SMS Mecklenburg

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Lithograph of Mecklenburg from 1902
History
German Empire
NameMecklenburg
NamesakeHouse of Mecklenburg
BuilderAG Vulcan Stettin
Laid down15 May 1900
Launched9 November 1901
Commissioned25 June 1903
Decommissioned24 January 1916
Stricken25 January 1920
FateScrapped in 1921
General characteristics
Class and typeWittelsbach-class pre-dreadnought battleship
Displacement
Length126.80 m (416 ft)
Beam22.80 m (74 ft 10 in)
Draft7.95 m (26 ft 1 in)
Installed power
Propulsion
  • 3 ×
    triple-expansion steam engines
  • 3 × screw propellers
Speed18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph)
Range5,000 nautical miles (9,300 km; 5,800 mi); 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement
  • 30 officers
  • 650 enlisted men
Armament
Armor
  • Belt: 100 to 225 mm (3.9 to 8.9 in)
  • Turrets: 250 mm (9.8 in)
  • Deck: 50 mm (2 in)

SMS Mecklenburg ("His Majesty's Ship

Stettin, Germany (now Szczecin, Poland), she was finished in May 1903. Her sister ships were Wittelsbach, Zähringen, Wettin, and Schwaben; they were the first capital ships built under the Navy Law of 1898, championed by Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz
. Mecklenburg was armed with a main battery of four 24-centimeter (9.4 in) guns and had a top speed of 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph).

Mecklenburg spent the early period of her career in I Squadron of the German fleet, participating in the peacetime routine of training cruises and exercises. After World War I began in August 1914, the ship was mobilized with her sisters as IV Battle Squadron. She saw limited duty in the Baltic Sea against Russian naval forces, and as a guard ship in the North Sea. The German High Command withdrew the ship from active service in January 1916 due to a threat from submarines and naval mines, together with severe shortages in personnel. For the remainder of her career, Mecklenburg served as a prison ship and as a barracks ship based in Kiel. She was stricken from the navy list in January 1920 and sold for scrapping the following year.

Description

Main article: Wittelsbach-class battleship
Plan and profile drawing of the Wittelsbach class

After the German

Reichsmarineamt (Imperial Navy Office), Vizeadmiral (VAdm—Vice Admiral) Friedrich von Hollmann struggled throughout the early and mid-1890s to secure parliamentary approval for the first three Kaiser Friedrich III-class battleships. In June 1897, Hollmann was replaced by Konteradmiral (KAdm—Rear Admiral) Alfred von Tirpitz, who quickly proposed and secured approval for the first Naval Law in early 1898. The law authorized the last two ships of the class, as well as the five ships of the Wittelsbach class,[1] the first class of battleship built under Tirpitz's tenure. The Wittelsbachs were broadly similar to the Kaiser Friedrichs, carrying the same armament but with a more comprehensive armor layout.[2][3]

Mecklenburg was 126.80 m (416 ft)

kW), which gave her a top speed of 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph). The ship had a cruising radius of 5,000 nautical miles (9,300 km; 5,800 mi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). She had a crew of 30 officers and 650 enlisted men.[4]

The ship's primary armament consisted of a

armored belt was 225 millimeters (8.9 in) thick in the central citadel that protected her magazines and machinery spaces and reduced to 100 mm (3.9 in) on either end of the hull. The deck was 50 mm (2 in) thick. Mecklenburg's main battery turrets had 250 mm (9.8 in) of armor plating.[6]

Service history

Pre-war career

Mecklenburg's keel was laid down on 15 May 1900 at

marks.[6]

Immediately following her commissioning, Mecklenburg began

Kaiserliche Werft (Imperial Shipyard) at Wilhelmshaven for minor improvements and repairs following her trials; this work lasted until the end of February 1904. After these modifications, Mecklenburg took part in individual and squadron training exercises, and a fleet review for the visiting British King Edward VII in June. The following month, the German fleet went on a cruise to Britain, the Netherlands, and Norway that lasted until August. Mecklenburg then participated in the annual autumn fleet exercises, which took place in late August and September, and a winter training cruise in November and December.[7]

Starting in mid-December 1904, Mecklenburg went into Wilhelmshaven for periodic maintenance, which lasted until the beginning of March 1905. After emerging from drydock, Mecklenburg joined her

Swinemünde.[7] From mid-February to the end of March 1906, Mecklenburg was in the Kaiserliche Werft in Wilhelmshaven for her annual overhaul. The training routine continued without incident through 1907 but, in early April 1908, a major accident in one of Mecklenburg's broadside torpedo rooms nearly sank her. Water began to flood the ship and could only be stopped by sealing the torpedo tubes from the outside; repairs lasted until May.[11]

