Naval/Maritime History 27th of August - Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1878 – Launch of SMS Bayern, one of four Sachsen-class armored frigates of the German Imperial Navy.


SMS Bayern was one of four Sachsen-class armored frigates of the German Imperial Navy. Her sister ships were Sachsen, Baden, and Württemberg. Named for Bavaria, Bayern was built by the Imperial Dockyard in Kiel from 1874 to 1881. The ship was commissioned into the Imperial Navy in August 1881. She was armed with a main battery of six 26 cm (10 in) guns in two open barbettes.


SMS Bayern (Stapellauf 1878) auf einer Zeichnung.

After her commissioning, Bayern served with the fleet on numerous training exercises and cruises. She participated in several cruises escorting Kaiser Wilhelm II on state visits to Great Britain and to various cities in the Baltic Sea in the late 1880s and early 1890s. During 1895–1898, the ship was modernized at the Schichau-Werke dockyard in Danzig; she served for another decade with the fleet before being withdrawn from active service in 1910. She was used as a target ship after 1911, until she was sold in 1919 and broken up for scrap.


Construction
Main article: Sachsen-class ironclad

Illustration of the Sachsen-class ships
Bayern was ordered by the Imperial Navy under the contract name "A," which denoted that the vessel was a new addition to the fleet. She was built at the Imperial Dockyard in Wilhelmshaven; her keel was laid in 1874 under construction number 3. The ship was launched on 13 May 1878 and commissioned into the German fleet on 4 August 1881. Along with her three sisters, Bayern was the first large, armored warship built for the German navy that relied entirely on engines for propulsion.

The ship was 98.20 meters (322 ft 2 in) long overall and had a beam of 18.40 m (60 ft 4 in) and a draft of 6.32 m (20 ft 9 in) forward. Bayern was powered by two 3-cylinder triple expansion engines, which were supplied with steam by eight coal-fired Dürr boilers. The ship's top speed was 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph), at 5,600 indicated horsepower (4,200 kW) Her standard complement consisted of 32 officers and 285 enlisted men, though while serving as a squadron flagship this was augmented by another 7 officers and 34 men.

She was armed with six 26 cm (10 in) guns, two of which were single-mounted in an open barbette forward of the conning tower and the remaining four mounted amidships, also on single mounts in an open barbette. As built, the ship was also equipped with six 8.7 cm (3.4 in) L/24 guns and eight 3.7 cm (1.5 in) Hotchkiss revolver cannons. Bayern's armor was made of wrought iron, and was concentrated in an armored citadel amidships. The armor ranged from 203 to 254 mm (8.0 to 10.0 in) on the armored citadel, and between 50–75 mm (2.0–3.0 in) on the deck. The barbette armor was 254 mm of wrought iron backed by 250 mm of teak.

Service history
After her commissioning in August 1881, Bayern was placed in reserve. She was not activated for service with the fleet until 1884; this in part had to do with the poor performance of her sister Sachsen in the fleet maneuvers of 1880. Among the problems associated with the Sachsen-class ships was a tendency to roll dangerously due to their flat bottoms, which greatly reduced the accuracy of their guns. The ships were also poorly armored, compared to their contemporaries. In addition, they were slow and suffered from poor maneuverability. Nevertheless, Bayern and her three sisters served as the I Division in the 1884 fleet maneuvers, under the command of Rear Admiral Alexander von Monts.

Bayern remained with the fleet for the 1885 maneuvers, though she was joined only by the older ironclads Friedrich Carl and Hansa. The maneuvers were begun with a visit to Ålesund, Norway, after which the fleet went to the Baltic Sea for training exercises. Bayern was demobilized at the close of maneuvers. In October 1885, August von Thomsen, who had been appointed chief gunner, set up the first long range gunnery experiments on Bayern. He went on to gain fame as "the father of German naval artillery." Bayern's three sisters and the new ironclad Oldenburg comprised the training squadron for 1886. Bayern returned to active duty in 1888, when she participated in a tour of the Baltic by the newly crowned Kaiser Wilhelm II. The fleet stopped in St. Petersburg, Stockholm, and Copenhagen on the seventeen-day cruise.

Bayern participated in the ceremonial transfer of the island of Helgoland from British to German control in the summer of 1890. She was present during the fleet maneuvers in September, where the entire eight-ship armored squadron simulated a Russian fleet blockading Kiel. She remained with the I Division in 1891; the year's maneuvers simulated a two-front war against Russia and either France of Denmark. Bayern participated in the 1892 fleet maneuvers as well. Three separate simulations were conducted, which included French blockades of the German North Sea coast and a Russian attack on Kiel. Vice Admiral Wilhelm Schröder commanded the fleet maneuvers of 1893, which simulated a protracted campaign against a superior French fleet. Bayern and her three sisters served as the Russian Baltic Fleet during the 1894 maneuvers.


SMS Bayern circa 1893

The four Sachsen-class ships were transferred to the II Division before the winter cruise of 1894–1895, following the completion of the four Brandenburg-classbattleships. The German fleet now possessed two homogenous squadrons of four ships each. The two divisions steamed to Orkney and the Shetland Islands in the spring of 1895. Bayern joined a massive fleet review on 21 July 1895 for the opening of the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, which connected Kiel to the North Sea. The Autumn 1895 maneuvers simulated a high-seas battle between the I and II Divisions in the North Sea, followed by combined maneuvers with the rest of the fleet in the Baltic.

After the conclusion of the 1895 maneuvers, Bayern was taken into drydock at the Schichau-Werke in Danzig for reconstruction. The ship's old wrought iron and teak armor was replaced with new Krupp nickel-steel armor. The four funnels were trunked into a single large funnel and new engines were also installed, which increased the ship's speed to 15.4 kn (28.5 km/h; 17.7 mph). The ship's 8.7 cm guns were replaced with quick-firing 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/30 guns and four 3.7 cm (1.5 in) autocannons. Work was completed in 1898. Bayern's three sisters were similarly modified between 1896 and 1899. Bayern remained with the fleet until 19 February 1910, when the ship was stricken from the naval register. She was converted into a target ship for the fleet and served in this capacity off Stollergrund after 1911. On 5 May 1919, Bayern was sold for scrapping and broken up in Kiel.


The Sachsen class of armored frigates was a class of four ships built by the Imperial German Navy in the late 1870s to early 1880s. The ships—Sachsen, Bayern, Württemberg, and Baden—were designed to operate as part of an integrated coastal defense network. The ships were intended to sortie from fortified bases to break up an enemy blockade or landing attempt. Armed with six 26 cm (10 in) guns, they were also intended to fight hostile ironclads on relatively equal terms.



Following their commissionings in 1878–1883, the four ships served with the fleet on numerous training exercises and cruises in the 1880s and 1890s. They also participated in several cruises escorting Kaiser Wilhelm II on state visits to Great Britain and to various cities in the Baltic Sea in the late 1880s and early 1890s. In the late 1890s, the four ships were extensively rebuilt; their secondary batteries were modernized and they received upgraded propulsion systems. They were removed from active duty between 1902 and 1910 and relegated to secondary duties. Sachsen and Bayern became target ships while Württemberg became a torpedo training ship. The three ships were broken up for scrap in 1919–1920. Baden was used as a boom defense hulk from 1910 to 1920, when she became a target ship. She survived until 1938, when she was sold for scrapping.


1902 lithograph of SMS Baden


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_Bayern_(1878)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sachsen-class_ironclad

 

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1879 – Launch of The SMS Möwe (Seagull), a gunboat of the Imperial German Navy. Its only sister ship was the SMS Habicht, although the SMS Adler was later built on the basis of the same blueprint.


The SMS Möwe (Seagull) was a gunboat of the Imperial German Navy. Its only sister ship was the SMS Habicht [de], although the SMS Adler was later built on the basis of the same blueprint.



This photo is part of the Australian National Maritime Museum’s William Hall collection. The Hall collection combines photographs from both William J Hall and his father William Frederick Hall. The images provide an important pictorial record of recreational boating in Sydney Harbour, from the 1890s to the 1930s – from large racing and cruising yachts, to the many and varied skiffs jostling on the harbour, to the new phenomenon of motor boating in the early twentieth century. The collection also includes studio portraits and images of the many spectators and crowds who followed the sailing races.
The Australian National Maritime Museum undertakes research and accepts public comments that enhance the information we hold about images in our collection. If you can identify a person, vessel or landmark, write the details in the Comments box below.
Thank you for helping caption this important historical image.
Object number: ANMS1092[204]

Service history
The Möwe was built by F. Schichau in Elbing and launched in 1879. It was deployed on service mostly at overseas stations, most notably in German West Africa.

In 1882, anti-European unrest following the British bombardment of Alexandria prompted the German government to send the Möwe and the Habicht to rescue German and Austrian nationals in Egypt, taking around 150 of them from Ismailiya to Port Said.

The Möwe was the vessel which took the Imperial Commissioner for West Africa, Gustav Nachtigal, out to seek treaties of protection with local rulers in 1884. On 4 July 1884 the first such treaty was signed at Bagida on the Togo coast, which thereby became a German colony. On 14 July 1884 Nachtigal took the Möwe to Bell-town (Douala) and signed a similar treaty, making Kamerun another colony of the German Empire. After this the Möwebrought the German flag to Nigeria, Gabon, and Angola, before taking Nachtigal south to found the new colony of German South West Africa. In 1889 it was involved in the suppression of the Abushiri revolt in German East Africa.

After 1895 it was used as a survey vessel coastal mapping German colonies in the Pacific and in German New Guinea. On 9 December 1905 the Möwe was decommissioned. It was retained as a hulk in the German territory of Qingdao on the Yellow Sea before finally being sold in 1910.

Technical description
The ship was 52.2m long, 8.9m breit and had a draught of 3.52m and a displacement of 845 tons. It was built using composite materials, with iron Ribs and wooden planks, covered with zinc plates. Two boilers produced the required steam, and a 3-cylinder engine provided 652kW (886PSi) of power to the 3.23m diameter propeller. It could make a top speed of 11.7 knots. With a coal stock of 100 tons and a speed of 11 knots it had an effective range of around 1230 nautical miles. There was no electrical equipment on board. It had a crew of 127.

The ship was originally barquentine-rigged with a total sail surface of 847m². It as later converted to schooner-rigging with 361m² of sail.

Armament
The ship, also designated as an aviso, was initially equipped with one 15cm hoop gun and four smaller 12cm hoop guns. This armament was replaced in 1882 by five 12.5 cm hoop guns, later reduced to two in 1890. Furthermore, from 1882 there were five 3.7 cm hotchkiss guns on board.

The maximum ammunition stock consisted of 115 rounds of 15 cm shells and 440 rounds of 12 cm shells. After conversion, 620 rounds of 12.5 cm shells could be carried, but from 1890, storage space for only 246 shells of this caliber was provided.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_Möwe_(1879)

 

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1903 – Launch of HMS Commonwealth, a King Edward VII-class battleship of the British Royal Navy.


HMS Commonwealth, was a King Edward VII-class battleship of the British Royal Navy. Like all ships of the class (apart from HMS King Edward VII) she was named after an important part of the British Empire, namely the Commonwealth of Australia. Armed with a battery of four 12-inch (305 mm) and four 9.2 in (234 mm) guns, she and her sister ships marked a significant advance in offensive power compared to earlier British battleship designs that did not carry the 9.2 in guns. Commonwealth was built at the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company, and was laid down in June 1902, launched in May 1903, and completed in March 1905.


HMS Commonwealth in heavy seas in 1912

After commissioning in March 1905, she served with the Atlantic Fleet until she was involved in a collision with HMS Albemarle in early 1907. While being repaired, she was transferred into what would become known as the Home Fleet. Following a reorganisation of the fleet in 1912, she, along with her sister ships formed the 3rd Battle Squadron, which served in the Mediterranean during the First Balkan War. The squadron returned to Britain in 1913 and remained there into 1914.

When the First World War broke out in August 1914, the 3rd Battle Squadron was assigned to the Grand Fleet, with Commonwealth conducting operations around Scotland and the North Sea as part of the Northern Patrol. The 3rd Battle Squadron was also involved in patrols of the entire Grand Fleet, though it did not see action against German forces. In 1916, the squadron was detached to the Nore Command. In 1917, the Commonwealth was updated, the only ship of her class to receive technology equivalent to that of the dreadnoughts. She ended the war as a gunnery training ship, continuing in this role until February 1921, at which time she was decommissioned and disposed of.


