HNLMS De Zeven Provinciën (1909)
De Zeven Provinciën in 1910
| |
History | |
---|---|
Netherlands | |
Name | De Zeven Provinciën |
Namesake | Seven Provinces |
Builder | Rijkswerf, Amsterdam |
Laid down | 7 February 1908 |
Launched | 15 March 1909 |
Commissioned | 6 October 1910 |
Renamed | Soerabaja, 1936 |
Namesake | Surabaya |
Fate | Sunk by aerial attack 18 February 1942 |
Japan | |
Name | Unknown |
Acquired | Salvaged in 1942 and used as a battery ship |
Fate | Bombed by aircraft and sunk, 1943 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Coastal defence ship |
Displacement | 6,530 tons |
Length | 101.5 m (333 ft 0 in) |
Beam | 17.1 m (56 ft 1 in) |
Draught | 6.15 m (20 ft 2 in) |
Propulsion | 8,000 hp (6,000 kW), two shafts |
Speed | 16 knots (30 km/h) |
Complement | 452 |
Armament |
|
Armour |
|
HNLMS De Zeven Provinciën was a Royal Netherlands Navy coastal defence ship in service from 1910 until 1942. It was a small cruiser-sized warship that sacrificed speed and range for armor and armament. She was armed with two 283 mm, four 150 mm, ten 75 mm, four 37 mm guns, in addition to a few 75 mm mortars.[1] She was 101.5 metres (333 ft) long, had a beam of 17.1 metres (56 ft) and a draft of 6.15 metres (20.2 ft), and displaced 6,530 tons. She had a crew of 448 and was able to reach 16 knots.
She served part of her career in the Dutch East Indies, from 1911 to 1918 and from 1921 onwards. During the 1920s, her crew included the future Rear Admiral Karel Doorman.[2] She suffered a high-profile mutiny on 5 February 1933, which had far-reaching implications for politics in the Netherlands. She was renamed Soerabaja in 1936.
On 18 February 1942, Soerabaja was sunk by Japanese bombers. The Japanese raised her and used her as a battery ship; one report is that she was sunk again by Allied aircraft in 1943; a second report is that she was raised two years after being sunk by the Japanese but was wrecked five miles north of Djamoenjan Reef, Indonesia.[3]
Service history
The ship was launched and christened at the Rijkswerf in Amsterdam by, Prince Henry on 15 March 1909. She was commissioned into the Royal Netherlands Navy on 6 October 1910. On 21 November that year she left the port of Den Helder for the Dutch East Indies. The route she took led by South Africa and she arrived at Surabaya on 25 January 1911.[4]
On 23 January 1912 De Zeven Provinciën hit a cliff while making a trip around Sumatra. After offloading coal and ammunition she pulled loose. After this she docked at Singapore. She returned 25 April to Surabaya.[5]
On 4 April 1918, during the final stages of World War I, the ship and Koningin Regentes escorted the passenger ships Vondel, Kawi, Rindjani and Grotius to the port of Tanjung Priok. The ships were intercepted in the eastern parts of the Indian archipelago by the two warships after Dutch merchant ships had been confiscated by British and American naval forces, exercising the Angary right.
After eight years in the Dutch East Indies the ship left on 20 November 1918, going from Tanjung Priok through the Panama Canal and by New York to Den Helder. She arrived on 1 April 1919 and then left for maintenance at Amsterdam.[6]
On 9 November 1921 the ship left for the second and last time for the Dutch East Indies. After arriving, she served as artillery instruction ship.[7]
Mutiny
While off the northwest tip of Sumatra, mutiny broke out on 5 February 1933. Part of the mixed Dutch and Indonesian crew seized control of the ship, keeping it in operation and sailing it southwards along the Sumatran coast. After six days during which the mutineers remained defiant, the Dutch Defence Minister Laurentius Nicolaas Deckers authorized an attack by military aircraft. On 10 February 1933 a task group of five Dornier 'Wal' flying boats (D-7, D-8, D-11, D-18 and D-35) and three Fokker 'T' bombers was launched.[8] At 9:18 AM a 50 kg bomb from D-11 struck the ship, killing 23 mutineers, whereupon the others immediately surrendered. In the fierce controversy which broke out immediately afterwards, it was asserted that this outcome was not deliberate, and that the only intention was to intimidate the mutineers. Incidentally, this was an early demonstration of the vulnerability of surface ships to aerial bombardment, of which this ship itself was to be a victim 10 years later. However, at the time naval experts in the Netherlands and elsewhere paid little attention to this aspect, the whole event being mainly discussed in terms of the putting down of a mutiny.
