The Zara- class was a class of heavy cruiser of the Italian Navy , which was named after the now Croatian city of Zadar . The class consisted of the four ships built in Livorno , La Spezia and Trieste in the early 1930s :
Zara (type ship)
Fiume
Pola
Gorizia
It was a further development of the Trento class . The Trento class were 10,000-ton ships that were built in accordance with the provisions of the Washington Fleet Agreement . The Zara- class ships received improved armor and therefore significantly exceeded the 10,000-tonne mark set for cruisers in Washington .
The Zara (Kpt. Z. S. Luigi Corsi) was sunk near Cape Matapan . After accompanying the battleship Vittorio Veneto , which had been hit by a British torpedo , on its way back to Italy , she turned around together with the sister ship Fiume and four destroyers to assist the cruiser Pola , which was unable to maneuver by another British torpedo hit . On March 29th these ships were caught by radar- equipped British warships during the night when they stopped at the Pola . The British ships sank the three Italian cruisers Zara (sunk after severe damage), Fiume and Pola and two of the four destroyers at close range .
The cruiser Gorizia took part in the following sea battles:
In addition, he escorted a total of 20 German-Italian convoys in the Mediterranean . In the spring of 1943 it was badly damaged by Allied bombers at the La Maddalena naval base and then transferred to La Spezia for repair work . The ship could not be put back into service.
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