Design
Main article: King Edward VII-class battleship


Left elevation and deck plan as depicted in Jane's Fighting Ships

Following the development of pre-dreadnought type battleships carrying heavy secondary guns of 8-inch (200 mm) diameter in the Italian Regia Marina and the United States Navy, the Royal Navy decided to build similar ships. Initial proposals called for a battleship equipped with eight 7.5 in (190 mm) guns to support the main battery, though under the direction of William Henry White, the Director of Naval Construction, these were replaced with four 9.2 in (234 mm) guns. The new ships, though based on the general Majestic type that had formed the basis of the preceding four battleship designs, marked the first significant change in the series. Like all late pre-dreadnoughts that entered service in the mid-1900s, Commonwealth was made almost instantaneously obsolescent by the commissioning of the all-big-gun HMS Dreadnought in December 1906, armed with a battery of ten heavy guns compared to the typical four of most pre-dreadnoughts.

Commonwealth was 453 feet 9 inches (138.30 m) long overall, with a beam of 75 ft (23 m) and a draft of 25 ft 8 in (7.82 m). The King Edward VII-class battleships displaced 15,585 to 15,885 long tons (15,835 to 16,140 t) normally and up to 17,009 to 17,290 long tons (17,282 to 17,567 t) fully loaded. Her crew numbered 777 officers and ratings. The King Edward VII-class ships were powered by a pair of 4-cylinder triple-expansion engines that drove two screws, with steam provided by sixteen water-tube boilers. The boilers were trunked into two funnels located amidships. The King Edward VII-class ships had a top speed of 18.5 knots (34.3 km/h; 21.3 mph) from 18,000 indicated horsepower (13,000 kW).

Commonwealth had four 12-inch (305 mm) 40-calibre guns mounted in twin-gun turrets fore and aft. These were supported by a heavy secondary battery of four 9.2 in (234 mm) guns in four single turrets, two on each broadside. The ships also mounted ten 6-inch (152 mm) 45-calibre guns mounted in casemates, in addition to fourteen 12-pounder 3 in (76 mm) guns and fourteen 3-pounder 47 mm (1.9 in) guns for defence against torpedo boats.[3] As was customary for battleships of the period, she was also equipped with five 18-inch (457 mm) torpedo tubes submerged in the hull; two were on each broadside, with the fifth in the stern.

Commonwealth had an armoured belt that was 9 inches (229 mm) thick; the transverse bulkheads on the aft end of the belt was 8 to 12 in (203 to 305 mm) thick. The sides of her main battery turrets were also 8 to 12 in thick, atop 12 in barbettes, and the 9.2 turrets had 5 to 9 in (127 to 229 mm) sides. The casemate battery was protected with 7 in (178 mm) of armour plate. Her conning tower had 12-inch-thick sides. She was fitted with two armoured decks, 1 and 2.5 in (25 and 64 mm) thick, respectively.


HMS King Edward VII, lead ship of the King Edward VIIclass.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Commonwealth
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Edward_VII-class_battleship

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1906 – Launch of Ioann Zlatoust (Russian: Иоанн Златоуст), an Evstafi-class pre-dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy's Black Sea Fleet.


Ioann Zlatoust (Russian: Иоанн Златоуст) was an Evstafi-class pre-dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy's Black Sea Fleet. She was built before World War I and her completion was greatly delayed by changes made to reflect the lessons of the Russo-Japanese War of 1905. She was the second ship of her class.

She and her sister ship Evstafi were the most modern ships in the Black Sea Fleet when World War I began and formed the core of the fleet for the first year of the war, before the Imperatritsa Mariya-class dreadnoughts entered service. Ioann Zlatoust and Evstafi forced the German battlecruiserSMS Goeben to disengage during the Battle of Cape Sarych shortly after Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire in late 1914. She covered several bombardments of the Bosphorus fortifications in early 1915, including one where she was attacked by the Goeben, but Ioann Zlatoust, together with the other Russian pre-dreadnoughts, managed to drive her off. Ioann Zlatoust was relegated to secondary roles after the first dreadnought entered service in late 1915 and reduced to reserve in 1918 in Sevastopol.

Ioann Zlatoust was captured when the Germans took the city in May 1918 and was turned over to the Allies after the Armistice in November 1918. Her engines were destroyed in 1919 by the British when they withdrew from Sevastopol to prevent the advancing Bolsheviks from using the ship against the White guards. She was abandoned when the Whites evacuated the Crimea in 1920 and was scrapped by the Soviets in 1922–23.


Ioann Zlatoust in 1913

Description
Ioann Zlatoust was 379 feet (115.5 m) long at the waterline and 385 feet 9 inches (117.6 m) long overall. She had a beam of 74 feet (22.6 m) and a maximum draft of 28 ft (8.5 m). Her displacement was 12,855 long tons (13,061 t) as completed.

She had two 3-cylinder vertical triple expansion steam engines driving two propellers. 22 Belleville water-tube boilers provided steam to the engines. The engines had a total designed output of 10,600 indicated horsepower (7,904 kW) and gave a top speed of 16 knots (30 km/h; 18 mph). At full load she carried 1,100 long tons (1,118 t) of coal that provided her a range of 2,100 nautical miles (3,900 km; 2,400 mi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). Ioann Zlatoust ran her propulsion trials on 26 July 1910 and reached a maximum speed of 16.2 knots (30.0 km/h; 18.6 mph) and her engines produced a total of 10,623 indicated horsepower (7,922 kW). The navy was not satisfied and ran another test on 11 August which revealed cracks in the port engine's medium pressure cylinder. A final test was run on 29 November and the ship's horsepower increased slightly to 10,990 indicated horsepower (8,200 kW).

Ioann Zlatoust's Obukhovskii 12-inch Pattern 1895 40-calibre guns were mounted in two twin-gun turrets, one each fore and aft. Each turret had a firing arc of 260°. All four 8-inch (203 mm) 50-calibre Pattern 1905 guns were mounted in the corners of the superstructure in armoured casemates. These guns had a firing arc of 120° and could fire straight ahead or astern. The dozen 6-inch (152 mm) Canet Pattern 1892 45-calibre guns were mounted in the lower casemates. The anti-torpedo boat armament consisted of 14 75-millimetre (3.0 in) Canet Pattern 1892 50-calibre guns mounted in sponsons on the upper deck, protected by gun shields. She carried two 17.7-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes on the broadside aft.

Wartime modifications
Ioann Zlatoust was fitted with anti-aircraft guns on top of each of her turrets during 1915 and screens were added on top of her funnels to keep out light bombs. She was initially received four 75-millimetre guns, but this was later altered to a pair of 75 mm guns and another pair of 63.5-millimetre (2.5 in) guns.


The Evstafi class were a pair of pre-dreadnought battleships of the Imperial Russian Navy built before World War I for the Black Sea Fleet. They were slightly enlarged versions of the Russian battleship Potemkin, with increased armour and more guns. Numerous alterations were made as a result of experience in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–5 that seriously delayed the completion of the two ships.

They were the most modern ships in the Black Sea Fleet when World War I began and formed the core of the fleet for the first year of the war, before the newer dreadnoughts entered service. They forced the German battlecruiser SMS Goeben to disengage during the Battle of Cape Sarych shortly after Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire in late 1914. Both ships covered several bombardments of the Bosphorus fortifications in early 1915, including one where they were attacked by the Goeben, but they managed to drive her off. Later, Evstafi and Ioann Zlatoust were relegated to secondary roles after the first dreadnought entered service in late 1915, and were subsequently put into reserve in 1918 in Sevastopol.

Both ships were captured when the Germans took the city in May 1918 and was turned over to the Allies after the Armistice in November 1918. Their engines were destroyed in 1919 by the British when they withdrew from Sevastopol to prevent the advancing Bolsheviks from using them against the White Russians. They were abandoned when the Whites evacuated the Crimea in 1920 and were scrapped in 1922–23.


Russian battleship Evstafi



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_battleship_Ioann_Zlatoust

Evstafi-class battleship - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Evstafi_(ship,_1911)

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1915 - HMS Goliath – On the night of 12–13 May 1915, Goliath was anchored in Morto Bay off Cape Helles when she was torpedoed.
Goliath began to capsize almost immediately, she rolled over and began to sink by the bow, taking 570 of the 700-strong crew to the bottom.


HMS Goliath was a pre-dreadnought battleship of the British Royal Navy and a member of the Canopus class. Intended for service in Asia, Goliath and her sister ships were smaller and faster than the preceding Majestic-class battleships, but retained the same battery of four 12-inch (305 mm) guns. She also carried thinner armour, but incorporated new Krupp steel, which was more effective than the Harvey armour used in the Majestics. Goliath was laid down in January 1897, launched in March 1898, and commissioned into the fleet in March 1900.



The ship was deployed to the China Station from her commissioning until 1903, when she returned to Britain; she was sent back to East Asian waters, but while en route was reassigned to the Mediterranean Fleet. In early 1906, she was transferred to the Channel Fleet, followed by a stint in the Home Fleet starting in early 1907. She was sent to the Mediterranean a second time in 1908, and later returned to the Home Fleet in 1909, before being decommissioned in 1913. With the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914, Goliath was mobilised into the 8th Battle Squadron. She initially served as a guard ship in Loch Ewe, one of the harbors used by the Grand Fleet, before escorting the crossing of British troops to Belgium in late August.

Goliath then took part in operations against German East Africa, participating in the blockade of the German light cruiser SMS Königsberg in the Rufiji River. From March 1915, she was part of the Dardanelles Campaign, and remained in support of the landings at Gallipoli in April. On 13 May 1915 Goliath was sunk in Morto Bay off Cape Helles by three torpedoes from the Ottoman destroyer Muâvenet-i Millîye. Out of her crew of 750, 570 were killed in the sinking.


Design
Main article: Canopus-class battleship

Right elevation, deck plan and hull section as depicted in Brassey's Naval Annual 1906



Goliath and her five sister ships were designed for service in East Asia, where the new rising power Japan was beginning to build a powerful navy, though this role was quickly made redundant by the Anglo-Japanese Allianceof 1902. The ships were designed to be smaller, lighter and faster than their predecessors, the Majestic-class battleships. Goliath was 421 feet 6 inches (128.47 m) long overall, with a beam of 74 ft (23 m) and a draft of 26 ft 2 in (7.98 m). She displaced 13,150 long tons (13,360 t) normally and up to 14,300 long tons (14,500 t) full loaded. Her crew numbered 682 officers and ratings.

The Canopus-class ships were powered by a pair of 3-cylinder triple-expansion engines, with steam provided by twenty Belleville boilers. They were the first British battleships with water-tube boilers, which generated more power at less expense in weight compared with the fire-tube boilers used in previous ships. The new boilers led to the adoption of fore-and-aft funnels, rather than the side-by-side funnel arrangement used in many previous British battleships. The Canopus-class ships proved to be good steamers, with a high speed for battleships of their time—18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph) from 13,500 indicated horsepower (10,100 kW)—a full two knots faster than the Majestics.

Goliath had four 12-inch (305 mm) 35-calibre guns mounted in twin-gun turrets fore and aft; these guns were mounted in circular barbettes that allowed all-around loading, although at a fixed elevation. The ships also mounted twelve 6-inch (152 mm) 40-calibre guns mounted in casemates, in addition to ten 12-pounder guns and six 3-pounder guns. As was customary for battleships of the period, she was also equipped with four 18-inch (460 mm) torpedo tubes submerged in the hull.

To save weight, Goliath carried less armour than the Majestics—6 inches (152 mm) in the belt compared to 9 in (229 mm)—although the change from Harvey armour in the Majestics to Krupp armour in Goliath meant that the loss in protection was not as great as it might have been, Krupp armour having greater protective value at a given weight than its Harvey equivalent. Similarly, the other armour used to protect the ship could also be thinner; the bulkheads on either end of the belt were 6 to 10 in (152 to 254 mm) thick. The main battery turrets were 10 in thick, atop 12 in (305 mm) barbettes, and the casemate battery was protected with 6 in of Krupp steel. Her conning tower had 12 in thick sides as well. She was fitted with two armoured decks, 1 and 2 in (25 and 51 mm) thick, respectively.

Operational history
Pre-World War I


HMS Goliath

The keel for Goliath was laid down on 4 January 1897, and the completed hull was launched on 23 March 1898. The ship was commissioned on 27 March 1900 by Captain Lewis Edmund Wintz to serve on the China Station, where she underwent a refit at Hong Kong from September 1901 – April 1902. Captain Frank Hannam Henderson was appointed in command 11 July 1902. She left the China Station in July 1903 and returned home, where she paid off into the commissioned Reserve at Chatham Dockyard on 9 October 1903. While in reserve, Goliath underwent a refit at Palmers on the Tyne from January–June 1904, then participated in maneuvers later in the year. On 9 May 1905, Goliath returned to full commission at Chatham to relieve her sister ship Ocean on the China Station. However, Great Britain and Japan ratified a treaty of alliance while she was on her outbound voyage, allowing the Royal Navy to reduce its presence on the China Station and recall all battleships from those waters; when Goliath reached Colombo, Ceylon in June 1905, she was recalled, and was instead attached to the Mediterranean Fleet. In January 1906, she was transferred to the Channel Fleet.

