181-862: SMS Prinz Heinrich was a unique German armored cruiser built at the turn of the 20th century for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy), named after Kaiser Wilhelm II 's younger brother Prince Heinrich . The second vessel of that type built in Germany, Prinz Heinrich was constructed at the Kaiserliche Werft (Imperial Shipyard) in Kiel , being laid down in December 1898, launched in March 1900, and commissioned in March 1902. Prinz Heinrich ' s design
362-617: A battle in May 1877 between the British unarmored cruiser Shah and the Peruvian monitor Huáscar demonstrated the need for more and better-protected cruisers. Shah and the smaller wooden corvette Amethyst hit Huáscar more than 50 times without causing significant damage. The Peruvian ship had an inexperienced crew unused to its cumbersome machinery, and managed to fire only six rounds, all of which missed. The engagement demonstrated
543-489: A 30 mm (1.2 in) thick roof. The aft conning tower was much less thoroughly protected; it was covered by only 12 mm (0.47 in) of steel plating. The main battery gun turrets had 150 mm-thick sides and 30 mm-thick roofs. The 15 cm gun turrets had 100 mm-thick armor, while the casemated weapons were protected by 70 mm (2.8 in) gun shields . The casemates themselves were armored with 100 mm worth of steel plating. Prinz Heinrich
724-457: A British force of the battlecruisers HMS Invincible and HMS Inflexible , three armoured cruisers and two light cruisers. The German armored cruisers were too slow to outrun their pursuers, and their initially accurate gunnery failed to inflict serious damage on the British battlecruisers. The British 12-inch guns turned the tide of battle once they started scoring hits on the Germans, and
905-703: A Sea Officer). The naval historians Hans Hildebrand, Albert Röhr, and Hans-Otto Steinmetz regard Hopman's criticism as an exaggeration, pointing out that Prinz Heinrich compared well to foreign contemporaries like the French Desaix , the Russian Bayan , and the Italian Giuseppe Garibaldi , though she was inferior to British designs. She nevertheless spent only four years in active service in peacetime before being replaced with newer, more powerful cruisers. Prinz Heinrich
1086-601: A boom in the construction of armored cruisers in the world's navies as some naval authorities concluded that the armored cruiser's superior speed could ensure survivability in a naval action against battleships; they did not take into account the Russian Baltic Fleet's inefficiency and tactical ineptitude during the battle. First Sea Lord "Jacky" Fisher , an advocate of armored cruisers as more useful than battleships to safeguard British trade and territorial interests, saw his efforts justified; his belief that "speed
1267-565: A bore as 16.25 inches (413 mm), firing an 1,800-pound (816 kg) exploding shell, were being mounted on naval vessels. This gun could penetrate up to 34 inches of wrought iron , the earliest form of naval armor. These were muzzle-loading guns , as had been used on ships from the 1500s. Breech-loading cannon , which were readopted into naval use in the 1870s, were more destructive than muzzle loaders due to their higher rate of fire. The development of rifled cannon , which improved accuracy, and advancements in shells were other factors. Although
1448-407: A certainty" and called for a "battleship-cruiser" which would possess the speed of a cruiser and the firepower of a capital ship Other naval authorities remained skeptical. Mahan called the interest in armored cruisers "a fad," then explained: She is armored, and she is a cruiser; and what have you got? A ship to "lie in the line"? as our ancestors used to say. No, and Yes; that is to say, she may at
1629-525: A combination, though I do call it a compromise.... I do not say you have a useless ship. I do say that you have not as useful a ship as, for the tonnage, you ought to have. Buoyed with their success at Tsushima, Japan laid down the four Tsukuba -class cruisers between 1905 and 1908. At a speed of 20.5 knots, they carried an extremely heavy main armament of four 12-inch (305 mm) guns, 8 inches (203 mm) of belt and turret armor and 3 inches (76 mm) of deck armor. The Tsukuba s were intended to take
1810-414: A compromise between cruiser and battleship and were intended to augment capital ship strength in battle squadrons. This practice would persist until World War I . The first United States armored cruiser, USS Maine , was launched in 1889 but not completed until 1895 due to a three-year delay in the delivery of her armor plate. Armed with four 10-inch (254 mm) guns, mounted en echelon (with
1991-654: A contract with the British armaments company Vickers and Son Ltd. (formerly Vickers Maxim) to supply Vickers-constructed Maxim machine guns. Conversely, from 1902 Krupp was contracted by Vickers to supply its patented fuses to Vickers bullets. It is known that wounded and deceased German soldiers were found to have spent Vickers bullets with the German inscription "Krupps patent zünder [fuses]" lying around their bodies. Krupp received its first order for 135 Panzer I tanks in 1933, and during World War II made tanks , artillery, naval guns, armor plate, munitions and other armaments for
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#17327836368402172-499: A cruiser would not likely face the largest-caliber guns of a battleship and many navies commonly used smaller weapons as they did not wear out as fast as larger ones did, cruisers still needed some form of protection to preclude being shot to pieces. The adoption of rolled iron armor in 1865 and sandwich armor in 1870 gave ships a chance to withstand fire from larger guns. Both these protective schemes used wood as an important component, which made them extremely heavy and limited speed,
2353-491: A cruiser, and still not fit to "lie in the line."... It may be urged that an armored cruiser was never intended to fight a battleship. Then what is she intended for? Surely not as a scout or a commerce destroyer, for vessels a fifth the displacement could do this work as well, and numbers are required here, not strength.... If she is to overtake a weaker enemy, you must first assume a smaller enemy, otherwise she could not have superiority in both speed and strength. By escaping from
2534-660: A different form than they had in the past. The battlecruiser HMS Invincible and her two sister ships were designed specifically to fulfill these requirements. In a sense they were an extension of the armored cruiser as a fast, heavily armed scout, commerce protector and cruiser-destroyer, reflected in the term originally ascribed to them, "large armored cruiser." However, the battlecruisers were much larger than armored cruisers, allowing them to be faster, more heavily armed, and better-protected, so battlecruisers were able to outpace armored cruisers, stay out of range of their weapons and destroy them with relative impunity. Because they carried
2715-544: A first-class battleship. Their armor belts also sat below the ships' waterlines, which made them of limited benefit. The underlying problem with these early warships was that technology had not caught up to the demands being made of them; therefore, they represented a series of compromises and could not be fully effective. They were typically powered by double-expansion steam engines fed by boilers which generated steam at perhaps 60 or 70 psi pressure, which gave relatively poor efficiency and short range. Even with improved engines,
2896-507: A fleet of technologically advanced armored cruisers and torpedo craft would be powerful and flexible enough to engage in a wide range of activity and overwhelm potential enemies. French naval and government circles embraced this ideal mutually and even advocates of battleships over cruisers admitted the latter's potential usefulness in scouting and commercial warfare. The result was the building of increasingly large armored cruisers. Jeanne d'Arc , laid down in 1896, displaced 11,000 tons, carried
3077-401: A heavy sea with a steam-and-sail turret ship .) Consequently, armored cruisers retained a more traditional broadside arrangement. Their armor was distributed in a thick belt around the waterline along most of their length; the gun positions on deck were not necessarily armored at all. The limitations of these ships would not be rectified fully until decades after their construction. Meanwhile,
3258-438: A maximum range of 2,290 nautical miles (4,240 km; 2,640 mi) at a speed of 18 kn (33 km/h; 21 mph) and 4,580 nmi (8,480 km; 5,270 mi) at a cruising speed of 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph). Prinz Heinrich was armed with a variety of weapons. Her primary armament consisted of two 24 cm (9.4 in) SK L/40 quick-firing guns mounted in single turrets, one on either end of
3439-1116: A mixed armament of 194-millimetre (7.6 in) and 138-millimetre (5.4 in) guns, and had a 150-millimetre (5.9 in) belt of Harvey armor over her machinery spaces. The 12,300-ton Léon Gambetta class and 14,000-ton Edgar Quinet class followed. With a speed of 22.5 knots, the Léon Gambetta s were armed with four 194-millimetre (7.6 in) guns in twin turrets and 16 164-millimetre (6.5 in) in four single and six twin turrets and were protected by up to 150-millimetre (5.9 in) of Krupp belt armor and nearly 200-millimetre (7.9 in) on their conning towers and turrets. The Edgar Quinet s, slightly faster at 23 knots, were armed with 14 194-millimetre (7.6 in) guns and carried up to 170-millimetre (6.7 in) of armor on their belts, almost 100-millimetre (3.9 in) on their decks and 150-millimetre (5.9 in) on their turrets. Britain, which had concluded as early as 1892 that it needed twice as many cruisers as any potential enemy to adequately protect its empire's sea lanes, responded to
3620-689: A navy composed of fast cruisers for commerce raiding and torpedo-boats for coast defense, was particularly influential in France. The first French protected cruiser was Sfax , laid down in 1882, and followed by six classes of protected cruiser – and no armored cruisers until Dupuy de Lôme , laid down in 1888 but not finished until 1895. Dupuy de Lôme was a revolutionary ship, being the first French armored cruiser to dispose entirely of masts, and sheathed in steel armor. However, she and two others were not sufficiently seaworthy, and their armor could be penetrated by modern quick-firing guns . Thus from 1891 to 1897