Cause
The cause and motivation of the mutiny was the focus of considerable debate, both in the Dutch public opinion and political system at the time, and among historians up to the present. Dutch researchers such as Loe de Jong believe that an active communist cell had been among the sailors—which was asserted in a highly inflammatory manner by nationalist right-wingers at the time, while in later periods Dutch and Indonesian communists were happy enough to be credited with what became a heroic myth in left-wing circles. However, J. C. H. Blom asserts that the mutiny was essentially spontaneous and unplanned, resulting from protest at pay cuts and bad working conditions, as well as generally poor morale in the Dutch Royal Navy at the time.[9] From that point of view, the case of De Zeven Provinciën is reminiscent of the Invergordon Mutiny of sailors in the Royal Navy a year and half earlier, which ended without the use of lethal force. Indeed, Dutch sailors may have been inspired by their British counterparts' mutiny, which had been international news at the time.
The harsher stance of the Dutch government in relation to the mutineers might be partially attributed to the British mutiny taking place in Britain itself, while the Dutch one happened in the context of a restive colony where an independence movement was already active, but which the Dutch contemporary political establishment was absolutely determined to retain.
Political consequence
In the Netherlands, the mutiny and its bloody conclusion had a deep impact, a blot on the record of Defence Minister Deckers and Prime Minister
Conversely, the
The single voice in Dutch politics to clearly and outspokenly support the De Zeven Provinciën mutineers was the
Name change
The ship was taken out of service in July that year and was modified to serve as a training ship. In 1936 she was renamed HNLMS Soerabaja. It might be no accident that the purely Dutch name De Zeven Provinciën was changed to the name of a major city of the Indies.[Note 1]
Loss
On 18 February 1942, a few days before the outbreak of the Battle of the Java Sea, Soerabaja was sunk by Japanese G4M bombers in the harbour of city whose name she bore – Surabaya, headquarters of the Dutch Navy in the Indies.[12]
Unlike most other Dutch ships sunk February and March 1942 far from shore, Soerabaja lay in shallow enough waters that the Japanese, once they were in control, were able to salvage and raise her up. In Japanese service she was used as a battery ship. Her name in this period is not on record.
In the following year, 1943, she was hit by Allied aerial bombardment and sank to the bottom, this time permanently.
See also
- Spithead and Nore mutinies
- Royal Indian Navy Mutiny
- Chilean naval mutiny of 1931
- Kronstadt rebellion
- Wilhelmshaven mutiny
- Invergordon Mutiny
- Revolt of the Lash
- 1936 Naval Revolt (Portugal)
Notes
- Home Fleet, ostensibly to purge the memory of the mutiny
References
- ^ "Koninklijke Marine – "Geschiedenis Hr.Ms. De Zeven Provinciën"" (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 7 June 2012. Retrieved 15 April 2012.
- ^ "Biography of Rear-Admiral Karel W.F.M. Doorman". Archived from the original on 8 July 2015. Retrieved 11 August 2010.
- ^ Wrecksite.com from C. Hocking "Dictionary of Disasters During the Age of Steam"
- ^ "scheepvaartmuseum.nl :: Maritieme kalender 1910" (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 5 October 2013. Retrieved 11 April 2014.
- ^ "scheepvaartmuseum.nl :: Maritieme kalender 1912" (in Dutch). Retrieved 11 April 2014.
- ^ "scheepvaartmuseum.nl :: Maritieme kalender 1918" (in Dutch). Retrieved 11 April 2014.
- ^ "scheepvaartmuseum.nl :: Maritieme kalender 1921" (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 9 December 2017. Retrieved 11 April 2014.
- ^ 'Dornier Wal - a Light coming over the Sea' by M. Michiel van der Mey, p204
- ^ J. C. H. Blom, De muiterij op "De Zeven Provinciën" (The Mutiny on The Seven Provinces), a comprehensive monograph, originally a doctoral dissertation at Leiden University; reviewed by Lawrence D. Stokes, The American Historical Review, 82 (2). Apr. 1977, p. 377.
- ^ Peter Boomgaard, Labor in Java in the 1930s, KITLV, Leiden (part of the "Working Papers on Asian Labor" published by International Institute for Asian Studies
- ^ "The Kingdom of the Netherlands During the Second World War" (Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede wereldoorlog), Volume I, Voorspel (Prelude),The Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature [1] Archived 25 October 2007 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Shores, Cull and Izawa 1993, p. 201.
Bibliography
- Boshart, M. (1978). De muiterij op de Zeven Provinciën. Amsterdam: Bert Bakker. ISBN 9060195728.
- Homburg, Leon (2018). "The Armoured Ship De Zeven Provinciën (1909)". In Taylor, Bruce (ed.). The World of the Battleship: The Lives and Careers of Twenty-One Capital Ships of the World's Navies, 1880–1990. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-0870219061.
- Shores, Christopher; Cull, Brian; Izawa, Yasuho (1993). Bloody Shambles: Volume Two: The Defence of Sumatra to the Fall of Burma. London: Grub Street. ISBN 0948817674.