After being fitted with fire control, Goliath transferred to the Portsmouth Division of the new Home Fleet on 15 March 1907. She was based at Portsmouth, and underwent a machinery overhaul there from August 1907 – February 1908. Upon completion of her refit, Goliath commissioned on 4 February 1908 for Mediterranean Fleet service. During her voyage to Malta, one of her propeller shafts fractured, and she required four-month repair period before she could begin her service. On 20 April 1909, she paid off at Portsmouth. On 22 April, Goliath recommissioned to serve in the 4th Division, Home Fleet, at the Nore. During this service, she was refitted at Chatham in 1910–1911 and was sent to Sheerness. In 1913, she was mothballed and joined the 3rd Fleet.

World War I
When the First World War broke out in August 1914, Goliath returned to full commission and was assigned to the 8th Battle Squadron, Channel Fleet, operating out of Devonport. She was sent to Loch Ewe as guard ship to defend the Grand Fleet anchorage, and then covered the landing of the Plymouth Marine Battalion at Ostend, Belgium on 25 August 1914. For this operation, she and three other battleships—Vengeance, Prince George, and Caesar—a protected cruiser, and six destroyers escorted the troopships; at the same time, elements of the Grand Fleet attacked the German patrol line off Heligoland to occupy the German High Seas Fleet.

Operations off German East Africa

SMS Königsberg, Goliath's quarry in German East Africa

Goliath transferred to the East Indies Station on 20 September to support cruisers on convoy duty in the Middle East, escorting an Indian convoy to the Persian Gulfand German East Africa through October. This included a major troop convoy that left India on 16 October, in company with the battleship Swiftsure. Goliath's arrival allowed cruisers that had been occupied with escorting convoys to join the hunt for the German light cruiser SMS Königsberg. The German cruiser, having sunk the British cruiser Pegasus in the Battle of Zanzibar, was trapped by three British cruisers in the Rufiji River delta in late October. Goliath arrived shortly thereafter and was to join the blockade of the delta, but the news of the British defeat at the Battle of Coronel on 1 November forced the Admiralty to transfer Goliathto South Africa, as it was feared that the German East Asia Squadron might attack the colony after it entered the southern Atlantic. To further complicate matters, Goliath had engine problems on arriving in Mombasa, Kenya, and was unable to proceed to South Africa, and instead the armoured cruiser Minotaur was sent in her place. After her engines were repaired, Goliath resumed her previous assignment with the blockade force at the Rufiji delta.

In November, Goliath attempted to get close enough to neutralise Königsberg, but the water was too shallow to permit her to get within range of the cruiser. As a result, she left to bombard Dar es Salaam on 28 November and 30 November. In the former attack, Commander Henry Ritchie, Goliath's executive officer, won the Victoria Cross. Goliath and the protected cruiser Fox destroyed the colonial governor's residence; the second bombardment proved to be less effective. Goliath underwent a refit at Simonstown, South Africa, from December 1914 to February 1915. She then returned to the Rufiji delta on 25 February, as it seemed from German activities that Königsberg's commander intended to break out soon. During this period, Goliath bombarded German positions at Lindi, but she saw no action with Königsberg. On 25 March, Goliath was ordered to move to the Mediterranean to take part in operations off the Dardanelles, her place being taken by the protected cruiser Hyacinth; the battleship left East African waters a week later on 1 April.

Dardanelles campaign
See also: Naval operations in the Dardanelles Campaign

Map showing the Ottoman defences at the Dardanelles in 1915

Upon arrival in the Aegean Sea, Goliath joined the First Squadron, which included seven other battleships and four cruisers, and was commanded by Rear Admiral Rosslyn Wemyss. The First Squadron was tasked with supporting the Landing at Cape Helles, which took place on 25 April. On the morning of the landings, Goliath took up a position off Y beach, some 4,000 to 5,000 yards (3,700 to 4,600 m) offshore to provide gunfire support. The protected cruisers Sapphire and Amethyst moved in closer, and all three ships opened fire at around 05:00, signalling the start of the attack. The Ottomans made no attempt to disrupt the landing, the Allied forces having successfully launching a surprise attack. By late in the day, however, an Ottoman counterattack had advanced from Krithia to threaten the British flank, but gunfire from Goliath and the cruisers broke up the attack. That night, the Ottomans launched another counterattack, this time against the centre of the British line, which was repulsed. Once the sun began to rise, Goliath and the cruisers, which had by then been reinforced by the cruisers Talbot and Dublin, shelled the Ottomans, forcing them to retreat again.

On the morning of 26 April, wounded soldiers began to be ferried off the beach, first to Goliath and the cruisers off shore. A miscommunication with the men on shore led to an unintended, larger evacuation effort. In the course of the action, she sustained some damage from the gunfire of Ottoman forts and shore batteries. Later in the day, order was restored on shore, and the Allied troops were able to occupy Sedd el Bahr. The Allies landed reinforcements, which allowed the advance to push toward Krithia on 27 April. Goliath and several other battleships shelled Ottoman defenders around the town to support the attack, which began the following morning at around 10:00. Goliath moved as close to shore as possible, to employ all of her guns at very close range. Despite the heavy fire support, the Allied troops were unable to dislodge the Ottoman defenders, and the First Battle of Krithia ended in an Allied defeat. Goliath was damaged by Ottoman guns again on 2 May.

By mid-May, the Allied fleet had developed a rotation of two battleships on station off Gallipoli every night to support the troops dug in on the peninsula. On the night of 12–13 May, Goliath was on station with the battleship Cornwallis. The two ships were moored in Morto Bay, with Goliath ahead of Cornwallis; five destroyers patrolled the area against Ottoman torpedo boats. The Ottoman destroyer Muâvenet-i Millîye sortied late on 12 May under cover of a moonless night. By steaming very slowly, the Ottomans were able to slip past the destroyer patrols at about 01:00 on 13 May. Fifteen minutes later, lookouts aboard Goliath spotted Muâvenet-i Millîye and issued a challenge; the Ottomans replied to the challenge but very quickly increased speed and launched three torpedoes at Goliath. The British opened fire, but only managed to shoot three rounds before the first torpedo struck the ship. Two torpedoes hit almost simultaneously, the first abreast her fore turret and the second abeam the fore funnel, causing a large explosion. Goliath began to capsize almost immediately, and was lying on her side when a third torpedo struck near her after turret. Muâvenet-i Millîye sped off and escaped unscathed in the darkness as the other British warships gathered to rescue survivors from Goliath. Some 570 men, out of a crew of 750 were killed in the sinking, including the ship's commander, Captain Thomas Shelford.

The wreck lies upside down at a depth of 63 metres (207 ft), and is largely buried in sediment. Only part of the hull, which was badly mangled by the explosion, and one of her screws are visible.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Goliath_(1898)
https://collections.rmg.co.uk/colle...l-1016784;browseBy=vessel;vesselFacetLetter=C

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 May 1972 – Launch of USS Nimitz (CVN-68), a supercarrier of the United States Navy, and the lead ship of her class.


USS Nimitz (CVN-68) is a supercarrier of the United States Navy, and the lead ship of her class. One of the largest warships in the world, she was laid down, launched, and commissioned as CVAN-68; "aircraft carrier, attack, nuclear powered", but she was later redesignated as CVN-68; "aircraft carrier, multi-mission", nuclear-powered", on 30 June 1975, as part of a fleet-wide realignment that year.


USS Nimitz (CVN-68) off the coast of San Diego in July 2009

The ship was named for World War II Pacific fleet commander Chester W. Nimitz, USN, (1885–1966), who was the Navy’s third fleet admiral. Nimitz had her homeport at Naval Station Norfolk until 1987, when she was relocated to Naval Station Bremerton in Washington (now part of Naval Base Kitsap). Following her Refueling and Complex Overhaul in 2001, her home port was changed to Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego County, California. The home port of Nimitz was again moved to Naval Station Everett in Washington in 2012.

In January 2015, Nimitz changed home port from Everett back to Naval Base Kitsap.


Nimitz (right) alongside HMS Ark Royal of the British Royal Navy (built 1950–1955), at Norfolk Naval Station in August 1978


The Nimitz class is a class of ten nuclear-powered aircraft carriers in service with the United States Navy. The lead ship of the class is named after World War II United States Pacific Fleet commander Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, who was the U.S. Navy's last living fleet admiral. With an overall length of 1,092 ft (333 m) and full-load displacement of over 100,000 long tons, the Nimitz-class ships were the largest warships built and in-service until USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) entered the fleet in 2017.

Instead of the gas turbines or diesel-electric systems used for propulsion on many modern warships, the carriers use two A4W pressurized water reactorswhich drive four propeller shafts and can produce a maximum speed of over 30 knots (56 km/h) and maximum power of around 260,000 shp (190 MW). As a result of the use of nuclear power, the ships are capable of operating for over 20 years without refueling and are predicted to have a service life of over 50 years. They are categorized as nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and are numbered with consecutive hull numbers between CVN-68 and CVN-77.

All ten carriers were constructed by Newport Shipbuilding Company in Virginia. USS Nimitz, the lead ship of the class, was commissioned on 3 May 1975, and USS George H.W. Bush, the tenth and last of the class, was commissioned on 10 January 2009. Since the 1970s, Nimitz-class carriers have participated in many conflicts and operations across the world, including Operation Eagle Claw in Iran, the Gulf War, and more recently in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The angled flight decks of the carriers use a CATOBAR arrangement to operate aircraft, with steam catapults and arrestor wires for launch and recovery. As well as speeding up flight deck operations, this allows for a much wider variety of aircraft than with the STOVL arrangement used on smaller carriers. An embarked carrier air wing consisting of up to around 90 aircraft is normally deployed on board. After the retirement of the F-14 Tomcat, the air wings' strike fighters are primarily F/A-18E and F/A-18F Super Hornets and F/A-18A+ and F/A-18C Hornets. In addition to their aircraft, the vessels carry short-range defensive weaponry for anti-aircraft warfare and missile defense.

The unit cost was about $8.5 billion in FY 12 dollars, equal to $9.36 billion (2018) inflation adjusted.




George Washington Carrier Strike Groupformation sails in the Atlantic Ocean.


A F/A-18 Hornet launches from the flight deck of Harry S. Truman. Other aircraft are stored on deck.


The hangar of George Washingtonduring a replenishment at sea, 2009

USS Nimitz - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nimitz-class_aircraft_carrier

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
Other Events on 13 May


1744 – Launch of French Caribou 52 guns (launched 13 May 1744 at Quebec, designed and built by René-Nicolas Levasseur) – condemneded 1757


1787 – Captain Arthur Phillip leaves Portsmouth, England, with eleven ships full of convicts (the "First Fleet") to establish a penal colony in Australia.

See also the Topic:

Discovery of present-day Australia – The First Fleet Ships

The first fleet was the 11 ships that left Portland, England to start the first penal colony in New South Wales which later became the country of Australia. Captain Arthur Philip was selected to lead this ambitious undertaking on 13 May 1787 to relieve the pressure on the overcrowded prisons in...

shipsofscale.com

First Fleet - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

1796 HMS Salisbury (50) wrecked near San Domingo

HMS Salisbury (1769) was a 50-gun fourth rate launched in 1769 and grounded and surrendered to the Spanish in 1796 at Avache Island, Santo Domingo.



https://collections.rmg.co.uk/colle...el-345522;browseBy=vessel;vesselFacetLetter=S


1798 Boats of HMS Flora (36) cut out Mondavi,

HMS Flora (1780) was a 36-gun fifth rate launched in 1780 and wrecked in 1808. Because Flora served in the navy's Egyptian campaign between 8 March 1801 and 2 September, her officers and crew qualified for the clasp "Egypt" to the Naval General Service Medal, which the Admiralty issued in 1847 to all surviving claimants



https://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections.html#!csearch;searchTerm=Flora_(1780


1846 - Congress declares war against Mexico. Commodore David Conner is responsible for the landing of the Army at Vera Cruz. In April 1847, Commodore Matthew C. Perry relieves Conner. On Feb. 2, 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed ending hostilities.


1854 – Launch of HMS Harrier, a Royal Navy Cruizer-class sloop launched in 1854.