3801-510: A necessity. The invention of face-hardened armor in the mid-1890s offered effective protection with less weight than previously. Varying in size, the armored cruiser was distinguished from other types of cruiser by its belt armor —thick iron (or later steel) plating on much of the hull to protect the ship from shellfire much like that on battleships. The first armored cruiser, the Imperial Russian Navy 's General-Admiral ,
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#17327836368403982-542: A pinch, and at a risk that exceeds her powers. A cruiser? Yes, and No; for, order to give her armor and armament which do not fit the line, you have given tonnage beyond what is needed for the speed and coal endurance proper for a cruiser. By giving this tonnage to armor and armament you have taken it from other uses; either from increasing her own speed and endurance, or from providing another cruiser. You have in her more cruiser than she ought to have and less armored vessel, or less cruiser and more armored ship. I do not call this
4163-549: A pioneering steel foundry in Essen in 1811. After his death, his sons Alfred and an unidentified brother operated the business in partnership with their mother. An account cited that, on his deathbed, the elder Krupp confided to Alfred, who was then 14 years old, the secret of steel casting. In 1848, Alfred became the sole owner of the foundry. This next generation Krupp (1812–87), known as "the Cannon King" or as "Alfred
4344-443: A preference for armored cruisers during the 1880s was Russia. The Russian Navy laid down four armored cruisers and one protected cruiser during the decade, all being large ships with sails. The development of rapid–fire cannons in the late 1880s forced a change in cruiser design. Since a large number of hits at or near the waterline could negate the effect of water–excluding material used in protected cruisers, side armor again became
4525-465: A priority. Four inches (c. 10 cm) was considered adequate. However, it had to cover not just guns and the waterline but also much of the hull structure in–between; otherwise, the equally new high–explosive shells could penetrate and destroy much of the unarmored portion of the ship. Another development was the publication in 1890 of American naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan 's book The Influence of Sea Power upon History . While Mahan emphasized
4706-510: A problem for Ford Motor Company in 1964 when they desired to export their car of the same name to Germany, especially since American military personnel stationed there wanted the new car. Although Krupp offered to sell the Mustang name to Ford for a reasonable price, Ford declined and as a result, badged all Mustangs destined for Germany "T-5." By 1978 Krupp's rights to the Mustang name expired and all Mustangs exported to Germany henceforth retained
4887-536: A resounding victory over British naval forces from the West Indies Station . With newer ships, superior gunnery and optimal logistics, the Germans sank the Royal Navy armored cruisers HMS Monmouth and HMS Good Hope , with the loss of over 1,500 British sailors and officers (including Rear-Admiral Christopher Cradock ). This was one of the last battles involving armored cruisers as
5068-490: A series of cylinders of increasing size before being released, was a more efficient process; it allowed the steam to generate more energy and use less coal to go the same distance. With greater efficiency came increasingly complex machinery and the larger potential for breakdown. However, advances in metallurgy and engineering, the potential for smaller bunkerage and the successful use of compounding in commercial engines made it an attractive option for naval engines, as well. By
5249-569: A ship her size. Her protection scheme, inspired by the Italia class, included a full–length protected deck up to 2 inches (51 mm) thick, and a cork-filled cofferdam along her sides. Esmeralda set the tone for cruiser construction for the years to come, with "Elswick cruisers" on a similar design being constructed for Italy, China, Japan, Argentina, Austria and the United States. Protected cruisers became attractive for two reasons. First,
5430-592: A single military mast with machine guns. The next class of small cruisers in the Royal Navy, the Mersey class , were protected cruisers, but the Royal Navy then returned to the armored cruiser with the Orlando class , begun in 1885 and completed in 1889. The navy judged the Orlando s inferior to protected cruisers and built exclusively protected cruisers immediately afterwards, including some very large, fast ships like
5611-468: A sortie into the Gulf of Finland . She supported another minelaying operation from 20 to 23 June. On 1 July, the minelayer SMS Albatross , escorted by the cruisers Roon , Augsburg , and Lübeck and seven destroyers, laid a minefield north of Bogskär . While returning to port, the flotilla separated into two sections; Augsburg , Albatross , and three destroyers made for Rixhöft while
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5792-621: A sortie toward Gotska Sandön , though the Germans failed to locate any Russian warships. Another sweep into the central Baltic, between Libau and Gotland, took place on 1 to 2 August that again did not result in combat. German naval forces in the Baltic were reinforced by elements of the High Seas Fleet during the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in early August 1915. The Germans sought to drive out
5973-541: A speed higher than that of battleships, preferably by at least 30 percent, to fulfill its traditional role as scout for the fleet and the newly acquired one of participating with battleships in a naval encounter. Thirty percent was the ratio by which frigates had been faster than ships of the line in the days of sail. If a battleship sailed at 20 knots, this would mean that an armored cruiser would have to steam at least 26 or 27 knots. To fulfill these criteria, however, armored cruisers would have to be built much larger and take on
6154-469: A stronger enemy she will never win wars. Later in the same address is this: "Every argument used against [armored cruisers] holds true for battle-cruisers of the Invincible type, except that the latter, if wounded, would be fit to lie in the line, owing to her great armament. If it is hoped to fight at such great ranges that her 7-inch belt and 5-inch side will be of value, then the armor of battleships
6335-553: A top speed of only 12.3 knots (22.8 km/h) and a high coal consumption, which necessitated a full sailing rig, they were not really suited for the role of cruiser. Nevertheless, these ships were considered a new threat to British commerce in the event of war, the rationale being that any vessel, regardless of its speed, could technically be a threat to overseas commerce. The British responded with Shannon , begun in 1873, launched in 1875 and armed with two 10-inch (254 mm) and seven 9-inch (229 mm) rifled guns. Two ships of
6516-514: A trip to meet Czar Nicholas II of Russia in Reval . Prinz Heinrich next took part in fleet training in August and September, where she served as the flagship of II Scouting Group , with included the light cruisers Niobe and Nymphe . After the conclusion of the maneuvers on 18 September, the pre-dreadnought battleship Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm was decommissioned for maintenance;
6697-417: A war at sea arise. Concern over obsolescence in official circles was further fueled by the race between the increasing size of naval guns and of armor strong enough to withstand such fire. In 1860, one of the largest naval cannons in standard use had a bore of 8 inches (203 mm) and fired a 68-pound (31 kg) solid shot or approximately 51-pound (23 kg) spherical shell . By 1884, guns with as wide
6878-487: Is armor" would lead him to create the battlecruiser . Danish Navy Commander William Hovgaard , who would later become president of New York Shipbuilding and serve on the U.S. Navy's Battleship Design Advisory Board , a group which would help plan the Iowa -class fast battleships in the 1930s, said, "The fighting capacity of the armored cruiser has reached a point which renders its participation in future fleet actions almost
7059-494: Is wrong, not in principle, but in distribution." Although pre-dreadnought battleships and armored cruisers were outclassed by modern battleship and battlecruiser designs, respectively, armored cruisers still played an active role in World War I. Their armor and firepower was sufficient to defeat other cruiser types and armed merchant vessels, while their speed and range made them particularly useful for extended operations out in
7240-503: The Reichsmarineamt decided to decommission older, less combat-capable vessels. On 10 November, Prinz Heinrich left Libau for Kiel, where she arrived the following day. Her crew was reduced and she was assigned to the "Readiness Division" with Wittelsbach , and she remained there until 27 March 1916, when she was decommissioned and disarmed. For the rest of the war, she served as a floating headquarters for Prince Heinrich,
7421-536: The Nelson class followed, armed with four 10-inch and eight 9-inch guns. These early armored cruisers were essentially scaled-down versions of the first-rate ironclad warships of the time and, like their Russian counterparts, were essentially belted cruisers. Their 9-inch belts were thicker than that of the Russians but did not extend the full length of the hull due to weight but tapered off at both ends. Past this belt,
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7602-623: The Comus class were designed for colonial service and were only capable of 13 knots (24 km/h) speed, not fast enough for commerce protection or fleet duties. The breakthrough for the protected cruiser design came with the Chilean Esmeralda , designed and built by the British firm Armstrong at their Elswick yard. Esmeralda , with a high speed of 18 knots (33 km/h), dispensed entirely with sails and carried an armament of two 10-inch and six 6-inch guns, considered very powerful for
