Helgoland-class battleship
SMS Helgoland c. 1911–1917
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Class overview | |
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Name | Helgoland class |
Operators | Imperial German Navy |
Preceded by | Nassau class |
Succeeded by | Kaiser class |
Built | 1908–1912 |
In commission | 1911–1920 |
Completed | 4 |
Lost | 0 |
Retired | 4 |
Scrapped | 3 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Dreadnought battleship |
Displacement |
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Length | 167.20 m (548 ft 7 in) |
Beam | 28.50 m (93 ft 6 in) |
Draft | 8.94 m (29 ft 4 in) |
Installed power |
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Propulsion |
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Speed | 20.5 knots (38.0 km/h; 23.6 mph) |
Range | 5,500 nmi (10,200 km; 6,300 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) |
Crew |
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Armament |
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Armor |
The Helgoland class was the second
The ships served as a unit in I Division,
Design
The Triple Entente between the United Kingdom, France, and Russia had been signed in 1907. Germany had become significantly isolated—on the Continent, Germany was hemmed in by France in the west and Russia in the east, and the UK, with her powerful navy, was capable of blocking German access to the world shipping lanes. Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz reacted to this development with the request for newer and stronger capital ships. His thoughts on the matter were, "The aim which I had to keep in view ... for technical and organizing reasons as well as reasons of political finance was to build as steadily as possible."[2] His appeal came in the form of the proposed Second Amendment to the Naval Law, which was passed on 27 March 1908.[2]
For the second class of German dreadnoughts, there was considerable debate as to what changes would be made from the first design. In May 1906, the Reichsmarineamt (RMA, Imperial Navy Office) received word that the British were building battleships equipped with 13.5-inch (34 cm) guns.[3] As a result, the General Navy Department advocated increasing the caliber of the main battery from 28 cm (11 in) to 30.5 cm (12 in). Tirpitz was reluctant to agree to this change, as he wished to avoid escalating the arms race with Britain.[4]
Tirpitz's hesitation at increasing the armament of the new ships was lost when it became known in early 1907 that the United States Navy was building battleships with 30.5 cm guns. In March 1907, Tirpitz ordered the Construction Department to prepare a design with 30.5 cm guns and 320 mm (13 in) thick belt armor.[4] Some dispute remained over the arrangement of the main battery. The two Minas Geraes-class battleships being built for Brazil mounted the same number of guns, but in a more efficient arrangement. Superfiring turret pairs were placed on either end of the ship, with two wing turrets amidships. Tirpitz favored adopting this arrangement for the Helgoland class, but the Construction Department felt two superfiring turrets could be easily disabled by a single hit. As a result, the hexagonal arrangement of the preceding Nassaus was retained.[5]
The Naval Law stipulated that the lifespan of large warships was to be reduced from 25 years to 20 years; this was done in an effort to force the
General characteristics
The Helgoland-class ships were longer than their predecessors, at 167.2 m (548 ft 7 in)
The class had greatly improved handling characteristics over the preceding Nassau class. The Helgolands were much better sea boats and did not suffer from the severe rolling that the Nassaus did. The ships were responsive to the helm, and had a tight turning radius, and lost only minimal speed during swells. The ships lost up to 54% of their speed at hard rudder, and would heel up to 7°.[1] For comparison, the earlier Nassaus lost up to 70% speed and held a 12° heel with the rudder hard over.[9]