HMS Harrier was a Royal Navy Cruizer-class sloop launched in 1854. She took part in the Crimean War, served on the Australia Station and took part in the New Zealand Wars. She was broken up in 1865


Cruizer, sister-ship to Harrier

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Harrier_(1854)

Cruizer-class sloop - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

1866 - General Grant was a 1,005-ton three-masted barque built in Maine in the United States in 1864, wrecked

General Grant was a 1,005-ton three-masted barque built in Maine in the United States in 1864 and registered in Boston, Massachusetts. She was named after Ulysses S. Grant and owned by Messers Boyes, Richardson & Co. She had a timber hull with a length of 179.5 ft, beam of 34.5 ft and depth of 21.5 ft. While on her way from Melbourne to London, General Grant crashed into a cliff on the west coast of main island of the Auckland Islands of New Zealand, and subsequently sank as a result. Sixty-eight people drowned and only 15 people survived.


Wreck of the American ship General Grant on Auckland Island, in Illustrated London , April 18, 1868

Wreck
She departed Melbourne on 4 May 1866 bound for London via Cape Horn, under the command of Captain William H. Loughlin. She was carrying 58 passengers and 25 crew, along with a cargo of wool, skins, 2,576 ounces of gold, and 9 tons of zinc spelter ballast. Included in the passenger list were a number of successful miners from the Australian gold fields.

At 11pm on 13 May 1866, the Auckland Islands were sighted dead ahead. With only light winds the crew were unable to change course, and she collided against the cliffs and drifted into a large cave on Auckland Island's western shore. The rising tide and increasing swell caused the main mast to hit the cave roof repeatedly until the mast forced a hole through the hull; the ship sank on 14 May 1866. Although the weather remained calm, the boats were not launched immediately on the ship entering the cave as it was very dark, there was no obvious landing place, and pieces of spars and rock were falling down continually.

Once daylight arrived the three boats on board were prepared for launch. The boats consisted of two quarter boats (each 22 feet long) and a long boat of 30 feet. One of the quarter boats was launched first and sent outside to see if landing could be made. The boat was expected to return for more people but instead waited outside the cave as no landing could be found. By this time the swell was increasing. The second quarter boat took a number of passengers and crew, including Mrs Jewell, to the first boat for transfer. The long boat was lying on the quarter deck and was filled with passengers. The ship was sinking fast and the long boat floated off General Grant's decks. Unfortunately, the long boat was swamped with water just after getting clear of the ship. The second quarter boat stayed out of the danger area, but three people (David Ashworth, Aaron Hayman, and William Sanguily) were able to swim through the surf to the quarter boat.[4] A total of fifteen people, including 9 crew and 6 passengers, survived the wreck. The captain did not leave the ship.

Castaway
After the sinking of the ship and the capsizing of the long boat, the remaining two quarter boats pulled up outside the cave and decided to row for Disappointment Island. They reached there at dark and then the next day made for the Auckland Island and Port Ross. They arrived there after three days and two nights. After exploring, the group found two huts at Port Ross and, on 13 July 1866 Musgrave's hut. The group split in two in order to keep watch for passing ships. After nine months ashore, four of the crew decided to attempt to sail to New Zealand in one of the quarter boats. They set sail on 22 January 1867 without a compass, chart, or nautical instrument of any kind and were never seen again. Another survivor, David McLelland, died of illness on 3 September 1867. He was 62.

The ten remaining survivors moved to Enderby Island, where they lived on seals and pigs. On 19 November, they sighted the cutter Fanny, but she did not see their signals. The brig Amherst noticed their signals on 21 November 1867 and rescued the group.

As a result of this shipwreck and two previous wrecks (Grafton and Invercauld), the New Zealand government established a network of castaway depots and regular visits by government vessels to the subantarctic islands to relieve further shipwreck victims.

From as soon as 1868, General Grant's cargo of gold attracted numerous recovery attempts, several of which proved deadly for the wreck seekers, but the exact location of the wreck has yet to be confirmed.

USS Grant - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

1908 - The Navy Nurse Corps is established by Public Law No. 115, though nurses have been volunteering onboard Navy ships prior to the Civil War.


1908 - The Pearl Harbor Navy Yard, later called Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, is authorized for the enlargement and dredging of the Pearl Harbor channel and locks to admit the largest ships as it becomes a coaling station for the U.S. Navy.


1911 – Launch of SMS Magdeburg ("His Majesty's Ship Magdeburg") was a lead ship of the Magdeburg class of light cruisers in the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy).

SMS Magdeburg ("His Majesty's Ship Magdeburg") was a lead ship of the Magdeburg class of light cruisers in the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy). Her class included three other ships: Breslau, Strassburg, and Stralsund. Magdeburg was built at the AG Weser shipyard in Bremen from 1910 to August 1912, when she was commissioned into the High Seas Fleet. The ship was armed with a main battery of twelve 10.5 cm SK L/45 guns and had a top speed of 27.5 knots (50.9 km/h; 31.6 mph). Magdeburg was used as a torpedo test ship after her commissioning until the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, when she was brought to active service and deployed to the Baltic.



In the Baltic, Magdeburg fired the first shots of the war against the Russians on 2 August, when she shelled the port of Libau. She participated in a series of bombardments of Russian positions until late August. On the 26th, she participated in a sweep of the entrance to the Gulf of Finland; while steaming off the Estonian coast, she ran aground off the island of Odensholm and could not be freed. A pair of Russian cruisers appeared and seized the ship. Fifteen crew members were killed in the brief engagement. They recovered three intact German code books, one of which they passed to the British. The ability to decrypt German wireless signals provided the British with the ability to ambush German units on several occasions during the war, including the Battle of Jutland. The Russians partially scrapped Magdeburg while she remained grounded before completely destroying the wreck.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_Magdeburg

Magdeburg-class cruiser - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

1918 - Bregenz – On 13 May 1918 the Austro-Hungarian troop transport was torpedoed and sunk by the Italian motor torpedo boat MAS 99 in Durazzo harbour. 234 of the 1,192 troops and crew aboard were lost, and 958 were rescued.


1942 - The Action of 13 May 1942 was a naval engagement during World War II between the British Royal Navy and the German Kriegsmarine.

The Action of 13 May 1942 was a naval engagement during World War II between the British Royal Navy and the German Kriegsmarine. It was an attempt by Royal Navy Motor Torpedo Boats (MTBs) to stop the German auxiliary cruiser Stier from reaching Gironde, France. Stier made it through the English Channel and reached Gironde, but MTBs sunk the German fleet torpedo boats Iltis and Seeadler. MTB 220 was sunk by the German ships.

Action of 13 May 1942 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

1944 - USS Francis M. Robinson (DE 220) sinks Japanese submarine RO 501 (ex-German U 1124) en route to Japan on her maiden voyage, 400 miles south-southwest of the Azores.

The Action of 13 May 1944 refers to the sinking of an Imperial Japanese submarine in the Atlantic Ocean during World War II. An American destroyer escort attacked the former German U-boat U-1224, which had been given to the Japanese Navy and renamed RO-501. The boat was the first of two Japanese vessels sunk in the European Theater of Operations.


USS Francis M. Robinson in the Atlantic on 2 February 1944.


Norita Sadotoshi at the christening of RO-501 in Germany.

Action of 13 May 1944 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

2008 - the double decker ferry MV Nazimuddin carrying 150 passengers on board sank in the Ghorautura River, Ghoradigha, Kishoregani, 80 kilometres (43 nmi) from Dhaka, killing at least 41.

MV Nazimuddin was a ferry that sunk in the Ghorautura River of Bangladesh on 13 May 2008, killing at least 40 people.

MV Nazimuddin - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1713 – Re-Launch of HMS Royal Oak, a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy


HMS Royal Oak was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built by Jonas Shish at Deptford and launched in 1674. She was one of only three Royal Navy ships to be equipped with the Rupertinoe naval gun. Life aboard her when cruising in the Mediterranean in 1679 is described in the diary of Henry Teonge.








She was rebuilt at Chatham Dockyard in 1690 as a 70-gun third rate.

On 24 August 1704, Royal Oak participated in the Battle of Vélez-Málaga, in the centre division of the combined English-Dutch fleet under Admiral George Rooke.

She was rebuilt a second time at Woolwich Dockyard, relaunching on 14 May 1713 as a 70-gun third rate built to the 1706 Establishment.[3] She fought off Forbin's squadron during the Action of 2 May 1707, and was also present in the Battle at The Lizard.

Under the command of Captain Thomas Kempthorne, Royal Oak took part in the Battle of Cape Passaro on 11 August 1718 as part of Admiral Sir George Byng's fleet.


On the left, a near starboard quarter view of the ‘Royal Oak’ at anchor. Her main topmasthead is not shown, but there is the tail of a pendant shown in the top left corner. Several other ships are in the background. It is inscribed ‘rooijal oock 1674’. This drawing is by the Younger, signed ‘W.V.VJ’ in pencil. The work is in pen, brown ink and grey wash over slight preliminary pencil work. Some of the wash may have been added by a later hand

On 8 March 1737 she was ordered to be taken to pieces at Plymouth, and rebuilt as a 70-gun ship according to the 1733 proposals of the 1719 Establishment. She was relaunched on 29 August 1741. Captain Philip Vincent took command and the ship was assigned to the Mediterranean with Rear Admiral Richard Lestock's squadron. Vincent was succeeded by Captain Edmund Willams, Captain Charles Long and finally Captain James Hodsall.

Royal Oak was converted to serve as a prison ship at Plymouth in 1756. The ship was the scene of an incident in January 1759 in which a Frenchprisoner, Jean Manaux, told the warden that his fellow prisoners were forging passes. His fellow prisoners discovered this and, on 25 January, dragged him to a remote part of the ship, gave him approximately 60 strokes with a large iron thimble tied to a rope, then beat him to death after he struggled from his bonds. They dismembered his body in an attempt to dispose of it. At an inquest ashore the next day, one of the prisoners provided information on the murder, which resulted in the hanging of Charles Darras, Louis Bourdec, Fleurant Termineu, Pierre Pitroll and Pierre Lagnal on April 25 at Exeter.

Royal Oak was broken up in 1763.


Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, sheer lines, and longitudinal half-breadth for rebuilding 'Essex' (1700), and later for rebuilding 'Royal Oak' (1713), as 'Essex' (1741) and 'Royal Oak' (1741), both 1733 Establishment 60-gun Third Rate two-deckers




Scale: 1:48. A contemporary full hull model of the 'Royal Oak' (1741), a 70-gun two-decker ship of the line, built plank on frame in the Navy Board style. The model is partially decked, equipped, rigged and mounted on its original baseboard. The model has been identified as being the 'rebuilt’ 'Royal Oak’ of 1741, and the dimensions agree closely to the original plans held in the NMM collection. It had a gun deck length of 151 feet by 43 feet in the beam and a tonnage of 1224 burden. Internal examination has also revealed that some structural alterations have been made to the model with the moving and filling of gunports in the stern, as well as changes to the stern layout. The name on the stern was probably added later as this practice was not introduced until the 1770’s. The rigging, which is largely contemporary, has had minor repairs carried out as well as some general restoration of the hull, which was undertaken by Jim Lees in the NMM workshop 1974-75. The 'Royal Oak’ had an active career with the fleet in the Mediterranean and was present at the blockade of Toulon in 1744, before it was finally ordered to be broken up in 1763

HMS Royal Oak (1674) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Collections - National Maritime Museum

Collections - National Maritime Museum

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1741 - HMS Wager (24), Cptn. Dandy Kidd, wrecked on the South coast of Chile


HMS Wager was a square-rigged sixth-rate Royal Navy ship of 28 guns. She was built as an East Indiaman in about 1734 and made two voyages to India for the East India Company before the Royal Navy purchased her in 1739. She formed part of a squadron under Commodore George Anson and was wrecked on the south coast of Chile on 14 May 1741. The wreck of the Wager became famous for the subsequent adventures of the survivors who found themselves marooned on a desolate island in the middle of a Patagonian winter, and in particular because of the Wager Mutiny that followed.





Service in the East India Company
Wager was an East Indiaman, an armed trading vessel built mainly to accommodate large cargoes of goods from the Far East. As an Indiaman she carried 30 guns and had a crew of 98.

Under Captain Charles Raymond she sailed from the Downs on 13 February 1735, arriving in Madras on 18 July and returning to England via St Helenain July 1736. She made her second and final run for the Company to India in 1738, sailing via the Cape of Good Hope to Madras and Bengal, and returning to the Downs on 27 August 1739.

Purchase by the Royal Navy
The Admiralty purchased Wager from Mr J. Raymond on 21 November 1739, and rated her as a 28-gun sixth-rate. The Admiralty bought her to fill in a squadron under Commodore George Anson that would attack Spanish interests on the Pacific west coast of South America. Her role was to carry additional stores of small arms, ball and powder to arm shore raiding parties. It was apt that she carried the name of the principal sponsor of the voyage, Admiral Sir Charles Wager.