7783-525: The Confederate ironclad CSS Virginia , the Admiralty realized that its ships could theoretically encounter an ironclad in any theater of operation. Ship propulsion was improving but was also taking time to develop. Naval engines in the 1860s were single-expansion types, in which steam was expanded into a cylinder, pushed a piston and was released. Compounding , where steam is passed through
7964-673: The German Navy's battle line, which included several battlecruisers and dreadnought battleships. The armor belt was shown to be far less than required to survive the 280mm (11 inch) and 300 mm (12 inch) shells of more modern dreadnoughts and battlecruisers and the cruisers were too slow to get away from them. The final nail in the coffin for the armored cruiser type was in the development of capped armor-piercing shells. The Harvey and Krupp Cemented armor that had looked to offer protection failed when hit with soft capped AP shells of large enough size. Later hard capped AP shell would only make
8145-754: The Great Venezuela Railway from 1888 to 1894 raised Venezuelan national debt. Venezuela's suspension of debt payments in 1901 led to gunboat diplomacy of the Venezuela Crisis of 1902–1903 . Russia and the Ottoman Empire both bought large quantities of Krupp guns. By 1887, Russia had bought 3,096 Krupp guns, while the Ottomans bought 2,773 Krupp guns. By the start of the Balkan wars the largest export market for Krupp worldwide
8326-517: The Pennsylvania s (5 inches (127 mm) on their belts and 1 inch (25 mm) on their decks) due to newly imposed congressional restraints on tonnage, they could still steam at 22 knots. They were built as a fast, powerful response in the eventuality of a Pacific war and were the largest and last American armored cruisers built. The British also considered 10-inch (254 mm) and 12-inch (305 mm) guns for its Minotaur -class cruisers,
8507-499: The flagship of the fleet's scouting forces, and she was primarily occupied with fleet training. The ship was out of service from early 1906 to mid-1908, when she was reactivated for use as a gunnery training ship , a role she filled until late 1912. Prinz Heinrich underwent modernization and conversion into a dedicated training ship in 1914, and the work was completed just before the outbreak of World War I in July that year. After
8688-523: The protected cruiser Victoria Louise , and the light cruisers Amazone and Ariadne conducted training maneuvers beginning in April. On 12 April, they were joined by the light cruiser Medusa ; by 2 May they had also been joined by the light cruisers Frauenlob and Niobe . The ships took part in the autumn fleet maneuvers in August and September, after which Borckenhagen was replaced by KAdm Gustav Schmidt . Prinz Heinrich participated in
8869-467: The u is usually treated as short in both languages, corresponding logically (in either language's regular orthography) with the doubled consonant that follows. A British documentary on the Krupp family and firm included footage of German-speakers of the 1930s who would have had speaking contact with the family, which attests the long [uː] , thus [kʁuːp] or [kɾuːp] , rather than what would be
9050-539: The 14,000-ton Powerful class . However, the Orlando s were the first class of cruiser to use the triple-expansion engine . Because this type of reciprocating engine used the steam in three stages, it was more fuel-efficient than earlier compound engines . It also used steam of higher pressure, 60 poundforce per square inch, as compared to the 25 to 30 poundforce in earlier engines. With these engineering developments, warships could now dispense with sails and be entirely steam-driven. The only major naval power to retain
9231-479: The 1870s, compound engines had become standard for warships. Compounding by itself did not increase power or speed significantly, although it allowed for a much greater operating range. Forced-draught systems would help increase power and speed but would not come into use until the early 1890s. The Russian navy became the first to produce an armored warship intended for commerce raiding, with General-Admiral , begun in 1870 and launched in 1873, often referred to as
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#17327836368409412-454: The 1880s and early 1890s. As mentioned earlier, the armored cruiser Shannon was the first ship to make use of an armored deck. However, by the end of the 1870s, ships could be found with full–length armored decks and little or no side armor. The Italian Italia class of very fast battleships had armored decks and guns but no side armor. The British used a full-length armored deck in their Comus class of corvettes started in 1878; however
9593-593: The 1914 420 mm Big Bertha , the 1916 Langer Max , and the seven Paris Guns in 1917 and 1918. In addition, Friedrich Krupp Germaniawerft built German warships and submarines in Kiel. During the war, Krupp also modified the design of an existing Langer Max gun, which they built in Koekelare . The gun called Batterie Pommern was the largest gun in the world in 1917 and was able to shoot shells of ±750 kg from Koekelare to Dunkirk . Before World War I Krupp had
9774-510: The 20th century the company was headed by Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1870–1950), who assumed the surname of Krupp when he married the Krupp heiress, Bertha Krupp . After Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, the Krupp works became the center for German rearmament. In 1943, by a special order from Hitler, the company reverted to a sole-proprietorship, with Gustav and Bertha's eldest son Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1907–67) as proprietor. After Germany's defeat, Gustav
9955-441: The 315 ft (96 m) length of the ship, and was submerged below the waterline at full load. The real protection of the class came from the armored deck 4 in (102 mm) thick, and the arrangement of coal bunkers to prevent flooding. These ships were also the last armored cruisers to be designed with sails. However, on trials it became clear that the masts and sails did more harm than good; they were removed and replaced by
10136-673: The Allies' battlecruisers, especially the Imperial Japanese Navy and the Royal Australian Navy —in fact he described the latter's flagship, the battlecruiser HMAS Australia , as being superior to his entire force by itself. At the Falklands, he had already deduced the battle was lost when he missed the chance to attack the British battlecruisers in port. During the Battle of Dogger Bank , Blücher
10317-498: The British Cressy class. Yakumo followed the basic pattern for these cruisers—on a 9,646 long tons (9,801 t) displacement, she carried four 7.99-inch (203 mm) and twelve 6-inch (150 mm) guns, was protected by a 3.5–6.7-inch (89–170 mm) main belt, 2.4-inch (61 mm) armored deck and 5.9-inch (150 mm) turret armor and steamed at 20.5 knots (23.6 mph; 38.0 km/h). They were considered
10498-684: The British Navy as a convoy escort in the Indian Ocean after the fall of Greece, while a number of Japanese armored cruisers were still active as minelayers or training vessels. The Imperial Japanese Navy armored cruisers Asama , Izumo , Tokiwa , Iwate , Yakumo , Azuma , & Kasuga were used as training, support, and anti-aircraft ships during the war near the Japanese home islands. Most were sunk by Allied bombings in Japanese harbors. The Regia Marina 's San Giorgio
10679-461: The French reverted to the construction of protected cruisers. The British Royal Navy was equivocal about which protection scheme to use until 1887. The large Imperieuse class , begun in 1881 and finished in 1886, were built as armored cruisers but were often referred to as protected cruisers. While they carried an armored belt some 10 in thick, the belt only covered 140 ft (43 m) of
10860-403: The German armored cruisers were fatally crippled before they had a chance to close the range and use their superior secondary armament. This victory seemed to validate Lord "Jacky" Fisher's justification in building battlecruisers—to track down and destroy armored cruisers with vessels possessing superior speed and firepower. The German force commander Admiral Maximilian von Spee had been wary of
11041-475: The German boy of the future must be slim and slender, as fast as a greyhound, tough as leather and hard as Krupp steel" ( "... der deutsche Junge der Zukunft muß schlank und rank sein, flink wie Windhunde, zäh wie Leder und hart wie Kruppstahl." ) During the war Germany's industry was heavily bombed. The Germans built large-scale night-time decoys like the Krupp decoy site (German: Kruppsche Nachtscheinanlage) which
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#173278363684011222-575: The German military. Friedrich Krupp Germaniawerft shipyard launched the cruiser Prinz Eugen , as well as many of Germany's U-boats (130 between 1934 and 1945) using preassembled parts supplied by other Krupp factories in a process similar to the construction of the US liberty ships . In the 1930s, Krupp developed two 800 mm railway guns , the Schwerer Gustav and the Dora . These guns were
11403-607: The Great", invested heavily in new technology to become a significant manufacturer of steel rollers (used to make eating utensils) and railway tyres. He also invested in fluidized hotbed technologies (notably the Bessemer process ) and acquired many mines in Germany and France . Initially, Krupp failed to gain profit from the Bessemer process due to the high phosphorus content of German iron ores. His chemists, however, later learned of
11584-628: The Mustang name. Krupp Steel Works of Essen, Germany, manufactured the spherical pressure chamber of the dive vessel Trieste , the first vessel to take humans to the deepest known point in the oceans, accomplished in 1960. This was a heavy duty replacement for the original pressure sphere (made in Italy by Acciaierie Terni) and was manufactured in three finely machined sections: an equatorial ring and two hemispherical caps. The sphere weighed 13 tonnes in air (eight tonnes in water) with walls that were 12.7 centimetres (5.0 in) thick. Krupp Steel Works
11765-508: The Navy blueprint by rearranging her boilers during construction; this allowed the installation of additional transverse and longitudinal bulkheads, which increased her underwater protection. Brooklyn was an improved version of the New York and Olympia designs, more heavily armed (with eight 8-inch (203 mm) and 12 5-inch (127 mm) guns) and with better sea-keeping abilities through