Propulsion
The Helgoland-class ships retained older triple-expansion steam engines rather than the new steam turbines in use in the British Royal Navy. This decision was based solely on cost: at the time,
Armament
Like the Nassau class which preceded it, the Helgoland-class ships carried their main armament in an unusual hexagonal configuration. Twelve 30.5 cm SK L/50[d] guns were emplaced in long-trunk Drh LC/1908 mountings, an improved version of the previous LC/1907 and LC/1906 mounts used in the Nassau class. The guns were arranged in pairs in six twin gun turrets, with one turret each fore and aft, and two on each flank of the ship.[13] The guns could initially be depressed to −8° and elevated to 13.5°, although the turrets were later modified to allow −5.5° depression and 16° of elevation.[6] The guns fired 405-kilogram (893 lb) projectiles at a muzzle velocity of 855 m/s (2,810 ft/s); at 13.5°, this provided a maximum range of 18,700 m (20,500 yd), and with the upgraded 16° elevation, the range was extended to 20,500 m (22,400 yd).[14] The guns had a total of 1,020 rounds for 85 shells per gun.[6]
The ships' secondary armament consisted of fourteen 15 cm (5.9 in) SK L/45 guns, which were mounted in casemates. The guns fired 45.3-kilogram (100 lb) shells at a muzzle velocity of 840 m/s (2,800 ft/s). The guns could be elevated to 19°, which provided a maximum range of 14,950 metres (16,350 yd). The ships also carried fourteen 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/45 guns, also in casemates. These guns fired a 10-kilogram (22 lb) projectile at 650 m/s (2,100 ft/s), and could be trained up to 25° for a maximum range of 9,600 m (10,500 yd).[14] After 1914, two 8.8 cm guns were removed and replaced by two 8.8 cm Flak guns, and between 1916 and 1917, the remaining twelve 8.8 cm casemated guns were removed.[6] These anti-aircraft guns fired a slightly lighter 9.6-kilogram (21 lb) shell at 770 m/s (2,500 ft/s). They could be elevated to 45° and could hit targets 11,800 m (12,900 yd) away. The Helgoland-class ships were further armed with six 50 cm (20 in) submerged torpedo tubes. One tube was mounted in the bow, another in the stern, and two on each broadside, on either ends of the torpedo bulkhead.[14]
Armor
The Helgoland-class ships were protected with
Construction
Four ships of the class were ordered, under the provisional names Ersatz Siegfried (Helgoland), Ersatz Oldenburg (Ostfriesland), Ersatz Beowulf (Thüringen), and Ersatz Frithjof (Oldenburg), as replacements for three of the coastal defense ships of the Siegfried-class, and the unique coastal defense ship SMS Oldenburg. SMS Helgoland was built at
Ships
Ship | Builder | Namesake | Laid down | Launched | Commissioned | Fate |
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Helgoland | Howaldtswerke Werft, Kiel | Heligoland | 11 November 1908 | 25 September 1909 | 23 August 1911 | Broken up at Morecambe, 1921 |
Ostfriesland | Kaiserliche Werft, Wilhelmshaven
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East Frisia | 19 October 1908 | 30 September 1909 | 1 August 1911 | Sunk as target off Cape Hatteras, 21 July 1921 |
Thüringen | AG Weser, Bremen | Thuringia | 2 November 1908 | 27 November 1909 | 1 July 1911 | Sunk as target off Gavres , August 1921
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Oldenburg | Schichau-Werke, Danzig | Duchy of Oldenburg | 1 March 1909 | 30 June 1910 | 1 May 1912 | Broken up at Dordrecht, 1921 |
History
The Helgoland-class ships operated as a unit in the High Seas Fleet; they served as I Division of I Battle Squadron. The ships of the class participated in several fleet operations in the North Sea, including the sortie on 31 May 1916 that resulted in the Battle of Jutland. The ships also saw limited service in the Baltic Sea, primarily during the abortive Battle of the Gulf of Riga in August 1915.
Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby
The first major operation of the war in which the Helgoland-class ships participated was the raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby on 15–16 December 1914. The raid was primarily conducted by the battlecruisers of the I Scouting Group. The Helgoland-class ships, along with the Nassau, Kaiser, and König classes steamed in distant support of Franz von Hipper's battlecruisers. Friedrich von Ingenohl, the commander of the High Seas Fleet, decided to take up station approximately in the center of the North Sea, about 130 miles east of Scarborough.[16]
The
Many in the German navy were furious over Ingenohl's timidity, and his reputation suffered greatly. Tirpitz remarked that "On 16 December, Ingenohl had the fate of Germany in the palm of his hand. I boil with inward emotion whenever I think of it."[19] The captain of the battlecruiser Moltke was even more scathing; he stated that Ingenohl had turned away "because he was afraid of eleven British destroyers which could have been easily eliminated ... Under the present leadership we will accomplish nothing."[19]
The Helgoland-class ships also sortied from port to support the German battlecruisers during the Battle of Dogger Bank, but did not actively engage British forces.[20]
Battle of the Gulf of Riga
On 3 August 1915, several heavy units of the High Seas Fleet were transferred to the Baltic to participate in a planned foray into the
The Russians' own minefields were larger than had been expected, and so clearing them took longer than the Germans had planned. This delay was compounded by stiff resistance from the Russian navy; Deutschland was ultimately unable to lay her mines. Reports of Allied submarine activity in the area prompted the withdrawal of the German naval force on the morning of 20 August.[23] Indeed, the battlecruiser Moltke had been torpedoed by the British submarine HMS E1 the day before, though only minor damage was sustained.[24]
Battle of Jutland
The ships took part in the inconclusive Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916. For the majority of the battle, I Battle Squadron formed the center of the line of battle, behind Rear Admiral Behncke's III Battle Squadron, and followed by Rear Admiral Mauve's elderly pre-dreadnoughts of II Battle Squadron. Ostfriesland served as the division flagship, under the command of Vice Admiral E. Schmidt.[25]
The Helgoland-class ships first entered direct combat at 19:20 on the first day of the battle. Ostfriesland, Helgoland, and Thüringen began firing on HMS Warspite, which, along with the other Queen Elizabeth-class battleships of the 5th Battle squadron, had been pursuing the German battlecruiser force.[26] With the exception of Ostfriesland, the firing only lasted for four minutes, because the German line had been in the process of turning to the east-northeast, and the ships quickly lost sight of the British battleships. Thüringen and Helgoland only fired around 20 main battery shells before they lost sight of their target.[27] Ostfriesland, however, was able to keep visual contact until 19:45, at which point she, too, ceased firing.[28] At 20:15, during the third Gefechtskehrtwendung,[e] Helgoland was struck by a 15 in (38 cm) shell in the forward part of the ship. The shell tore a 20-foot (6.1 m) hole in the hull and rained splinters on the foremost port side 5.9 in gun; approximately 80 tons of water entered the ship.[30]
At around midnight on 1 June, the Helgoland- and Nassau-class ships in the center of the German line came into contact with the British 4th Destroyer Flotilla. A chaotic night battle ensued, during which Nassau rammed the British destroyer Spitfire. The 4th Flotilla broke off the action temporarily to regroup, but at around 01:00, unwittingly stumbled into the German dreadnoughts a second time.[31] Oldenburg and Helgoland opened fire on the two leading British destroyers, but a British shell destroyed Oldenburg's forward search light. Shell fragments rained down on the bridge and wounded the ship's captain, Kapitän Hopfner, and killed his second in command, Kapitänleutnant Rabius, along with a number of other men on the bridge, including the helmsman. Oldenburg was temporarily without anyone to steer the ship; she was in danger of ramming either the ship to her rear or to her front. Hopfner, despite his injuries, took the helm and brought the ship back into line.[32]
Shortly after 01:00, Thüringen and Nassau encountered the British armored cruiser Black Prince. hüringen opened fire first and pummeled Black Prince with a total of 27 heavy-caliber shells and 24 rounds from her secondary battery. Nassau and Ostfriesland joined in, followed by Friedrich der Grosse.[33]
[Black Prince] presented a terrible and awe-inspiring spectacle as she drifted down the line blazing furiously until, after several minor detonations, she disappeared below the surface with the whole of her crew in one tremendous explosion.[33]
By this time, the 4th Destroyer Flotilla had been largely destroyed as a fighting unit. The few remaining, heavily damaged ships had been scattered and would take no further part in the battle.[34]
Following the return to German waters, Helgoland and Thüringen, along with the Nassau-class battleships Nassau,
Post-war
The ships of the class saw no further significant action during the war, and were ceded to the Allies under the terms of the
Ostfriesland was ceded to the
Notes
Footnotes
- Ersatz (ship name)." An excellent example of this practice is the Derfflinger-class battlecruisers: the lead ship SMS Derfflinger was considered a new addition to the fleet, and was ordered as "K", while her sisters Lützow and Hindenburg were ordered as Ersatz Kaiserin Augusta and Ersatz Hertha, as replacements for two older ships.[7]
- ^ The Nassau-class battleships displaced 18,570 tons at the designed weight, and 21,000 tons at a full load.[9]
- ^ Because of the wartime situation, Germany had limited access to high quality coal, but was able to acquire lower-grade coal for its ships. The higher quality coal was generally reserved for the smaller craft, whose crews were less able to clean the boilers at the increased rate demanded by the low-quality coal. As a result, German capital ships were often supplied with poor coal, in the knowledge that their larger crews were better able to perform the increased maintenance. After 1915, the practice of spraying oil onto the low-quality coal was introduced, in order to increase the burn rate.[11]
- ^ In Imperial German Navy gun nomenclature, "SK" (Schnelladekanone) denotes that the gun is quick firing, while the L/50 denotes the length of the gun. In this case, the L/50 gun is 50 caliber, meaning that the gun is 50 times as long as it is in diameter.[12]
- ^ This translates roughly as the "battle about-turn", and was a simultaneous 16-point turn of the entire High Seas Fleet. It had never been conducted under enemy fire before the Battle of Jutland.[29]
Citations
- ^ a b c d Gröner, p. 25.