She was fitted for naval service at Deptford Dockyard between 23 November 1739 and 23 May 1740 at a cost of £7,096.2.4d, and was registered as a sixth-rate on 22 April 1740, being established with 120 men and 28 guns.

Anson's circumnavigation
Main article: George Anson's voyage around the world
Anson's expedition to the Pacific in August 1740 comprised six warships and two transports, all manned by 1854 men. The Navy commissioned Wager under Captain Dandy Kidd, who died before the ship reached Cape Horn; Lieutenant David Cheap was promoted to captain (acting). The squadron rounded Cape Horn in terrible weather, which scattered the ships of the squadron. Wager became separated and then needed to make her rendezvous. Unfortunately, she turned north before she had sailed sufficiently far to the west, and in foul weather closed the coast of modern-day Chile.

The wreck of the Wager

The Wreck of the Wager, the frontispiece from John Byron's account

On 13 May 1741 at 9:00am, the carpenter went forward to inspect the chain plates. Whilst there he thought he caught a fleeting glimpse of land to the west. Lieutenant Baynes was also there but he saw nothing, and the sighting was not reported. Consequently, no one realised that Wager had entered a large, uncharted bay.

At 2:00pm land was positively sighted to the west and northwest and all hands were mustered to make sail and turn the ship to the southwest. During the operations that followed, Captain Cheap fell down the quarterdeck ladder, dislocated his shoulder, and was confined below. The ship's disabled and worn-out condition severely hampered efforts to get clear of the bay.

At 4:30am the next day the ship struck rocks repeatedly, broke her tiller, and although still afloat, was partially flooded. Invalids below who were too sick to get out of their hammocks drowned. The ship was steered with sail alone towards land, but later in the morning the ship struck again, and this time became hard aground.

Wager had struck the coast of what would subsequently be known as Wager Island in position 47°40′43″S 75°02′57″W in Guayaneco Archipelago. Some of the crew broke into the spirit room and got drunk, armed themselves and began looting, dressing up in officers' clothes and fighting. The other 140 men and officers took to the boats and made it safely on shore. On the following day, Friday 15 May, the ship bilged amidships and many of the drunken crew still on board drowned.

The Wager mutiny
Main article: Wager Mutiny
In the Royal Navy of 1741 officers' commissions were valid only for the ship to which they had been appointed; thus the loss of the ship implied the loss of any official authority. Seamen ceased to be paid on the loss of their ship. After the wreck of Wager these factors, combined with terrible conditions and murderous in-fighting between officers and men, caused discipline to break down. The party divided into two: 81 men under the gunner, Mr Bulkley, took to small boats with the aim of returning to England via the East coast of South America, and 20 men, including Captain Cheap and Midshipman John (later Vice Admiral ‘Foulweather Jack’) Byron remained on Wager Island. After a series of disasters, over five years later six of Bulkley's group and four of Captain Cheap's group returned to England. Wager had left England with the best part of 300 men on board.

Spanish response and fate of the wreck site
See also: Coastal defence of colonial Chile
The British arrival caused great alarm among the Spanish who searched extensively the Patagonian archipelagoes to cleanse it from any possible British presence. In the 1740s the viceroy of Peru and the governor of Chile converged in a project to advance the frontiers of the Spanish Empire in the Southeast Pacific and prevent the establishment of a British base. As a result of this plan the Juan Fernández Islands were settled and the fort of Tenquehuen established in Chonos Archipelago near Taitao Peninsula. This last fort was manned for one and half year before being abandoned. After the Tenquehuen fort was dismantled the Marquis of the Ensenada, being briefed on local affairs, recommended the establishment of a fort in the Guaitecas Archipelago, but this never happened. For Governor Antonio Narciso de Santa María, Chiloé Island was the most important part of the Patagonian Archipelago recommending to concentrate on the defense of Chiloé. It was following Narciso de Santa María's recommendations that the Spanish founded the "city-fort" of Ancud in 1767–1768.

Spanish charts of the mid-eighteenth century show the approximate location of the wreck, indicating that it was well-known to the local elite at the time. In late 2006, a Scientific Exploration Society expedition searched for the wreck of the Wager and found, in shallow water, a piece of a wooden hull with some of the frames and external planking. Carbon-14 dating indicated a date contemporary with the Wager. In 2007, the Transpatagonia Expedition visited the wreck site and saw more remains.

HMS Wager in fiction
The novel The Unknown Shore (pub. 1959) by Patrick O'Brian is based on the accounts of the survivors. One of the crew on Wager was Midshipman John Byron, later Vice-Admiral in the Royal Navy and grandfather of the famous poet George Byron. O'Brian's novel closely follows John Byron's account.

HMS Wager (1739) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1747 - First Battle of Cape Finisterre
14 British ships of the line under Admiral George Anson attack a French 30-ship convoy commanded by Admiral de la Jonquière and capture 4 ships of the line, 2 frigates and 7 merchantmen, in a five-hour battle in the Bay of Biscay.


The First Battle of Cape Finisterre (14 May 1747[3]) saw 14 British ships of the line under Admiral George Anson attack a French 30-ship convoy commanded by Admiral de la Jonquière during the War of the Austrian Succession. The British captured 4 ships of the line, 2 frigates and 7 merchantmen, in a five-hour battle in the Atlantic Ocean off Cape Finisterre in northwest Spain. One French frigate, one French East India Company warship and the other merchantmen escaped.



Lord Anson's victory off Cape Finisterre, 3 May 1747, National Maritime Museum.



Events
Prelude
France needed to keep shipping lanes open in order to maintain her overseas empire. To this end she assembled merchantmen into convoys protected by warships. Anson on Prince George and Rear-Admiral Sir Peter Warren on Devonshire had sailed from Plymouth on 9 April to intercept French shipping. When a large convoy was sighted Anson had made the signal to form line of battle. When Rear-Admiral Warren, suspecting the enemy to be merely manoeuvring to promote the escape of the convoy, bore down and communicated his opinion to the admiral, the latter threw out a signal for a general chase.

Battle
Centurion under a press of sail, was the first to come up with the rearmost French ship, which she attacked heavily and two other ships dropped astern to her support. The action became general when three more British ships, including Devonshire, came up. The French, though much inferior in numbers, fought till seven in the evening, when all but two of their ships were taken, as well as nine East India merchantmen. The French lost 700 men killed and wounded, and the British 520. Over £300,000 was found on board the ships of war, which were turned into British ships.

Aftermath

Chevalier de Saint-George of Invincible surrenders his sword to Admiral Anson after the battle

Following his victory, Anson was raised to the peerage. The French assembled another, much bigger, convoy which set sail in October; Hawke's defeat of this fleet in the Second Battle of Cape Finisterre put an end to French naval operations for the rest of the war. François de Grasse later the famous Comte was wounded in this First Battle and taken prisoner as he served on La Gloire, which was captured.

According to historian William Williamson, the battle was a "most severe blow to the French interests in America. Besides immense property taken, there were found on board … numerous articles designed for the Acadians and Indians" who continued to resist the British in Acadia/ Nova Scotia.


Order of battle
Britain (George Anson)

• Prince George 90 (flag) - Vice-Admiral George Anson, Captain John Bentley
• Devonshire 66 - Rear-Admiral Peter Warren, Captain Temple West
• Namur 74 - Captain Edward Boscawen
• Monmouth 64 - Captain Henry Harrison
• Prince Frederick 64 - Captain Harry Norris
• Yarmouth 64 - Captain Piercy Brett
• Princess Louisa 60 - Captain Charles Watson
• Nottingham 60 - Captain Philip Saumarez
• Defiance 60 - Captain Thomas Grenville
• Pembroke 60 - Captain Thomas Fincher
• Windsor 60 - Captain Thomas Hanway
• Centurion 50 - Captain Peter Denis
• Falkland 50 - Captain Blomfield Barradell
• Bristol 50 - Captain William Montagu
• Ambuscade 40 - Captain John Montagu
• Falcon 10 (sloop)
• Vulcan 8 (fireship)

Print of Invincible captured after the battle

France (de la Jonquière)

• Sérieux 64 (flag) — captured
• Invincible 74 — captured
• Rubis 52 — captured
• Jason 50 — captured
• Gloire 40 — captured
• Emeraude 40 — escaped
• Chimère 36 — escaped
• Diamant 30/56 — captured, sunk later
• Apollon 30 — captured
• Philibert 30 — captured
• Thétis 22 — captured
• Vigilant 20 — captured
• Modeste 18 — captured
• Dartmouth 18 (ex-British privateer) — captured
• Convoy of 24 ships or fewer — 6 captured

The Invincible was originally a 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy launched in October 1744. Captured on 14 October 1747, she was taken intoRoyal Navy service as the third rate HMS Invincible.







During the early part of the 18th century British ship designers had made few significant advances in design, whereas French shipbuilding benefited from a remarkably creative period. At the time of the capture of Invincible, there was not one 74-gun ship in the Royal Navy. By 1805 at the battle of Trafalgar, three quarters of British ships of the line were of this singular design and the 74-gun ship had become the backbone of all major navies of the world.

Invincible was one of the first trio of a new and longer type of 74-gun ships. Until 1738, French 74s had been little more than 154 (French) feet in gundeck length, carrying just thirteen pairs of 36-pdr guns on the lower deck, fourteen pairs of 18-pdr guns on the upper deck and eight pairs of 8-pdr guns on the quarterdeck and forecastle, with the balance of the 74 guns made up of four small 4-pdr guns on the poop.


The Invincible after her capture.

This was changed by François Coulomb's design for the Terrible, launched in 1739 at Toulon. The gundeck length was stretched to 164 (French) feet, and the four small guns on the poop were eliminated, replaced by new gunports for an additional pair of 36-pdr guns on the lower deck and an extra pair of 18-pdr guns on the upper deck. This new gun establishment became the standard for all subsequent French 74s. The next two ships, Invincible designed by Pierre Morineau and Le Magnanime designed by Blaise Geslain, were begun in early 1741 at Rochefort and were each even longer than Le Terrible.

At the First Battle of Cape Finisterre (14 May 1747) during the War of the Austrian Succession, Invincible was escorting a convoy of merchant ships when she was sighted by the British channel fleet of 16 ships of the line, which gave chase. Invincible attacked the British ships to give the convoy a chance to escape, and alone engaged six British warships. In the end with most of her crew dead or wounded she struck her colours. Gracious in defeat, the French Commander, Saint-Georges, handed his sword to Admiral George Anson.

HMS Invincible sank in February 1758 when she hit a sandbank in the East Solent. The ship remained upright for 3 days after its grounding allowing the crew to safely escape. The wreck site was designated under the Protection of Wrecks Act on 30 September 1980. In 1996 Amer Ved grounded at the wrecksite, although it is not clear whether or not this resulted in damage to the remains. In 2013 the wreck was placed on English Heritage's list of ten most at risk heritage sites due to parts of the ship being exposed by changing seabed levels. In July 2016 it was announced that £2 million of the fines imposed for the Libor banking scandal would be used to fund an excavation of the wreck site.


A port-broadside view of the Invincible on steady waters, flying the British flag with sails billowing in the wind; accompanying her is a ship’s boat on the right. The Invincible occupies the majority of the image. In the left distance are two vessels, one shown starboard quarter with a British flag and the other port bow






https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Battle_of_Cape_Finisterre_(1747)

HMS Invincible (1747) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Collections - National Maritime Museum

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1766 – Launch of french Languedoc, a 80-gun ship of the line of the French Navy and flagship of Admiral d'Estaing.


The Languedoc was a ship of the line of the French Navy and flagship of Admiral d'Estaing. She was offered to King Louis XV by the Languedoc, as part of the Don des vaisseaux, a national effort to rebuild the navy after the Seven Years' War. She was designed by the naval architect Joseph Coulomb, and funded by a don des vaisseaux donation from the Estates of Languedoc.




The Languedoc, dismasted by the storm the night of the 12th, attacked by HMS Renown the afternoon of 13 August 1778


Career
Ordered in Toulon, Languedoc took several years to complete due to a lack of timber in the shipyard, already busy building Zélé and Bourgogne, and with the orders of Marseillois and Provence in queue.

In 1776, France decided to intervene in the American War of Independence. Admiral d'Estaing was ordered to bring the fleet to the Americas. He set his flag on the Languedoc, after her upgrade to 90 guns. His 12-ship fleet set sail on the 18 April 1778. The fleet reached New York on 8 July 1778, and Languedoc landed the French chargé d'affaires.