11946-517: The North Sea against the powerful British Royal Navy , she was transferred to the Baltic Sea in early 1915. She supported offensive minelaying operations and patrolled the central Baltic for Russian forces, but never encountered hostile forces. She provided gunfire support during the attack on Libau in May 1915 and shelled Russian positions during the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in August. In
12127-504: The Russian squadron briefly engaged Roon before both sides broke contact. Upon being informed of the situation, Hopman sortied with Prinz Heinrich and Prinz Adalbert to support Karpf. While en route, the cruisers encountered the British submarine E9 , which scored a hit on Prinz Adalbert . Hopman broke off the operation and returned to port with the damaged cruiser. From 11 to 12 July, Prinz Heinrich participated in
12308-485: The Russians in the Gulf of Riga and to lay defensive minefields that would prevent a Russian counterattack. The battleships of the I Battle Squadron were the primary force, though Prinz Heinrich and the rest of the older vessels assigned to the Baltic fleet participated. On 10 August, Prinz Heinrich and Roon bombarded Russian defenses at Zerel , on the southernmost tip of the Sworbe Peninsula on
12489-605: The U.S. Navy in hearings before the House of Representatives gave testimony to the effect that no armored cruisers were further planned nor to it knowledge were armored cruisers being built by any major naval power worldwide. Armored cruisers were used with success in the line of battle by the Japanese at the Battle of Tsushima in 1905. Of the battle damage received by the Japanese, the armored cruiser Nisshin received eight hits, which destroyed three of her 8-inch (203 mm) guns, killed five crew members and injured 90 more (one of
12670-474: The addition of a forecastle . After these two ships, the Navy concentrated on battleship construction until the Spanish–American War showed how cruisers could be "useful," in the words of General J. B. Crabtree, "and [showed] how desirable others would be." Shortly after the war ended, the Navy laid down six Pennsylvania -class armored cruisers to take advantage of lessons learned and better control
12851-561: The additional weight of armor, these ships could reach speeds of up to 16 or 17 knots. The most powerful among them were the British Inconstant , the U.S. Navy's Wampanoag and the French Duquesne . The British especially had hoped to rely on these vessels to serve the more distant reaches of its empire. In the aftermath of the Battle of Hampton Roads in 1862, where United States wooden warships were defeated by
13032-792: The advantage in weight these much lighter armors offered. She was redesignated a "second-class battleship" in 1894, an awkward compromise reflecting that, at 16.45 knots, she was considerably slower than other cruisers and weaker than first-line battleships. Her destruction in Havana harbor in 1898 was a catalyst in starting the Spanish–American War . Maine ' s immediate successors, New York and Brooklyn , launched in 1895 and 1896 respectively, carried thinner but newer armor than Maine , with 3 inches (76 mm) on her belt and 3 to 6 inches (76 to 152 mm) on her deck but better protected overall against rapid-fire weaponry. Their armor
13213-514: The armor layout pioneered in Prinz Heinrich provided the basis of all German capital ships designed over the next forty years, including the final battleships of the Bismarck and H-classes . Nevertheless, she was not without critics; Vizeadmiral ( VAdm —Vice Admiral) Albert Hopman referred to the ship as "cheap, but bad" in his memoirs Logbuch eines Seeoffiziers (Log of
13394-568: The armored cruiser was mixed. The 1904 edition of the Encyclopedia Americana quotes an otherwise unidentified Captain Walker, USN, in describing the role of the armored cruiser as "that of a vessel possessing in a high degree offensive and defensive qualities, with the capacity of delivering her attack at points far distant from her base in the least space of time." The same source defines an armored cruiser as "a battleship in which
13575-501: The belt covered the guns and heavier protection surrounded the conning tower. With these improvements, the ships became more fully protected than was possible previously. They were also expensive to maintain at fighting strength as they required a greater number of stokers to feed the boilers than a battleship when steaming at flank speed . The ideas presented by Mahan prompted French Admiral Ernest François Fournier to write his book La flotte necessaire in 1896. Fournier argued that
13756-407: The bid was abandoned after resistance from Thyssen management and protests by its workers. Nevertheless, Thyssen agreed to merge the two firms' flat steel operations, and Thyssen Krupp Stahl AG was created in 1997 as a jointly owned subsidiary (60% by Thyssen and 40% by Krupp). About 6,300 workers were laid off. Later that year, Krupp and Thyssen announced a full merger, which was completed in 1999 with
13937-476: The biggest artillery pieces ever fielded by an army during wartime, and weighed almost 1,344 tons. They could fire a 7-ton shell over a distance of 37 kilometers. More crucial to the operations of the German military was Krupp's development of the famed 88 mm anti-aircraft cannon which found use as a notoriously effective anti-tank gun. In an address to the Hitler Youth , Adolf Hitler stated "In our eyes,
14118-427: The center shaft drove a four-bladed screw 4.28 m (14 ft) in diameter while the two outer shafts drove 4.65-meter (15.3 ft) wide four-bladed screws. Fourteen Dürr water-tube boilers , produced by Düsseldorf-Ratinger Röhrenkesselfabrik , supplied steam to the engines at pressures up to 15 standard atmospheres (1,500 kPa ). The boilers were ducted into two funnels amidships. The propulsion system
14299-586: The chief adversaries; all subsequent engagements were dominated by battlecruisers and dreadnought battleships. Moreover, the timing could not have been worse for British morale. Six weeks earlier, the armored cruisers HMS Cressy , HMS Hogue and HMS Aboukir had all been sunk on the same day by the German submarine U-9. Five weeks later, the Battle of the Falkland Islands showed graphically how much technology and tactics had changed. SMS Scharnhorst and SMS Gneisenau were sunk by
14480-405: The city. The attack took place on 7 May, and consisted of Prinz Heinrich , Roon , and Prinz Adalbert , the elderly coast defense ship Beowulf , and the light cruisers Augsburg , Thetis , and Lübeck . They were escorted by a number of destroyers, torpedo boats, and minesweepers. The IV Scouting Group of the High Seas Fleet was detached from the North Sea to provide cover for
14661-593: The commander in chief of naval forces in the Baltic. She was also used as a barracks ship and a tender . Beginning in 1918, she was also used to support the U-Kreuzer Flotilla . She was stricken from the naval register on 25 January 1920 and sold later that year. The ship was ultimately broken up for scrap at Audorf-Rendsburg. See also : List of ships of the Imperial German Navy Armored cruiser The armored cruiser
14842-419: The company had a steelmaking capacity of around eight million metric tons and sales of about 28 billion DM (US$ 18.9 billion). The new Krupp had six divisions: steel, engineering, plant construction, automotive supplies, trade, and services. After two years of heavy losses, a modest net profit of 40 million DM (US$ 29.2 million) followed in 1994. In 1997 Krupp attempted a hostile takeover of the larger Thyssen, but
15023-448: The concept of the armored cruiser was not embraced wholeheartedly in naval circles. Second, several navies were caught in a race between armor thickness and the size of main guns and did not have the money to spend on battleships and armored cruisers. The use of smaller, cheaper cruisers was a better alternative. The French navy adopted the protected cruiser wholeheartedly in the 1880s. The Jeune Ecole school of thought, which proposed
15204-405: The conversion. The arrangement of the searchlights was modified, the superstructure deck bulwark was removed, and the masts were modernized. Conversion work was completed just before the outbreak of World War I in July 1914. Following the wave of declarations of war between the major European powers at the end of July and early August, Britain declared war on Germany on 5 August. Prinz Heinrich
15385-445: The cruiser. The belt was reduced to 80 mm (3.1 in) on either end of the main belt, and the bow and stern were unarmored. The entire length of the belt was backed by equal thicknesses of teak planks. The armored deck was 35 to 40 mm (1.4 to 1.6 in) thick and was connected to the belt by 50 mm (2 in) thick sloped armor on the broadside . The forward conning tower had 150 mm (5.9 in) thick sides and
15566-729: The culmination of its armored cruiser building program. They displaced 14,600 tons, were capable of 23 knots and were armed with four 9.2-inch (234 mm) and 10 7.5-inch (191 mm) guns. By the time these ships were commissioned, Britain possessed the largest armored cruiser force in the world. Undaunted and fully engaged in a naval arms race with the British, the Germans also continued to build armored cruisers, partly from their faith in them as fighting units and commerce raiders, partly from Japan's success. Between 1897 and 1906 they laid down eight of them for use on overseas stations. The initial two, SMS Fürst Bismarck and SMS Prinz Heinrich , were armed with 9.44-inch (240 mm) guns;
15747-446: The darkness convinced Ingenohl that he was faced with the entire Grand Fleet . Under orders from Kaiser Wilhelm II to avoid risking the fleet unnecessarily, Ingenohl broke off the engagement and turned the battle fleet back toward Germany. After the operation, it was determined that the twelve-year-old Prinz Heinrich had no place in operations against the powerful British Grand Fleet. Accordingly, on 12 April 1915, III Scouting Group
