SMS Gneisenau (1879)

:"For other ships of this name, see Gneisenau.

The SMS "Gneisenau" was a three-masted, fully-rigged sail ship of the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy). It had an unplated iron hull and a steam engine.

The ship served in the training of officers, for which it undertook numerous voyages abroad. In 1885 in Sydney it succumbed to desertion. On December 16 1900, it sank in a storm after the failure of the machinery near the harbor of Málaga, Spain, after it was grounded to the harbor mole. Forty members of the crew, including the commandant and the first officer, lost their lives.

Its sister ships were the SMS Moltke, SMS Blücher, SMS Stosch and SMS Stein.