On the 10th of August, the French fleet encountered the English fleets of Admirals Howe and Byron. A tempest broke out, and the Languedoc lost her rigging and steering. The 50-gun Renown raked her, but she was saved by the timely arrival of a French squadron led by Suffren.

The Languedoc took part in the Battle of St. Lucia, an abortive attempt to recapture St Lucia from the British in December 1778. The Languedoc then took part in the conquest of Grenada, in July 1779.

The Languedoc returned to France, where she was refitted. In 1781, she set sail in the fleet of Admiral de Grasse, under captain d'Argelos. She took part in the Battle of the Chesapeake.

At the Battle of the Saintes, the Languedoc was following the flagship Ville de Paris. The French fleet was parted in two, and the Languedoc eventually fled the battle, leaving de Grasse to be captured. The Languedoc then joined with La Pérouse, and reached Brest on the 28 June 1783. Argelos was tried for his conduct at the Saintes and found innocent, de Grasse being found ultimately responsible.

The Languedoc was refitted and upgraded by engineer Jacques-Noël Sané. On the 5 September 1792, she set sail under Admiral de Latouche Tréville. She took part in the campaign off Italy, and was badly damaged in the tempests of December; from 21 to 23, Scipion had to assist. On the 7 February, she took part in the landing of troops in Sardinia.

She sailed back to Toulon and undertook extensive repairs. Toulon fell to the hands of the English and was retaken by the French. The Languedoc, being deemed unusable, was not destroyed when the English left the city. She was renamed Antifédéraliste at the height of Robespierre's power, and renamed again to Victoire at the Thermidorian Reaction.

As Victoire, under captain Savary, she took part in the campaign off Italy, where she confronted Nelson's squadron. She served off Canada in 1796, returned to France, and was deemed too old to take part in the landing in Ireland.

She was used as a floating barracks off Venice, where she had been scuttled



Fight of the Ça Ira off Noli on 14 March 1795


The Saint-Esprit class was a type of three 80-gun ships of the line of the French Navy. They did not constitute a single class, as each was built to a separate design, but they each carried a standard ordnance amounting to 80 guns.

• Saint-Esprit. Renamed Scipion.

Builder: Brest
Ordered: 11 January 1762
Launched: 12 October 1765
Fate: Lost in storm on 26 january 1795

• Languedoc Renamed Anti-fédéraliste and Victoire

Builder: Toulon
Ordered: 9 December 1761
Launched: 15 May 1766
Fate: Broken up in 1799 in Brest

• Couronne.

Builder: Arsenal of Brest
Ordered: 1766
Launched: May 1768
Fate: Accidentally burnt at Brest in 1781. A replacement, Couronne was constructed from the salvaged remains. Renamed Ça Ira in 1792, this ship was captured by Britain on 14 March 1795, destroyed in an accidental fire on 11 April 1796


The Saint-Esprit in action.
(Detail of an English painting of 1784)


Model of Couronne, on display at the Château de Brest.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_ship_Languedoc_(1766)

Saint-Esprit-class ship of the line - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1794 – Launch of Spanish Montañés, a 74 gun third-rate Spanish ship of the line.
The name ship of her class, she was built in the Ferrol shipyards and paid for by the people of Cantabria.


The Montañés was a 74 gun third-rate Spanish ship of the line. The name ship of her class, she was built in the Ferrol shipyards and paid for by the people of Cantabria. She was built following José Romero y Fernández de Landa's system as part of the San Ildefonso class, though her were amended by Retamosa to refine her buoyancy. She was launched in May 1794 and entered service the following year. With 2400 copper plates on her hull, she was much faster than other ships of the same era, reaching 14 (rather than the average 10) knots downwind and 10 (rather than 8) knots upwind.



In 1795 she fought a French force of 8 ships of the line (including one three-decker) and 2 frigates single-handed in the bay of San Feliu de Guíxols - thanks to her superior speed, the Montañés managed to get within range of a coastal artillery battery, forcing the French to break off the chase.

In June 1805 she was put under the command of Francisco Alcedo and made part of Alcalá Galdiano's division, defending Cadiz from a possible British attack. At the battle of Trafalgar she was assigned to the second division of Gravina's squadron. Both Alcedo and his deputy Antonio Castaños were killed (with the ship's command passing to lieutenant Joaquín Gutiérrez de Rubalcava), but overall the ship lost only 20 dead and 29 wounded and was able to recapture the Santa Ana and Neptuno after their capture by the British. The Montañés returned to Cadiz on the night of 21 October 1805.

Now commanded by José Quevedo, on 14 July 1808 the Montañés took part in the capture of the Rosily Squadron at Cadiz. She also made several voyages to the Canary Islands, Balearics and Havanabefore being lost in a heavy storm on 10 March 1810.




Montañés class. Two were ordered at Ferrol in late 1792 and the third in November 1795. Although the first of these ships was rated at 74 guns and the other two at 80 guns, all three were built to the same design (by Julian Retamosa) and each actually carried 80 guns.



The Montañés class were a series of four ships of the line designed and built between 1792 and 1798 by Julián Martín de Retamosa for the Spanish Navy.

The four ships in the class, and their fates, were:

Montañés 74 (launched 14 May 1794 at Ferrol) - Wrecked 9 March 1810
Neptuno 80 (launched 26 November 1795 at Ferrol) - Wrecked in storm after the Battle of Trafalgar, 23 October 1805
Argonauta 80 (launched 7 July 1798 at Ferrol) - Captured by Britain at the Battle of Trafalgar and sank in storm, 21 October 1805
Monarca (1794) - captured by Britain at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 and later lost in the storm.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_ship_Montañés_(1794)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_ship_Argonauta_(1798)

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1794 - HMS Alert, launched in 1793 for the Royal Navy, was captured by the French Navy and took her into service as Alerte.
A few months later the Royal Navy destroyed her.


HMS Alert was launched in 1793 for the Royal Navy. In May 1794 the French Navy captured her and took her into service as Alerte. A few months later the Royal Navy destroyed her.






Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, sheer lines with some inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth for the Alert (1793) and Albacore (1793), both 16-gun Ship Sloops with quarterdeck and forecastle. The plan includes the ship dimensions. Signed by John Henslow [Surveyor of the Navy, 1786-1806] and William Rule [Surveyor of the Navy, 1793-1813]

Career
Commander Charles Smyth commissioned her in October 1793. He then sailed for Nova Scotia in May 1794. Alerte was off the coast of Ireland when she had the misfortune to encounter the 40-gun French frigate Unité.

At daybreak on 14 May Alert was at 46°35′N 15°15′W when she sighted three vessels. These edged towards Alert, as she edged away, and the strangers did not respond to Alert's signals. At about 10:45 another three vessels appeared. The strange vessels signaled to each other, and most sailed away, but one remained in chase. Then at noon some vessels appeared off Alert's bow and Smyth decided to engage his pursuer to try to cripple her and so escape. Alert and the frigate closed at about 1:45pm and an action commenced after Smyth declined an invitation to strike. By 3:30 Alert had lost three men killed and nine wounded, her rigging and sails were shredded, and she had taken shots between wind and water. At this point Smyth struck.

sistership Peterel

Battle between Ligurienne and HMS Peterel, 30 Ventôse an VIII (21 March 1800).

The French took her into service as Alerte. Some four months later, on 23 August, HMS Flora, Captain John Borlase Warren, and HMS Arethusa, Captain Sir Edward Pellew, chased two French corvettes, Alerte and Espion into Audierne Bay. The two corvettes anchored off the Gamelle Rocks, but when they saw that the British intended to capture them, their captains got under weigh and ran their vessels aground below the guns of three shore batteries. The corvettes continued to exchange fire with the two British frigates until early evening, when the corvettes' masts fell. At that point many of the French crewmen abandoned their vessels and went ashore. Warren sent in the boats from both Flora and Arethusa, all under Pellew's command, with orders to set fire or otherwise destroy the two corvettes. Pellew went in and took possession of both, but determined that he could not extract the wounded. Pellew therefore left the vessels, which he determined were bilged and scuttled, with rocks having pierced their bottoms, and left with 52 prisoners. Pellew estimated that Alerte had suffered 20 to 30 men killed and wounded, and that Espion had lost more.

French records indicate that Alerte, which had been under the command of lieutenant de vaisseau Passart, had been scuttled and was lost. However, the French Navy was able to refloat Espion, which had been under the command of lieutenant de vaisseau Magendie.






Pylades class — 6 ship sloops, 1793–1795

• Pylades (1794)
• Alert (1793)
• Albacore (1793)
• Peterel (1794)
• Ranger (1794)
• Rattler (1795)

HMS Alert (1793) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Collections - National Maritime Museum

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1806 – Action of 1806-05-14

HMS Pallas vs French Minerve and other french ships

Description (from Threedecks)

On May 14th 1806, the Pallas stood in to the Isle of Aix to reconnoitre Allemand's squadron, and anchored just within range of the French batteries. The Kingfisher, 16, Commander George Francis Seymour, was in the offing, but had been given strict orders by Vice-Admiral Thornbrough not to pass Chassiron Lighthouse, as Seymour was thought to be prone to run great risks. As soon as the French admiral realised Cochrane's audacious intentions, he directed the frigate Minerve, 40, Captain J. Collet, and Lynx, Sylphe, and Palinure, of 16 guns each, to get under way to attack the Englishman, whilst the Armide, 40, and Infatigable, 40, were to hold themselves ready to assist at a signal.

Cochrane weighed and waited for his four enemies under topsails. The French came up with every inch of canvas studding-sails and royals spread. A broadside, as soon as the French vessels were within range, brought down the main topsail yard of one of the brigs, and put her out of action. The Minerve and the second brig then engaged the Pallas closely; but the action was not continuous, as each side had frequently to tack to avoid the shoals. At about 1 P.M., or almost two hours after the action had begun, Cochrane succeeded in getting to windward of the Minerve, and between her and the French batteries on the Isle of Aix, which had constantly fired at him. He then gave her two or three broadsides in quick succession. Her fire slackened, and, as there were signs that she meditated making off, he ran the Pallas on board her. Unfortunately, the Minerve had grounded on a shoal just before the Pallas struck her, so that the force of the concussion was very great indeed. The guns on board the British ship were driven back into the ports, and the fore topmast, fore-sail, jib-boom, sprit-sail yard, top-sail yards, fore-rigging, cat-head, and bower anchor were torn away. With the bower anchor, Cochrane had intended to grapple the Minerve; and he was unable to hold the two ships together. In the Minerve, the fore-yard came down, and much damage was done to the rigging. Three pistol shots were the only reply she made to a broadside from the Pallas; and the French crew fled below, Collet alone gallantly keeping his place on deck. The British were setting to work to clear away the wreckage from the Pallas' s deck, preparatory to boarding, when it was seen that the Armide and Infatigable were getting under way and coming to the Minerve' s help. There was nothing for it but to withdraw. Meantime Seymour, in the Kingfisher, observing that the Pallas had lost her fore-sail, came up with all possible speed, passed inside Chassiron light in defiance of orders and sent a cable to the Pallas. The three French frigates, presently reinforced by the Gloire, 40, positively allowed those two vessels to retire unmolested, though any one of them was a match in guns for the Pallas and Kingfisher together.

Cochrane's whole career is so wonderful his judgment was so excellent, his resourcefulness so capable of surmounting any emergency that one hesitates to accuse him of rashness in thus assailing an enemy of enormously superior force in full sight of a strong French squadron. But a lesser genius would probably have sacrificed his ship by such an act.





from wikipedia
french Minerve was initially commanded by Capitaine Jaques Collet, entering service during the early days of the War of the Fourth Coalition between Britain and her allies, and Napoleonic France. In April 1806 she was part of a squadron—under Contre-amiral Zacharie Allemand and comprising five ships-of-the-line, five frigates, and four smaller vessels—anchored under the shore batteries of the Île-d'Aix awaiting the opportunity to put to sea. The British knew the location of Allemand's squadron; on 25 April Admiral Edward Thornbrough, sent the British frigate HMS Pallas (1804) close to the Île-d'Aix to count the enemy vessels. Allemand ordered Minerve and three corvettes, Lynx, Sylphe, and Palinure, to meet the British frigate, leading to a skirmish in which no ship incurred much damage. Three other British vessels subsequently approached — the frigate Iris, the 16-gun sloop Hazard, and a cutter— and Capitaine Collet ended the engagement by sailing Minerve to a position under the shelter of the island's guns.