Mecklenburg participated in a training cruise to the

dreadnought battleship Ostfriesland; Mecklenburg was then decommissioned and assigned to the Reserve Division in the North Sea. On 9 May 1912, she was transferred to the Reserve Division in the Baltic. She returned briefly to active service in 1912 from 9 to 12 May to move her from the North Sea to the Baltic, and again from 14 August to 28 September to participate in the fleet exercises that year. During the maneuvers, she served in III Squadron.[12]

World War I

Map of the North and Baltic Seas in 1911

After the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, Mecklenburg and the rest of her class were mobilized to serve in IV Battle Squadron, under the command of Vice Admiral

Windau the next day.[15][12] From 5 December to 2 April 1915, Mecklenburg and the rest of the squadron were assigned to guard duty in the North Sea, based in the mouth of the Elbe.[12]

In May 1915, IV Squadron, including Mecklenburg, was transferred to support the German Army in the Baltic Sea area.[16] Mecklenburg and her sisters were then based in Kiel.[17] From 8 to 12 May, she participated in a sweep toward Gotland and Bogskär,[12] to support the assault on Libau. Mecklenburg and the other ships stood off Gotland to intercept any Russian cruisers that might try to intervene in the landings, but this did not occur. On 10 May, after the invasion force had entered Libau, the British submarines HMS E1 and HMS E9 spotted IV Squadron, but were too far away to make an attack.[17] After the operation, Mecklenburg and the rest of IV Squadron returned to the Elbe for guard duties, which lasted until 4 July. The next day, Mecklenburg departed for Kiel in preparation for a major operation in the Baltic. She proceeded to Danzig, and on 11 July departed for a sweep to Gotska Sandön; another patrol to western Gotland followed on 21–22 July. Mecklenburg then steamed from Danzig to Libau on 2 August, where she joined another foray toward Gotska Sandön from 7 to 10 August.[12]

Mecklenburg and her sisters were not included in the German fleet that assaulted the Gulf of Riga in August 1915, due to the scarcity of escorts. The increasingly active British submarines forced the Germans to employ more destroyers to protect the capital ships.[18] Mecklenburg took part in two sweeps to Huvudskär on 9–11 and 21–23 September. On 17 December she ran aground in the entrance to the harbor of Libau, but was towed free without suffering any damage. She was to replace the worn-out armored cruiser Prinz Heinrich in the reconnaissance forces of the fleet in the Baltic, but Mecklenburg and her sisters were removed from service shortly thereafter. By this stage of the war, the German Navy was facing severe shortages of crews, which could be alleviated by the decommissioning of older, less effective warships. Furthermore, the increasing threat from British submarines and Russian mines in the Baltic by 1916, the latter of which sank the armored cruiser Friedrich Carl, convinced the German navy to withdraw the elderly Wittelsbach-class ships from active service.[12][19] On 6 January 1916, Mecklenburg left Libau bound for Kiel, arriving the following day. She was decommissioned on 24 January and placed in reserve.[12]

Mecklenburg was initially based in Kiel and used as a floating prison. In early 1918, she became a barracks ship for the crews of U-boats being repaired in Kiel. The ship was briefly retained after the German defeat at the end of World War I,[20] but was to be discarded under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, which limited the re-formed Reichsmarine to eight pre-dreadnought battleships of the Deutschland and Braunschweig classes, of which only six could be operational at any given time.[21] Accordingly, on 25 January 1920, Mecklenburg was stricken from the naval register. She was sold to Deutsche Werke, a shipbuilder based in Kiel, on 16 August 1921 for 1,750,000 Marks, and was broken up for scrap metal that year at Kiel-Nordmole.[8][22]

Footnotes

Notes

  1. Seiner Majestät Schiff
    " (German: His Majesty's Ship).
  2. ^ In Imperial German Navy gun nomenclature, "SK" (Schnelladekanone) denotes that the gun is quick firing, while the L/40 denotes the length of the gun. In this case, the L/40 gun is 40 caliber, meaning that the gun is 40 times as long as it is in diameter.[5]

Citations

  1. ^ Sondhaus, pp. 180–189, 216–218, 221–225.
  2. ^ Herwig, p. 43.
  3. ^ Lyon, p. 248.
  4. ^ Gröner, pp. 16–17.
  5. ^ Grießmer, p. 177.
  6. ^ a b c Gröner, p. 16.
  7. ^ a b c d e Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, p. 59.
  8. ^ a b Gröner, p. 17.
  9. ^ Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, p. 58.
  10. ^ "The British and German Fleets", p. 335.
  11. ^ Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, pp. 59–60.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, p. 60.
  13. ^ "German Naval Notes", p. 1052.
  14. ^ Scheer, p. 15.
  15. ^ Halpern, p. 185.
  16. ^ Scheer, pp. 90–91.
  17. ^ a b Halpern, p. 192.
  18. ^ Halpern, p. 197.
  19. ^ Herwig, p. 168.
  20. ^ Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, pp. 60–61.
  21. ^ Treaty of Versailles Section II: Naval Clauses, Article 181.
  22. ^ Hildebrand, Röhr, & Steinmetz, p. 61.

References

Further reading
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