15928-516: The dearth of overseas refueling stations made a full sailing rig a necessity. As sailing ships required a high freeboard and a large degree of stability , the use of armored turrets as used on monitors and some battleships was ruled out, because a turret was a very heavy weight high in the ship and its placement necessitated a lower freeboard than was warranted for an oceangoing vessel. (The loss of HMS Captain in 1870 with nearly all of her 500-man crew illustrated graphically what could happen in
16109-434: The designers placed a 3-inch (76 mm) armored deck, situated deepest in the ships, to guard magazines and machinery against plunging fire. Above this deck, space was allocated for coal bunkers and storerooms. These areas served a two-fold purpose. The bunkers served as added protection, since two feet of coal was considered the equivalent of one foot of steel. Also, if either of the ships became flooded from battle damage, it
16290-526: The direction of Alfred von Tirpitz , the State Secretary of the Reichsmarineamt (Imperial Naval Office). The design for Prinz Heinrich was prepared in the late 1890s while construction of the first vessel, Fürst Bismarck , was still underway. Some older naval historians, including Hugh Lyon and John Taylor, writing in 1979 and 1969, respectively, have stated that Prinz Heinrich
16471-615: The end of the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895 and the return under pressure from Russia (in what became known as the " Triple Intervention ") of the Liaotung peninsula to China , Japan began a 10-year naval build-up program, under the slogan "Perseverance and determination" ( 臥薪嘗胆 , Gashinshōtan) in preparation for further confrontations. The core of this 109-ship build-up was the "Six-Six Program" of six battleships and six (eventually eight) armored cruisers comparable to
16652-416: The entire floors of these lavatories. The Tatars and Kirghiz suffered most; they collapsed like flies [from] bad housing, the poor quality and insufficient quantity of food, overwork and insufficient rest...Countless fleas, bugs and other vermin tortured the inhabitants of these camps..." The survivors finally returned home in the summer of 1945 after their liberation by the allied armies. Krupp industries
16833-425: The face of severe crew shortages in late 1915, Prinz Heinrich had her crew reduced and was ultimately decommissioned and disarmed in March 1916. She thereafter served in a variety of secondary roles for the rest of the war, before being broken up in 1920. Prinz Heinrich , the second armored cruiser built in Germany, was authorized under the 1898 Naval Law , the first naval construction program begun under
17014-552: The firm. In 1968, the company became an Aktiengesellschaft and ownership was transferred to the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Foundation . In 1999, the Krupp Group merged with its largest competitor, Thyssen AG ; the combined company— ThyssenKrupp , became Germany's fifth-largest firm and one of the largest steel producers in the world. In the early 1980s, the company spun off all its operating activities and
17195-434: The first armored cruiser. Armed with six 8-inch (203 mm) and two 6-inch (152 mm) guns, she and her sister Gerzog Edinburgski were not fully armored but protected only by a narrow belt along the waterline. This belt, moreover, was so heavy that it sat below the ships' waterlines, which limited its benefit still further. Since they were iron-hulled, however, they were more durable than their wooden counterparts. With
17376-441: The first time upon merging with Hoesch AG . In 1999, it merged with Thyssen AG to form the industrial conglomerate ThyssenKrupp AG . Controversy has not eluded the Krupp company. Being a major weapons supplier to multiple sides throughout various conflicts, it was sometimes blamed for the wars themselves or the degree of carnage that ensued. Friedrich Krupp (1787–1826) launched the family's metal-based activities, building
17557-549: The fleet training activities of 1903, which included a visit to Spain from 7 May to 10 August. During the cruise, she stayed in Vigo , Spain from 20 to 30 May. After returning to Germany, the fleet then conducted its annual training exercises, which concluded on 22 September. On 25 January 1904, Prinz Heinrich went to help the Norwegian town of Ålesund in the aftermath of a fire that had caused extensive destruction. In mid-1904,
17738-590: The fleet. Prinz Heinrich spent two years in reserve when she was reactivated on 15 May 1908 to replace the old gunnery training ship Mars . She went to Sonderburg on 22 June, where the Naval Artillery Inspectorate was located. Over the next four years, Prinz Heinrich largely remained in port where she trained gunners for the fleet until she was replaced by the armored cruiser Prinz Adalbert in October 1912. Prinz Heinrich
17919-414: The force of the impact from oncoming shells; 2.5 inches (64 mm) of teak to give a fair surface upon which to attach them was all that was needed. Moreover, this belt could also be much wider than previously, covering the center of the hull, where the ammunition and engines were located, from the main deck to five feet below the waterline. Steel bulkheads added strength to the hull, while armor as thick as
18100-399: The fore turret sponsoned to starboard and the aft turret to port) to allow end-on fire for both turrets, and six 6-inch (152 mm) guns on broadside, she carried between 7 and 12 inches (178 to 305 mm) of belt armor and between 1 and 4 inches (25 to 102 mm) on her decks. However, Maine was laid down before Harvey or Krupp armor was available and could not benefit from
18281-439: The formation of ThyssenKrupp AG. Cromme and Ekkehard Schulz were named co-chief executives of the new company, operating worldwide in three main business areas: steel, capital goods (elevators and industrial equipment), and services (specialty materials, environmental services, mechanical engineering, and scaffolding services). The unexpected victory of Prussia over France (19 July 1870 – 10 May 1871) demonstrated
18462-648: The giant Krupp steel works in Essen . Low pay, long hours, frequent bombings, and crowded air raid shelters added to the unpleasantness of poor housing, inadequate heating, limited food, and poor medical care, all compounded by harsh Nazi discipline. In an affidavit provided at the Nuremberg Trials following the war, Dr. Wilhelm Jaeger, the senior doctor for the Krupp slaves, wrote: Sanitary conditions were atrocious. At Kramerplatz only ten children's toilets were available for 1200 inhabitants...Excretion contaminated
18643-434: The heavy guns normally ascribed to battleships, they could also theoretically hold their place in a battle line more readily than armored cruisers and serve as the "battleship-cruiser" for which Hovgaard had argued after Tsushima. All these factors made battlecruisers attractive fighting units, although Britain, Germany and Japan would be the only powers to build them. They also meant that the armored cruiser as it had been known
18824-414: The high seas. Some German and Royal Navy vessels, like HMS Good Hope , were allocated to remote naval squadrons. Many other vessels however, were formed into independent squadrons for patrolling European waters and accompanied capital ships every time the latter made forays out of port. At the Battle of Coronel , the German armored cruisers SMS Scharnhorst and SMS Gneisenau scored
19005-540: The hull that needed to be protected with armor, further saving weight and allowing thicker armor to be concentrated in the battery. Further weight savings were achieved by adopting a smaller superstructure and discarding heavy military masts in favor of lighter pole masts. Her engines, however, were some 2,000 metric horsepower (2,000 ihp) more powerful, which produced a faster vessel. The ship proved to be an influential design, and all subsequent German armored cruisers were developments of Prinz Heinrich . In fact,
19186-562: The importance of battleships above all other types of warships in obtaining command of the sea, armored cruisers and large protected cruisers could still be used as second-class battleships to maintain control of the sea lanes and potentially as fighting units of a battle fleet. The armored cruisers built in the mid– to late–1890s were often as large and expensive as pre-dreadnought battleships . They combined long range, high speed and an armament approaching that of battleship with enough armor to protect them against quick-firing guns , considered
19367-405: The island of Ösel . Several Russian destroyers were anchored off Zerel, and were caught unawares by the German bombardment. Prinz Heinrich and Roon damaged one of the destroyers during their attack. A combination of tenacious Russian defense and reports of British submarines in the area—proved by the torpedoing of the battlecruiser Moltke on 19 August—caused the German navy to break off
19548-544: The key factor in a cruiser's ability to perform its duties satisfactorily. While the first ocean-going ironclads had been launched around 1860, the "station ironclads" built for long-range colonial service such as the British Audacious class and French Belliqueuse were too slow, at 13 and 11 knots respectively, to raid enemy commerce or hunt down enemy commerce raiders , tasks usually assigned to frigates or corvettes. Powered by both sail and steam but without
19729-498: The large sea areas the nation had just gained. Much larger than their predecessors (displacing 14,500 tons as compared to 8150 for New York ), the Pennsylvania s "were closer to light battleships than to cruisers," according to naval historian William Friedman . They carried four 8-inch (203 mm) and 14 6-inch (152 mm) guns, 6 inches (152 mm) of armor on their belts, 6.5 inches (165 mm) on their turrets and 9 inches (229 mm) on their conning towers. Their deck armor
19910-495: The late 1880s the manufacture of armaments represented around 50% of Krupp's total output. When Alfred Krupp started with the firm, it had five employees. At his death twenty thousand people worked for Krupp—making it the world's largest industrial company and the largest private company in the German empire . Krupp's had a Great Krupp Building with an exhibition of guns at the Columbian Exposition in 1893. In
20091-406: The long-range and high speed required to fulfill its mission. For this reason, beginning in the 1880s and 1890s, many navies preferred to build protected cruisers , which only relied on a lightly armored deck to protect the vital parts of the ship. However, by the late 1880s, the development of modern rapid-fire breech-loading cannons and high-explosive shells made the reintroduction of side armor