Pallas returned on 12 May with Indefatigable and a 16-gun ship-sloop, Kingfisher. Allemande despatched two large frigates and three corvettes; facing unfavourable winds, the British withdrew. Two days later, Pallas and Kingfisher came back and Allemande again ordered Minerve, Lynx, Sylphe, and Palinure to chase Cochrane off. As a precaution, he also had two other large frigates, Armide and Infatigable, cleared for action and ready to go. Collett ordered his ships to set all sail in the hope of catching Pallas before she could escape, but Cochrane was in no hurry to leave and even attempted to draw the French on by backing his topsails and slowing down. Once in range, Pallas opened fire, bringing down the topsail yard of one of the smaller vessels and then retreating into nearby shoals with Minerve in pursuit. By 13:00 Minerve had come up on the leeward side of Pallas, whereupon Pallas fired into her and closed with the intention of boarding. Just at that moment, Minerve hit a sandbank and Pallas crashed into her. The force of the collision, great enough to jolt Pallas's guns from their positions, did not prevent her from unleashing a devastating broadside. Both ships were damaged but Pallas's shallower draught prevented her grounding. Her crew were able to disengage and get back under way, having seen the two 40-gun French frigates, Armide and Infatigable, drawing near. The crew of Kingfisher sailed in to take Pallas in tow; the latter had lost her fore topmast, jib-boom, spritsail, stunsail, and main topsail yards. Minerve was only lightly damaged; she was re-floated and taken to Rochefort for repair. The engagement cost the lives of seven seamen aboard Minerve, with a further fourteen injured. There were a further one dead and five wounded aboard Pallas.

sistership of Minerve

Portrait of Pénélope by François-Geoffroi Roux

HMS Alceste (1806) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Action of 1806/05/14, 14th May 1806

Description and participants : Action of 1806-05-14, 14th May 1806

threedecks.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Pallas_(1804)

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1814 - May 14, 16 and 17 - Argentines under William Brown defeat Spanish


The Battle of Buceo was a decisive naval battle which took place on 14–17 May 1814, during the Argentine War of Independence between an Argentine fleet under William Brown and a Spanish fleet under Admiral Sienna off the coast of Montevideo, in today's Uruguay.

Outcome
Five Spanish ships were burned and two were captured on 17 May. The other surrendered later and 500 prisoners were taken. Argentine forces lost four men killed in action and one ship. William Brown was given the rank of admiral because of this victory.

Ships involved
Argentina (William Brown)
Hercules 32 (flag)
Zephyr 18 (King)
Nancy 10 (Leech)
Julietta 7 (McDougald)
Belfast 18 (Oliver Russell)
Agreeable 16 (Lemare)
Trinidad 12 (Wack)

Spain (Sienna)
Hyena 18 (flag)
Mercurio 32
Neptuno 28 - Captured by Belfast 16 May
Mercedes 20
Palomo 18 - Captured 16 May
San Jose 16 - Captured 16 May
Cisne 12
6 schooners


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Buceo

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1824 – Launch of HMS Aetna, a Hecla class bomb vessel of the Royal Navy of the early 19th century.


The Hecla class was a class of bomb vessels of the Royal Navy of the early 19th century. They were designed for use as bomb or mortar ships and were very heavily built. Eight ships were launched; all were converted for use as exploration or survey ships. Four ships of the class are known for the role they played in Arctic and Antarctic exploration.






Ships

• HMS Fury

Builder: Mrs Mary Ross, Rochester
Ordered: 5 June 1813
Laid down: September 1813
Launched: 4 April 1814
Notes: Converted to Arctic discovery vessel in 1821
Fate: Bilged in Prince Regent Inlet, and abandoned in the Arctic on 25 August 1825

• HMS Hecla

Builder: Barkworth & Hawkes, North Barton (Hull)
Ordered: 5 June 1813
Laid down: July 1813
Launched: 22 July 1815
Notes: Arctic discovery vessel from 1819 to 1827. Converted to survey ship in December 1827
Fate: Sold on 13 April 1831

• HMS Infernal

Builder: Barkworth & Hawkes, North Barton (Hull)
Ordered: 5 June 1813
Laid down: July 1813
Launched: 26 July 1815
Fate: Sold on 13 April 1831

• HMS Meteor

Builder: Pembroke Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: May 1820
Launched: 25 June 1823
Completed: 26 July 1823
Notes: Survey ship, renamed HMS Beacon in June 1832
Fate: Sold on 17 August 1846

• HMS Aetna

Builder: Chatham Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: September 1821
Launched: 14 May 1824
Completed: June 1824
Notes: Converted to survey ship in 1826. Receiving ship at Portsmouth in 1839.
Fate: Sold on 20 February 1846

• HMS Sulphur

Builder: Chatham Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: May 1824
Launched: 26 January 1826
Completed: 21 February 1826
Notes: The last bomb-ship in Royal Navy service. Converted to survey ship in December 1835. Receiving ship at Woolwich from May 1843
Fate: Broken up by 20 November 1857

• HMS Thunder

Builder: Deptford Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: November 1826
Launched: 4 August 1829
Completed: 26 October 1829
Notes: Converted to survey ship in January 1833
Fate: Broken up in March 1851

• HMS Vesuvius

Builder: Deptford Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819 (Order transferred to Chatham Dockyard, reordered on 30 August 1828)
Laid down: August 1830
Fate: Cancelled on 10 January 1831

• HMS Devastation

Builder: Plymouth Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: 1820
Notes: Suspended on 10 January 1831
Fate: Cancelled on 11 July 1833

• HMS Volcano

Builder: Plymouth Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Laid down: 1821
Notes: Suspended on 10 January 1831
Fate: Cancelled on 11 July 1833

• HMS Beelzebub

Builder: Plymouth Dockyard
Ordered: 18 May 1819
Notes: Suspended on 10 January 1831
Fate: Cancelled on 11 July 1833

• HMS Erebus

Builder: Pembroke Dockyard
Ordered: 9 January 1823
Laid down: October 1824
Launched: 7 June 1826
Completed: February 1828
Notes: Arctic discovery vessel in 1839, fitted with screw in 1845
Fate: Abandoned in Arctic on 22 April 1848

Service
Fury and Hecla sailed with William Edward Parry on his explorations in search of the Northwest Passage, with Fury being lost to ice on the second. Meteor was renamed Beacon and used as a survey ship, while Aetna and Thunder were both used as survey ships. Sulphur was also used as a survey ship, at one time being commanded by Edward Belcher who later commanded an expedition in search of John Franklin (though not in Sulphur). Erebus was one of two ships commanded by James Clark Ross during his exploration of Antarctica and by Franklin on his ill-fated search for the Northwest Passage. The other was the Vesuvius-class bomb vessel Terror. Both ships were lost during this last voyage.


Bomb Bed (ZAZ5733)

Hecla-class bomb vessel - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Lines - National Maritime Museum

Collections - National Maritime Museum

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1832 – Launch of HMS Salamander, one of the first paddle warships built for the Royal Navy.


HMS Salamander was one of the first paddle warships built for the Royal Navy. Initially classed simply as a steam vessel, she was re-classed as a second-class steam sloop when that categorisation was introduced on 31 May 1844. She was launched in 1832 from Sheerness Dockyard, took part in the Second Anglo-Burmese War and was broken up in 1883.




Photograph of British paddle sloop HMS Salamander, probably while on the Australia station in the 1860s.

Design and construction
Salamander was designed by Joseph Seaton as a steam vessel (in 1844 designated as a second-class paddle sloop) and ordered from Sheerness Dockyard on 12 January 1831. She was armed with two 10-inch (84 cwt) pivot guns and two (later four) 32-pounder (25 cwt) guns. Her two-cylinder side lever steam engine was provided by Maudslay, Sons & Field at a cost of £11,201, and produced 220 nominal horsepower, or 506 indicated horsepower (377 kW).

Her keel was laid in April 1831 and she was launched on 14 May 1832. Her total cost was £34,334 (comprising £20,429 for the hull, £11,201 for the machinery and £2,704 for fitting out) and was the only ship ever built to the design. She was one of the first true paddle warships built for the Royal Navy. She was provided with a schooner rig, which was later changed to a barquentine rig.

Service
She was commissioned on 27 November 1832 under Commander Horatio Thomas Austin. From 15 February 1834 she was under Commander William Langford Castle, for service in the Channel; on 15 April 1836 she was under Commander John Duffill, and then on 16 August 1836 to 1840 she was under Commander Sydney Dacres, notably off the north coast of Spain during the first of the Carlist Wars. On 16 September she was under Commander Hastings Henry, but paid off from this commission on 11 August 1841.

On 25 June 1842 she was recommissioned under Commander Andrew Snape Hamond (1811-1874), and joined the South America Station, before proceeding to the Pacific. On her way home in 1847, she was repaired with a new mainmast and bowsprit at Jamaica in February 1847, and then arrived home to pay off in November 1847 at Woolwich Dockyard. After a refit at Sheerness she returned to Woolwich, and in January 1849 she moved to Plymouth where she joined the Steam Reserve.

The Salamander was recommissioned on 17 July 1850 under Commander John Ellman, and proceeded to the East Indies, where she participated in the Second Anglo-Burmese War. She returned home in August 1854, and on 18 August command was taken over by Commander Benjamin Portland Priest for a brief period of service in the Mediterranean before she arrived home again at Portsmouth, to pay off on 23 November into the Steam Reserve. She recommissioned again on 6 November 1855 under Commander George Mecham, for service off the west coast of Africa. Arriving home in June 1856, she was used as a transport, but in late 1856 she proceeded northwards to search for missing British merchantmen overdue on their voyage from Archangel. She returned to Sheerness in February 1857 to repair damage caused by ice, and was paid off on 4 February. Over the next year, she underwent a major refit at Chatham Dockyard, including the replacement of her boilers. More extensive repairs took place over the next few years, culminating in 1863 in the rebuilding of her poop and masts, and the overhaul of all her machinery.

She was recommissioned on 8 December 1863 under Commander John Carnegie, and was assigned to the Australia Station, where she transported the party to set up the coaling station at Albany passage. She undertook survey work along the Great Barrier Reef, running aground on a reef, which was named in her honour, before being refloated. She then undertook survey duties of Wilsons Promontory and Port Phillip Bay under the command of Commander George Nares from 11 July 1865, before leaving the Australia Station on 4 July 1867. She was paid off in December 1867 into the Steam Reserve.

Over the next decade, the Salamander served in a number of ancillary tasks, mainly as a tug or a transport, under a variety of commanding officers. She towed HMS Unicorn to Dundee in 1873, but afterwards was paid off into reserve again.

Fate
She was sold to Castle for breaking in 1883.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Salamander_(1832)

 

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1847 - HMS Driver was a Driver-class wooden paddle sloop of the Royal Navy.
She is credited with the first global circumnavigation by a steamship when she arrived back in England on 14 May 1847.


HMS Driver was a Driver-class wooden paddle sloop of the Royal Navy. She is credited with the first global circumnavigation by a steamship when she arrived back in England on 14 May 1847.





Construction and commissioning
Driver was ordered on 12 March 1840 from Portsmouth Dockyard to a design by Sir William Symonds. She was laid down in June 1840 and launched on 24 December 1840, with her machinery being supplied by Seaward & Capel of Limehouse, Woolwich. Her hull cost £19,433, with the machinery costing another £13,866. After she had completed fitting out, at a further cost of £6,408, she was commissioned on 5 November 1841.



Career
Driver embarked for the East Indies and China in March 1842. She served some time in China (losing her original Commander) before being ordered to New Zealand in September 1845. She was damaged by a storm en-route, necessitating repairs to her engine and boiler and other parts of the ship.

During her circumnavigation Driver became the first steamship to visit New Zealand, arriving on 20 January 1846, and was involved in the Hutt Valley Campaign, which was part of the New Zealand Wars. At the time of her visit she was described as a brig-rigged 6-gun warship displacing 1,058 tons with engines rated 280 horsepower.

Driver set off east from New Zealand for her return journey to England via Cape Horn on 28 January 1847. She stopped for six days in Argentina to pick up more coal, finally arriving in Portsmouth, England on Friday 14 May 1847, 105 days after starting from New Zealand. Of the ship's original officers, the second in command Lieutenant Thomas Kisbee, the master, purser, surgeon and assistant surgeon completed the entire circumnavigation.

On 11 March 1850 she was docked in Victoria Harbour to witness Richard Blanshard assume the Governorship of the newly formed Colony of Vancouver Island, and issued a seventeen-gun salute.

Fate
She was wrecked on 3 August 1861 on Mayaguana Island, the most easterly of the Bahamas, in the West Indies.

HMS Driver (1840) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1904 – Launch of SMS Yorck ("His Majesty's Ship Yorck"), the second and final member of the Roon class of armored cruisers built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy) as part of a major naval expansion program aimed at strengthening the fleet.


