by British naval forces, including the battleship HMS Warspite , or by their own crews on land after their ammunition was used up set. Z 12 was badly hit, whereupon the commander, Korvettenkapitän Karl Smidt , gave the order to leave the ship. During the sinking of Z 12 at 68 ° 28 ′ 0 ″  N , 17 ° 18 ′ 0 ″  E Coordinates: 68 ° 28 ′ 0 ″  N , 17 ° 18 ′ 0 ″  E 83 men lost their lives - partly because of British ships were shot at survivors floating in the water with machine guns and on-board cannons. This was also reported by the crews of the other units, but only the Erich Giese case was confirmed by the Wehrmacht investigation agency. In the 1970s, the survivors publicly repeated their statements.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ "Flotilla of Destroyers" at wlb-stuttgart.de, viewed on January 8, 2010
2. ↑ http://www.wlb-stuttgart.de/seekrieg/39-08.htm#SEP
3. ↑ http://www.wlb-stuttgart.de/seekrieg/39-08.htm#SEP
4. ↑ http://www.wlb-stuttgart.de/seekrieg/39-10.htm
5. ↑ http://www.wlb-stuttgart.de/seekrieg/39-12.htm
6. ↑ Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronik des Seekrieges 1939–1945, published by the Library for Contemporary History, Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Stuttgart 2007 - Failure to provide assistance to or shooting of shipwrecked people