- ^ a b c Campbell & Sieche, p. 135.
- ^ Staff (German Battleships), p. 33.
- ^ a b Staff (German Battleships), p. 34.
- ^ Staff (German Battleships), pp. 34–35.
- ^ a b c d e f Gröner, p. 24.
- ^ Gröner, p. 56.
- ^ Gröner, pp. 23–24.
- ^ a b c Gröner, p. 23.
- ^ Staff (German Battleships), p. 35.
- ^ Philbin, p. 56.
- ^ Grießmer, p. 177.
- ^ a b Campbell & Sieche, p. 146.
- ^ a b c Campbell & Sieche, p. 140.
- ^ Gröner, pp. 24–25.
- ^ a b Tarrant, p. 31.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 32.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 33.
- ^ a b Tarrant, p. 35.
- ^ a b c d Hore, p. 68.
- ^ Halpern, p. 196.
- ^ Halpern, p. 197.
- ^ Halpern, pp. 197–198.
- ^ Staff (German Battlecruisers), p. 15.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 286.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 142.
- ^ Tarrant, pp. 142–143.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 143.
- ^ Tarrant, pp. 153–154.
- ^ Tarrant, pp. 173, 175.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 222.
- ^ Tarrant, p. 223.
- ^ a b Tarrant, p. 225.
- ^ Tarrant, pp. 225–226.
- ^ a b Tarrant, p. 263.
References
- Campbell, N. J. M. & Sieche, Erwin (1986). "Germany". In Gardiner, Robert & Gray, Randal (eds.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1906–1921. London: Conway Maritime Press. pp. 134–189. ISBN 978-0-85177-245-5.
- ISBN 978-1-84832-229-5.
- Grießmer, Axel (1999). Die Linienschiffe der Kaiserlichen Marine: 1906–1918; Konstruktionen zwischen Rüstungskonkurrenz und Flottengesetz [The Battleships of the Imperial Navy: 1906–1918; Constructions between Arms Competition and Fleet Laws] (in German). Bonn: Bernard & Graefe Verlag. ISBN 978-3-7637-5985-9.
- ISBN 978-0-87021-790-6.
- Halpern, Paul G. (1995). A Naval History of World War I. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-55750-352-7.
- Hore, Peter (2006). Battleships of World War I. London: Southwater Books. ISBN 978-1-84476-377-1.
- Philbin, Tobias R. III (1982). Admiral Hipper: The Inconvenient Hero. John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 978-90-6032-200-0.
- Staff, Gary (2006). German Battlecruisers: 1914–1918. Oxford: Osprey Books. ISBN 978-1-84603-009-3.
- Staff, Gary (2010). German Battleships: 1914–1918. Vol. 1: Deutschland, Nassau and Helgoland Classes. Oxford: Osprey Books. ISBN 978-1-84603-467-1.
- Tarrant, V. E. (2001) [1995]. Jutland: The German Perspective. London: Cassell Military Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-304-35848-9.
Further reading
- Dodson, Aidan; Cant, Serena (2020). Spoils of War: The Fate of Enemy Fleets after the Two World Wars. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-1-5267-4198-1.
- Koop, Gerhard & Schmolke, Klaus-Peter (1999). Von der Nassau – zur König-Klasse [From the Nassau to König Class] (in German). Bonn: Bernard & Graefe Verlag. ISBN 978-3-7637-5994-1.