SMS Yorck ("His Majesty's Ship Yorck") was the second and final member of the Roon class of armored cruisers built for the German Kaiserliche Marine(Imperial Navy) as part of a major naval expansion program aimed at strengthening the fleet. Yorck was named for Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg, a Prussian field marshal. She was laid down in 1903 at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg, launched in May 1904, and commissioned in November 1905. The ship was armed with a main battery of four 21 cm (8.3 in) guns and had a top speed was 20.4 knots (37.8 km/h; 23.5 mph). Like many of the late armored cruisers, Yorck was quickly rendered obsolescent by the advent of the battlecruiser; as a result, her career was limited.


Yorck in the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal

Yorck spent the first seven years of her career in I Scouting Group, the reconnaissance force for the High Seas Fleet, initially as the group flagship. During this period, the ship was occupied with training exercises and made several cruises in the Atlantic Ocean. Yorck was involved in a number of accidents, including an accidental explosion aboard the ship in 1911 and a collision with a torpedo boat in 1913. In May 1913, she was decommissioned and placed in reserve until the outbreak of World War I in July 1914. She was thereafter mobilized and assigned to III Scouting Group. On 3 November, she formed part of the screen for the High Seas Fleet as it sailed to support a German raid on Yarmouth; on the return of the fleet to Wilhelmshaven, the ships encountered heavy fog and anchored in the Schillig Roads to await better visibility. Believing the fog to have cleared sufficiently, the ship's commander ordered Yorck to get underway in the early hours of 4 November. The ship entered a German minefield in the haze, struck two mines, and sank with heavy loss of life. The wreck was dismantled progressively between the 1920s and 1980s to reduce the navigational hazard it posed.


Design
Main article: Roon-class cruiser

Plan and elevation of the Roon class

The two Roon-class cruisers were ordered in 1902 as part of the fleet expansion program specified by the Second Naval Law of 1900. The two ships were incremental developments of the preceding Prinz Adalbert-class cruisers, the most significant difference being a longer hull; the additional space was used to add a pair of boilers, which increased horsepower by 2,000 indicated horsepower (1,500 kW) and speed by .5 knots(0.93 km/h; 0.58 mph). The launch of the British battlecruiser HMS Invincible in 1907 quickly rendered all of the armored cruisers that had been built by the world's navies obsolescent.

Yorck was 127.8 m (419 ft) long overall and had a beam of 20.2 m (66 ft 3 in) and a draft of 7.76 m (25 ft 6 in) forward. She displaced 9,533 t (9,382 long tons; 10,508 short tons) as built and 10,266 t (10,104 long tons; 11,316 short tons) fully loaded. The ship had a crew of 35 officers and 598 enlisted men, though this was frequently augmented with an admiral's staff during periods where the ship served as a flagship.

She was propelled by three vertical triple expansion engines, with steam provided by sixteen coal-fired water-tube boilers. The ship's propulsion system developed a total of 17,272 metric horsepower (12,704 kW) and yielded a maximum speed of 20.4 knots (37.8 km/h; 23.5 mph) on trials, falling short of her intended speed of 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph). She carried up to 1,570 t (1,550 long tons; 1,730 short tons) of coal, which enabled a maximum range of up to 5,080 nautical miles (9,410 km; 5,850 mi) at a cruising speed of 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph).

She was armed with four 21 cm (8.3 in) SK L/40 guns arranged in two twin-gun turrets, one on either end of the superstructure. Her secondary armament consisted of ten 15 cm (5.9 in) SK L/40 guns; four were in single-gun turrets on the upper deck and the remaining six were in casemates in a main-deck battery. For close-range defense against torpedo boats, she carried fourteen 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/35 guns, all in individual mounts in the superstructure and in the hull. She also had four 45 cm (18 in) underwater torpedo tubes, one in the bow, one in the stern, and one on both beams.

The ship was protected with Krupp cemented armor, with the belt armor being 100 mm (3.9 in) thick amidships and reduced to 80 mm (3.1 in) on either end. The main battery turrets had 150 mm (5.9 in) thick faces. Her deck was 40–60 mm (1.6–2.4 in) thick, connected to the lower edge of the belt by 40–50 mm (1.6–2.0 in) thick sloped armor.

Service history
Construction – 1908

An unidentified Roon-class cruiser

Yorck was ordered under the provisional name Ersatz Deutschland and built at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg under construction number 167. Her keelwas laid down on 25 April 1903 and she was launched on 14 May 1904. General Wilhelm von Hahnke gave a speech at the launching ceremony and the vessel was christened Yorck after Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg, a Prussian general during the Seven Years' War by Josephine Yorck von Wartenburg, one of his descendants. Fitting-out work was completed by late 1905, when the ship began builder's trials, after which a shipyard crew transferred the vessel to Kiel, where she was commissioned into the fleet on 21 November.


The Roon class was a pair of armored cruisers built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy) in the 1900s. The two ships of the class, Roonand Yorck, closely resembled the earlier Prinz Adalbert-class cruisers upon which they were based. The Roon class incorporated slight incremental improvements, including a pair of extra boilers. The ships were easily distinguished from their predecessors by the addition of a fourth funnel. Though the additional boilers were meant to increase the ships' speed, both vessels failed to reach their designed top speed. In addition, the ships had comparatively light armament and thin armor protection, so they compared poorly with their foreign contemporaries, particularly the armored cruisers of their primary opponent, the British Royal Navy.

The two ships served in I Scouting Group, the reconnaissance force of the High Seas Fleet after they entered service in 1905–1906. During this period, Yorck and Roon served stints as the group flagship and the deputy commander flagship, respectively. By the early 1910s, the first German battlecruisershad begun to enter service and Roon was decommissioned in 1911 and placed in reserve; Yorck joined her in 1913. Both ships were reactivated after World War I broke out in July 1914. They were assigned to III Scouting Group, with Roon as its flagship, and tasked with screening for the main body of the German fleet. In November, the German fleet made the raid on Yarmouth, but on return to port at Wilhelmshaven, the fleet encountered heavy fog and had to stop off Schillig. Yorck's commander decided that visibility had improved so he ordered his ship to get underway again, but she quickly struck two German mines and sank with heavy loss of life.

Roon was transferred to the Baltic in April 1915 and participated in a series of offensive operations against Russian forces, including the attack on Libauin May, the Battle of the Åland Islands in July, and the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in August. The threat of British submarines led to her decommissioning in 1916, after which she was employed as a training ship and a accommodation vessel. Plans to convert her into a seaplane tender late in the war came to nothing owing to Germany's defeat in 1918, and she was stricken from the naval register in 1920 and broken up the following year.




Roon, likely during her visit to the United States in 1907


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_Yorck

Roon-class cruiser - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Uwek]

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
14 May 1904 - Although Port Arthur was as good as blocked, due to the lack of initiative by Makarov's successors, Japanese naval losses began to mount, largely due to Russian mines.
two Japanese battleships, the 12,320-ton Yashima and the 15,300-ton Hatsuse, sank in a Russian minefield off Port Arthur after they both struck at least two mines each, eliminating one-third of Japan's battleship force.
At the same day cruiser Yoshino sank killing 319 people after a collision with cruiser Kasuga. Only 19 survived.
-> The worst day for the Japanese Navy during the war.


Yashima (八島 Yashima) was a Fuji-class pre-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) in the 1890s. As Japan lacked the industrial capacity to build such warships, the ship was designed and built in the United Kingdom. She participated in the early stages of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, including the Battle of Port Arthur on the second day of the war. She was involved in subsequent operations until she struck two mines off Port Arthur in May 1904. She did not sink immediately, but capsized while under tow a number of hours later. The Japanese were able to keep her loss a secret from the Russians for over a year so they did not try to take advantage of her loss.


Yashima in 1897

Fate:
On 14 May 1904, Nashiba put to sea with the battleships Hatsuse (flagship), Shikishima, and Yashima, the protected cruiser Kasagi, and the dispatch boat Tatsuta to relieve the Japanese blockading force off Port Arthur. On the following morning, the squadron encountered a minefield laid by the Russian minelayer Amur. Hatsuse struck one mine that disabled her steering around 11:10 and Yashimastruck two others when moving to assist Hatsuse. One blew a hole in her starboard aft boiler room and the other detonated on the starboard forward side of her hull, near the underwater torpedo room. After the second detonation the ship had a 9° list to starboard that gradually increased throughout the day.

Yashima was towed away from the minefield, north towards the Japanese base in the Elliott Islands. She was still taking on water at an uncontrollable rate and Captain Sakamoto ordered the ship anchored around 17:00 near Encounter Rock to allow the crew to easily abandon ship. He assembled the crew, which sang the Japanese national anthem, Kimigayo, and then abandoned ship. Kasagi took Yashimain tow, but the battleship's list continued to increase and she capsized about three hours later, after the cruiser was forced to cast off the tow, roughly at coordinates 38°34′N 121°40′ECoordinates:

38°34′N 121°40′E. No Russians observed Yashima sink so the Japanese were able to conceal her loss for more than a year. As part of the deception, the surviving crewmen were assigned to four auxiliary gunboats that were assigned to guard Port Arthur for the rest of the war and addressed their letters as if they were still aboard the battleship.


A model of Yashima in the British National Maritime Museum


Hatsuse (初瀬 Hatsuse) was a Shikishima-class pre-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy by the British firm of Armstrong Whitworth in the late 1890s. The ship participated in the early stages of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, including the Battle of Port Arthur on the second day of the war. She was involved in the subsequent operations until she struck two mines off Port Arthur in May 1904. The second mine detonated one of her magazines and Hatsuse sank almost immediately afterwards with the loss of over half her crew.


Hatsuse at anchor

Fate:
On 14 May 1904, Admiral Nashiba put to sea with the battleships Hatsuse (flag), Shikishima, and Yashima, the protected cruiser Kasagi, and the dispatch boat Tatsuta to relieve the Japanese blockading force off Port Arthur. On the following morning, the squadron encountered a minefield laid by the Russian minelayer Amur. Hatsuse struck one mine that disabled her steering at 10:50 a.m. and Yashima struck another when moving to assist Hatsuse. At 12:33 pm, Hatsuse drifted onto another mine that detonated one of her magazines, killing 496 of her crew, and sinking the ship at 38°37′N 121°20′ECoordinates:

38°37′N 121°20′E . Tatsuta and Kasagi managed to save the Admiral and Captain Nakao with 334 other officers and enlisted men. Yashima's flooding could not be controlled and she foundered about eight hours later, after her crew had abandoned ship.


Yoshino (吉野) was a protected cruiser of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Yoshino is sometimes regarded as a sister ship to Takasago, although the two vessels are of different classes. The name Yoshino comes from the Yoshino mountains, located in the southern portion of Nara prefecture. She played an important role in the First Sino-Japanese War, but was sunk in the Russo-Japanese War after being rammed by Japanese armored cruiser Kasuga in dense fog.


At Yokosuka in 1896

Fate:
With the start of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, Yoshino participated in the naval Battle of Port Arthur. However, soon after the start of the war, Yoshinocollided with the Japanese armored cruiser Kasuga in dense fog. Kasuga's ram hit Yoshino's port side, and penetrated to the engine room; Yoshino turned turtle and sank in the Yellow Sea at (38°07′N 122°33′ECoordinates:

38°07′N 122°33′E) on 15 May 1904 with the loss of 319 lives. Only 19 of the crew managed to survive.
As a result of this accident, the Imperial Japanese Navy removed the rams from the bows of all its warships.


Kasuga (春日) was the name ship of the Kasuga-class armored cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy, built in the first decade of the 20th century by Gio. Ansaldo & C., Sestri Ponente, Italy, where the type was known as the Giuseppe Garibaldi class. The ship was originally ordered by the Argentine Navy during the Argentine–Chilean naval arms race, but the lessening of tensions with Chile and financial pressures caused the Argentinians to sell her before delivery. At this time tensions between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire were rising, and the ship was offered to both sides before she was purchased by the Japanese.


Kasuga at Sasebo after the Battle of Tsushima, May 1905

During the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05, Kasuga participated in the Battle of the Yellow Sea and was lightly damaged during the subsequent Battle of Tsushima. In addition she frequently bombarded the defenses of Port Arthur. The ship played a limited role in World War I and was used to escort Allied convoys and search for German commerce raiders in the Indian Ocean and Australasia. Kasuga became a training ship in the late 1920s and was then disarmed and hulked in 1942 for use as a barracks ship. The ship capsized shortly before the end of World War II in 1945 and was salvaged three years later and broken up for scrap.

Battle of Port Arthur - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Japanese battleship Yashima - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Japanese battleship Hatsuse - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Japanese cruiser Yoshino - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Japanese cruiser Kasuga - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org