20272-516: The magazines. Intended as the first of a three-ship class, Rurik ' s sisters were cancelled with the advent of the battlecruiser HMS Invincible . "The supreme embodiment of the armored cruiser," in historian Robert K. Massie 's words, was the German ship SMS Blücher . An enlarged version of the Scharnhorst class with a speed of 24.25 knots, armed with 12 8.2-inch (208 mm) and eight 5.9-inch (150 mm) guns, Blücher
20453-462: The major naval powers, according to naval historian Eric Osborne, "as they showcased the abilities of the modern ships in warfare." The only time cruisers were seen in any of their traditional role, he continues, was as blockade ships during the Spanish–American War. More often, they were seen fighting in a battle line. They would not been seen in their designed role until World War I. Even with all their improvements and apparent performance, opinion on
20634-483: The majority of rail to the new continental railway system. "Nearly all railroads were using Krupp rails, the New York Central , Illinois Central , Delaware and Hudson , Maine Central , Lake Shore and Michigan Southern , Bangor and Aroostook , Great Northern , Boston and Albany , Florida and East Coast , Texas and Pacific , Southern Pacific , and Mexican National ." In 1893, a mechanical engineer by
20815-426: The matter worse. After the end of World War I, many of the surviving armored cruisers were sold for scrap. The Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 placed strict limits on the numbers of "capital ships" possessed by the navies of the great powers. A "capital ship" was defined as any vessel of over 10,000 tons displacement or with guns over 8-in caliber, and several more armored cruisers were decommissioned to comply with
20996-466: The most important weapons afloat at the time. Their speed was made possible due to another development, case-hardened steel armor—first Harvey armor and then crucially Krupp armor . The higher tensile strength of these armors compared to nickel steel and mild steel made it feasible to put a light yet useful armor belt on a large cruiser. They saved further weight by not requiring a heavy timber backing, as previous armor plating had, to soften and spread
21177-456: The name of Rudolf Diesel approached Gustav with a patent for a "new kind of internal combustion engine employing autoignition of the fuel". He also included his text " Theorie und Konstruktion eines rationellen Wärmemotors ". Four years later, the first 3- horsepower diesel engine was produced. The common English pronunciations are / k r ʊ p / or / k r ʌ p / . The common German pronunciations are [kʁʊp] or [kɾʊp] . Thus
21358-651: The new armored cruiser Friedrich Carl joined the Reconnaissance Force. The typical autumn maneuvers took place in August and September, during which Prinz Heinrich won the Kaiser's Schiesspreis (Shooting Prize) for excellent accuracy for large cruisers. On 3 December, Schmidt transferred his flag to Friedrich Carl . The year 1905 passed without incident, following the same routine as previous years. From 11 March to 20 June, Prinz Heinrich again served as Schmidt's flagship, as Friedrich Carl
21539-480: The new ship's size was reduced by about 1,500 metric tons (1,500 long tons). Weight reduction was achieved in part by thinning the ship's armor layout, though advances in steel technology meant this was not actually a compromise and her armor layout was in fact significantly more effective than Fürst Bismarck ' s. Krupp had recently developed cemented armor plate , which was considerably stronger than earlier Harvey armor , so less of it could be used to achieve
21720-510: The operation. In the meantime, Prinz Heinrich ' s boiler tubes were in need of replacement, so she was detached for repairs at Kiel, where she arrived on 11 August. Repairs were completed the following month, and she arrived back in Libau on 22 September. She took part in another minelaying sortie into the Baltic in the direction of Östergarn on 5–6 October. By this time, the German navy had begun to experience severe crew shortages, and so
21901-403: The operation. The bombardment went as planned, though the destroyer V107 struck a mine in Libau's harbor, which blew off her bow and destroyed the ship. German ground forces were successful in their assault however, and took the city. Prinz Heinrich supported a minelaying operation off the coast of Finland over the course of 23–26 May. From 3 to 5 June, Prinz Heinrich participated in
22082-574: The outbreak of war, the ship was reactivated for active service, initially with III Scouting Group with the High Seas Fleet . Prinz Heinrich was used for coastal defense in the North Sea and she participated in the fleet sortie that supported the Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby in December 1914. After the naval command determined that Prinz Heinrich was too old to serve in
22263-644: The perceived threat from France, Russia and, increasingly, Germany with a resumption of armored cruiser construction in 1898 with the Cressy class . At 21 knots, the Cressy s were slower than the newer French cruisers. However, their 6-inch (152 mm) belt of Krupp steel was expected to keep out armor-piercing shells from a 6-inch (152 mm) quick-firing gun at likely battle ranges, while their two 9.2-inch (233.7 mm) and 12 6-inch (152 mm) guns offered comparable firepower. The 2,500-ton weight of their belt armor
22444-409: The place of aging battleships and thus showed Japan's intention of continuing to use armored cruisers in fleet engagements. The U.S. Navy raised the main gun caliber of its cruisers with its Tennessee class , laid down between 1902 and 1904. These mounted four 10-inch (254 mm) and 16 6-inch (152 mm) guns, the former a size previously allocated to battleships. While they had thinner armor than
22625-424: The problem and constructed a Bessemer plant called C&T Steel. Unusual for the era, he provided social services for his workers, including subsidized housing and health and retirement benefits. The company began to make steel cannons in the 1840s—especially for the Russian, Turkish, and Prussian armies. Low non-military demand and government subsidies meant that the company specialized more and more in weapons: by
22806-453: The qualities of offense and defense have been much reduced to gain high speed and great coal capacity" and adds, "... there are many who hold that the armored cruiser is an anomaly, something less than a battleship and more than a protected cruiser, performing satisfactorily the duties of neither, with no special function of her own and lacking the great desideratum in warships, ability to fight in proportion to her great size and cost." By 1914
22987-485: The regime and was one of many German businesses that profited from slave labor during World War II . Upon the war's end, the head of the company, Alfried Krupp , was tried and convicted as a war criminal for employing prisoners of war, foreign civilians and concentration camp inmates under inhumane conditions in support of the Nazi war effort . Despite being sentenced to imprisonment for twelve years, he served just three and
23168-450: The remainder of the unit went to Libau. Augsburg and Albatross were intercepted by a powerful Russian squadron commanded by Rear Admiral Bakhirev , consisting of three armored and two light cruisers. Commodore Johannes von Karpf , the flotilla commander, ordered the slower Albatross to steam for neutral Swedish waters and recalled Roon and Lübeck . Albatross was grounded off Gotland and Augsburg escaped, and
23349-438: The same level of protection. In addition, the belt could be made taller, extending up to the main deck level, which protected more of the ship's interior. The ship's deck armor sloped down on the sides, where it was connected to the lower edge of the belt, which considerably strengthened the protection system by providing another layer of armor that would need to be penetrated before the ship's vitals could be damaged. The armament
23530-414: The ship had been serving as the flagship of Konteradmiral ( KAdm —Rear Admiral) Curt von Prittwitz und Gaffron , the deputy commander of the squadron. While the ship was out of service, Prittwitz und Gaffron transferred to Prinz Heinrich , though he remained there only briefly before he was replaced by KAdm Ludwig Borckenhagen on 1 October. Prinz Heinrich and the rest of the squadron ended
23711-452: The ship stable in the event of damage—could be positioned underneath an armored deck just below the waterline. This deck, which would only be struck very obliquely by shells, could be thinner and lighter than belt armor. The sides of the ship would be entirely unarmored but would be as effective as an armored belt which would not stop shellfire. Cruisers designed along these guidelines, known as protected cruisers , superseded armored cruisers in
23892-495: The ship's sides, she displaced 15,190 tons and carried a 6-inch (152 mm) belt, two armored decks and 8-inch (203 mm) armor on her turrets and conning tower. Her top speed was 21 knots. Rurik was unusual in that she was Russian designed but British built; the Russian Navy was not usually a customer of British shipyards. She was reportedly one of the best armored cruisers built, with an advanced sprinkler protection for
24073-573: The six that followed had 8.2-inch (208 mm) guns of a more modern design. The final pair, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau , displaced 12,781 tons, steamed at 23.5 knots, carried 6 inches (152 mm) of belt and 2 inches (51 mm) of deck armor and were armed with eight 8.2-inch (208 mm) guns. Another powerful armored cruiser was the Russian Rurik , completed in 1908. Armed with four 10-inch (254 mm) in two twin turrets fore and aft and eight 8-inch (203 mm) in turrets along
24254-469: The superiority of breech-loaded steel cannon over muzzle-loaded brass. Krupp artillery was a significant factor at the battles of Wissembourg and Gravelotte , and was used during the siege of Paris. Krupp's anti-balloon guns were the first anti-aircraft guns. Prussia fortified the major North German ports with batteries that could hit French ships from a distance of 4,000 yd (3.7 km; 2.3 mi), inhibiting invasion. Krupp's construction of
24435-483: The superstructure. These guns were supplied with 75 rounds each; they could depress to −4° and elevate to 30°, which enabled a maximum range of 16,900 m (18,500 yd). The guns fired a 140 kg (310 lb) round at a muzzle velocity of 835 m (2,740 ft) per second. A secondary battery of ten 15 cm (5.9 in) SK L/40 quick-firing guns rounded out her offensive armament. Six of these guns were mounted in amidships casemates on either side of
24616-557: The terms of the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922, which imposed limits on warships and defined a cruiser as a ship of 10,000 tons or less carrying guns of 8-inch caliber or less—rather smaller than many of the large armored cruisers. A handful survived in one form or another until World War II . Only one, the Greek Navy 's Georgios Averof , has survived to the modern day as a museum ship . The armored cruiser
24797-541: The terms of the treaty. The London Naval Treaty of 1930 introduced further limits on cruiser tonnage, and the former role of the armored cruiser was occupied by more modern light cruisers and heavy cruisers (and, in the case of the German navy, panzerschiffe ). Only a small number of armored cruisers survived these limitations, though a handful saw action in World War II in marginal roles; The Hellenic Navy 's Georgios Averof , constructed in 1909, served with
24978-494: The thousands, as detailed in the book The Arms of Krupp . Nazi Germany kept two million French POWs captured in 1940 as forced laborers throughout the war. They added compulsory (and volunteer) workers from occupied nations, especially in metal factories. The shortage of volunteers led the Vichy government of France to deport workers to Germany, where they constituted 15% of the labor force by August 1944. The largest number worked in
25159-514: The value of cruisers with armor protection. During the 1870s, the rapid increase in the size and power of armor-piercing guns caused problems for the designers of battleships and cruisers alike. Even a ship designed with adequate armor protection from the current generation of guns might be vulnerable to new guns powerful enough to penetrate its armor. Consequently, naval designers tried a novel method of armoring their ships. The vital parts—engines, boilers, magazines and enough hull structure to keep
25340-492: The vessel, and the remaining four were mounted in turrets in the ship's hull above the casemates. These guns were supplied with 120 rounds each. The shells weighed 40 kg (88 lb) and were fired at a muzzle velocity of 800 m (2,600 ft) per second. The guns could elevate to 25° for a maximum range of 13,700 m (15,000 yd). The cruiser carried ten 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/30 quick-firing guns for defense against torpedo boats . Each of these guns
25521-435: The wounded being Isoroku Yamamoto , who would later plan the attack on Pearl Harbor ). None of the other Japanese armored cruisers suffered serious damage or large loss of life. Iwate was hit 16 times but no one onboard was killed and only 15 were wounded. Except for Kasagi , all the cruisers present at Tsushima that morning were still battle-ready in the evening. The performance of the Japanese armored cruisers led to
25702-502: The year with a winter training cruise, during which she tried to pull the new battleship Wittelsbach free on 17 December after she ran aground in the Great Belt . The 1900 Naval Law created the position of Commander of Scouting Forces, and Borckenhagen became the first person to fill the role. He therefore remained aboard Prinz Heinrich , which became the flagship of the Reconnaissance Force on 1 March 1903. Prinz Heinrich ,
25883-529: Was laid down on 1 December 1898 at the Kaiserliche Werft (Imperial Shipyard) in Kiel . She was launched on 22 March 1900, when she was christened by Princess Heinrich of Prussia ; the ship's namesake, her husband Prince Heinrich of Prussia , was present at the ceremony, and the Generalinspekteur der Marine (General Inspector of the Navy), Admiral Hans von Koester , gave a speech. The ship
26064-464: Was prosecuted after the end of war for its support to the Nazi regime and use of forced labour. Krupp's trucks were once again produced after the war, but so as to minimize the negative wartime connotations of the Krupp name they were sold as " Südwerke " trucks from 1946 until 1954, when the Krupp name was considered rehabilitated. Krupp also used the name "Mustang" for some of their products, causing
26245-399: Was 124.9 meters (410 ft) long at the waterline and 126.5 m (415 ft) overall . She had a beam of 19.6 m (64 ft) and a draft of 7.65 m (25.1 ft) forward and 8.07 m (26.5 ft) aft. The ship displaced 8,887 metric tons (8,747 long tons ; 9,796 short tons ) as built, and 9,806 t (9,651 long tons; 10,809 short tons) at full load . The hull
26426-526: Was Turkey, which purchased 3,943 Krupp guns of various types between 1854 and 1912. The second-largest customer in the Balkans was Romania, which purchased 1,450 guns in the same period, while Bulgaria purchased 517 pieces, Greece 356, Austria-Hungary 298, Montenegro 25, and Serbia just 6 guns. Krupp produced most of the artillery of the Imperial German Army, including its heavy siege guns:
26607-410: Was a German decoy-site of the Krupp steel works in Essen . During World War II, it was designed to divert Allied airstrikes from the actual production site of the arms factory. Krupp Industries employed workers conscripted by the Nazi regime from across Europe. These workers were initially paid, but as Nazi fortunes declined they were kept as slave workers . They were abused, beaten, and starved by
26788-422: Was a modification of the previous armored cruiser, Fürst Bismarck , and traded a smaller main battery and thinner armor for higher speed. All subsequent German armored cruisers were incremental developments of Prinz Heinrich . Prinz Heinrich served with the German fleet in home waters for just four years, from 1902 to 1906, when she was withdrawn from front-line service. During this period, she served as
26969-410: Was a type of warship of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was designed like other types of cruisers to operate as a long-range, independent warship, capable of defeating any ship apart from a battleship and fast enough to outrun any battleship it encountered. For many decades, naval technology had not advanced far enough for designers to produce a cruiser that combined an armored belt with
27150-476: Was also contracted in the mid-1960s to construct the Effelsberg 100-m Radio Telescope , which, from 1972 to 2000 was the largest fully steerable radio telescope in the world. Krupp was the first company to patent a seamless, reliable and strong enough railway tyre for rail freight. Krupp received original contracts in the United States and enjoyed a period of technological superiority while also contributing
27331-402: Was also significantly reduced to save weight and cost, from four heavy guns in two twin- gun turrets to two guns, each in single turrets; she also received two fewer secondary guns compared to Fürst Bismarck . But rather than spreading the secondary battery along the length of the hull in casemates and sponsons , they were concentrated in a battery amidships , which reduced the amount of
27512-578: Was an improvement over the 1809 tons of the otherwise similar Diadem class and very similar to that of the Canopus class of battleships. The Cressy s were the beginning of a rapid expansion in British cruiser construction. Between 1899 and 1905, seven classes of armored cruisers were either completed or laid down, a total of 35 ships. Japan, which now received British technical assistance in naval matters and purchased larger vessels from France and Britain, began an armored cruiser program of its own. With
27693-503: Was comparable in thickness to that of Dupuy de Lôme but the French ship's armor covered a much greater area of the hull. The hull protection of both ships was superior to their main rival, the British Blake class , which were the largest cruisers at the time but had no side armor. Armed with six 8-inch (203 mm) guns, New York carried more heavy weapons than the French ship. Moreover, New York ' s builder diverged from
27874-402: Was completed just under two years later, on 11 March 1902. She then began sea trials that lasted until June, at which point she joined the reconnaissance forces attached to I Squadron. She took part in the training activities in the squadron, including a training cruise in Norwegian waters from 8 to 20 July. In August, she escorted Kaiser Wilhelm II aboard his yacht Hohenzollern during
28055-408: Was constructed with transverse and longitudinal steel frames, and incorporated thirteen watertight compartments and a double bottom that extended for 57 percent of the length of the ship. The German navy considered the ship to be a good sea boat with gentle motion, though she suffered from severe roll. Her transverse metacentric height was .731 m (2 ft 4.8 in). Prinz Heinrich
28236-427: Was created, and Prinz Heinrich ' s commander, Kapitän zur See ( KzS —Captain at Sea) Raimund Winkler became the first to fill the role. In March 1906, the ship was removed from the reconnaissance forces, her place having been taken by Friedrich Carl , which had in turn been replaced by the new armored cruiser Yorck . By this time, Prinz Heinrich had spent just four years on active service with
28417-509: Was crewed by 35 officers and 532 enlisted men. For the duration of her career as the second command flagship of the Cruiser Division, the standard crew was augmented by an additional nine officers and 44 enlisted men. She carried a number of smaller vessels, including two picket boats, a launch , a pinnace , two cutters , two yawls , and two dinghies . The ship was propelled by three vertical 4-cylinder triple expansion engines ;
28598-399: Was crippled by a shell from a British battlecruiser, which slowed Blücher to 17 knots and eventually sealed her fate. Admiral Franz von Hipper chose to let Blücher go down so his more valuable battlecruisers could escape. HMS Warrior , HMS Defence and HMS Black Prince were lost at the Battle of Jutland when they inadvertently came into sight and range of
28779-526: Was decommissioned again on 31 October; a year later, in November 1913, the Reichsmarineamt began exploring the possibility of converting the ship into a dedicated training vessel, and the naval command decided that it should still be possible to use the vessel as a warship in the event of an emergency. In early 1914, Prinz Heinrich went into dry dock at the Kaiserliche Werft in Kiel for
28960-557: Was deployed to Spain to protected Italian interests during the Spanish Civil War . During World War II, she was heavily utilized at the Siege of Tobruk . There she provided anti-aircraft cover and naval gunfire support to Italian units. She was heavily damaged by British aircraft and was scuttled to prevent her capture. Her sister ship, San Marco was decommissioned in 1931 and used as a radio controlled target ship. In 1943, she
29141-536: Was detached from the High Seas Fleet and the ships were transferred to the Baltic Sea to operate against the Russian Baltic Fleet . On 15 April, the ships arrived in Kiel, where they came under command of then- KAdm Hopman, the commander of scouting forces in the Baltic. Hopman was then in the process of planning a major attack on Libau in conjunction with an attempt by the German Army to seize
29322-491: Was developed in the 1870s as an attempt to combine the virtues of the armored ironclad warship and the fast and long-ranged, but unarmored, cruisers of the time. Such a ship was desirable to protect overseas trade and, especially for the French and British, to police their vast overseas empires. The concern within higher naval circles was that without ships that could fulfill these requirements and incorporate new technology, their fleet would become obsolete and ineffective should
29503-529: Was hoped the contents of the bunkers and storerooms would aid in their continued buoyancy. Because of this unarmored protection, these ships could be considered the first protected cruisers. However, these ships also shared the liabilities of the Russian ones and because of this, the British Navy was never happy with them. Shannon ' s top speed of 12.25 knots (22.69 km/h) and Nelson ' s of 14 knots (26 km/h) made them too slow to deal with fast cruisers and they were not armored well enough to take on
29684-460: Was intended for overseas service, but Aidan Dodson points out that the ship's hull was not sheathed with wood and copper or zinc layers , which would have been necessary for any ship deployed overseas where shipyard facilities would not be readily available. Dodson also noted that the ship never actually went abroad on an extended deployment. The design staff based the new vessel on the basic design of Fürst Bismarck , but for budgetary reasons
29865-709: Was launched in 1873 and combined sail and steam propulsion. By the 1890s, cruisers had abandoned sail and took on a modern appearance. In 1908, the armored cruiser was supplanted by the battlecruiser , which, with armament equivalent to that of a dreadnought battleship and speed equivalent to that of a cruiser, was faster and more powerful than an armored cruiser. At around the same time, the term " light cruiser " came into use for small cruisers with armored belts. Although they were now considered second-rate ships, armored cruisers were widely used in World War I . Most surviving armored cruisers from this conflict were scrapped under
30046-512: Was light at 1.5 inches (38 mm) for flat surfaces and 3 inches (76 mm) for sloped, a compromise made for faster speed (22 knots, compared with 20 knots for Brooklyn ). Improved ammunition made their main guns as powerful as the 12-inch (305 mm) guns of the battleship Iowa and their use of state instead of city names, usually reserved for capital ships, emphasized their kinship. The Spanish-American and First Sino-Japanese wars proved instrumental in spurring cruiser growth among all
30227-406: Was mounted on the stern in a swivel mount, one was mounted submerged in the bow, and one was placed submerged in the hull on either side abreast of the forward gun turret. Prinz Heinrich was protected by Krupp armor . Her armor belt was 100 millimeters (3.9 in) thick in the central citadel of the ship, which protected the ammunition magazines, machinery spaces, and other vital areas of
30408-463: Was now outmoded and no more were built after 1910. The United States Naval Institute put the matter bluntly in its 1908 written proceedings: It is very doubtful if an armored cruiser of the Colorado class would dare even tackle a monitor, for fear that one of the latter's shot might hit a vital spot, and if it did she would lose her only raison d'etre, for a crippled cruiser would be useless as
30589-503: Was occupied with escorting Hohenzollern on a trip abroad. In early July, Prinz Heinrich experimented with a new coaling apparatus; further tests were made with it in November and February 1906. She visited Uddevalla and Södertälje in Sweden in mid-1905. She had another stint as flagship from 10 to 26 August while Friedrich Carl was in dry dock for maintenance. On 1 October, the position of Deputy Commander of Scouting Forces
30770-431: Was ordered to proceed as scheduled. Although much more powerful than a typical armored cruiser, she was significantly weaker than the new British battlecruisers. By the time these ships were entering service, the armored cruiser as it was then known had reached the end of its development. Tactics and technology favored fighting power over long to medium ranges, which demanded an armament of primarily large caliber guns and
30951-539: Was pardoned (but not acquitted) by John J. McCloy . As a result of this pardon, all of Krupp's holdings were restored. In the years following the Third Reich's collapse, Krupp rose once again to become one of the wealthiest companies in Europe. However, this growth did not last indefinitely. In 1967, an economic recession resulted in significant financial losses for the business. In 1992, the company went public for
31132-474: Was planned as an armored cruiser in part because the British had misled the Germans on the Invincible s then being constructed. The Germans expected these new British ships to be armed with six or eight 9.2 in (23 cm) guns. One week after the final decision to construct Blücher , the German naval attache learned they would carry eight 30.5 cm (12.0 in) guns, the same type mounted on battleships. With no funds available to redesign Blücher , work
31313-474: Was primarily occupied with guard duty in the Jade Bay and the river Ems . During this period, she participated in the second major German offensive in the North Sea , the operation to bombard Hartlepool on 15–16 December 1914. Prinz Heinrich , along with Roon and a flotilla of torpedo boats, was assigned to the van of the High Seas Fleet, commanded by Admiral Friedrich von Ingenohl . The main fleet
31494-399: Was providing distant cover to Rear Admiral Franz von Hipper 's battlecruisers , which were conducting the bombardment. During the night of the 15th, the German battle fleet of some twelve dreadnoughts and eight pre-dreadnoughts came to within 10 nmi (19 km; 12 mi) of an isolated squadron of six British battleships. However, skirmishes between the rival destroyer screens in
31675-484: Was rated at 15,000 indicated horsepower (11,000 kW) and gave the ship a top speed of 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph), though on sea trials , Prinz Heinrich ' s engines reached 15,694 ihp (11,703 kW) but a top speed of only 19.9 kn (36.9 km/h; 22.9 mph). She was designed to carry 900 t (890 long tons; 990 short tons) of coal, though additional storage allowed up to 1,590 t (1,560 long tons; 1,750 short tons). This enabled
31856-408: Was reactivated for wartime service the same day, and she then went into the shipyard in Kiel for preparation work. She was then assigned to the defenses of the port in advance of an expected British attack on Kiel on 25–26 September. When that failed to materialize, Prinz Heinrich was assigned to III Scouting Group , part of the High Seas Fleet . From 8 November to 14 April 1915, Prinz Heinrich
32037-449: Was restructured as a holding company. VDM Nickel-Technologie was bought in 1989, for high-performance materials, mechanical engineering and electronics. That year, Gerhard Cromme became chairman and chief executive of Krupp. After its hostile takeover of rival steelmaker Hoesch AG in 1990–1991, the companies were merged in 1992 as "Fried. Krupp AG Hoesch Krupp," under Cromme. After closing one main steel plant and laying off 20,000 employees,
32218-552: Was scuttled to prevent her capture by the Germans. The United States Navy 's USS Rochester , decommissioned since 1933, was moored in Subic Bay and used as a receiving ship and anti-aircraft platform. She was later scuttled to prevent her capture by the Japanese during the Invasion of The Philippines . Krupp Friedrich Krupp AG Hoesch-Krupp (formerly Fried. Krupp AG and Friedrich Krupp GmbH ) trading as Krupp ,
32399-620: Was senile and incapable of standing trial, and the Nuremberg Military Tribunal convicted Alfried as a war criminal in the Krupp Trial for "plunder" and for his company's use of slave labor . It sentenced him to 12 years in prison and ordered him to sell 75% of his holdings. In 1951, as the Cold War developed and no buyer came forward, the U.S. occupation authorities released him, and in 1953 he resumed control of
32580-420: Was supplied with 250 shells. The shells weighed 7 kg (15 lb) and were fired at a muzzle velocity of 670 m (2,200 ft) per second. This enabled a maximum range of 7,300 m (8,000 yd) at an elevation of 20°. The ship's gun armament was rounded out by four autocannons, though these were subsequently removed. The ship was also fitted with four 45 cm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes. One
32761-555: Was the largest company in Europe at the beginning of the 20th century as well as Germany 's premier weapons manufacturer during both world wars . It produced battleships , U-boats , tanks , howitzers , guns , utilities, and hundreds of other commodities. The company also produced steel used to build railroads in the United States and to cap the Chrysler Building . After the Nazis seized power in Germany , Krupp supported
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