SMS Roon

SMS "Roon""SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German.] was the lead ship of her class of armored cruisers of the Imperial German Navy. The ship participated in several actions during the First World War, including the raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby, as well as operations against Russian forces in the Baltic Sea. "Roon" was used as a training and barracks ship in Kiel until the end of the war. The ship was struck from the naval register in 1920 and scrapped thereafter.

"Roon" and her sistership "Yorck" were a further refinement in the series of armored cruisers built by German around the turn of the 20th century. The ships closely resembled the preceding "Prinz Adalbert" class of armored cruisers. The ships mounted the same armament, and were only slightly larger and faster than the previous class.

Design

ize and machinery

SMS "Roon" was convert|418|ft|m|0, 7 inches at the waterline, had a beam on convert|66|ft|m|0, 4 inches, and a draught of 25 and a half feet. She displaced 9,533 tons normally [Seligmann, p. 20] , and 10,104 at full load. [Gardiner, Gray, and Budzbon, p. 142] "Roon" was powered by 3 shaft triple-expansion engines, which produced 19,000 ihp, delivering a top speed of convert|21|knot|km/h|0.

Armor and armament

"Roon" had 6 inches of belt armor, 7 inches on the turret faces, and between 2.5 to 1.5 inches of armor on the decks. She was armed with four convert|8.2|in|mm|0|sing=on guns, in fore and aft twin turrets. Secondary armament included ten convert|5.9|in|mm|0|sing=on guns in single turrets and casemates, fourteen 3.45 inch guns, and four convert|17.7|in|mm|0|sing=on torpedo tubes. This was the exact same armament as on the preceding "Prinz Adalbert" class. [O'Brien p. 18]

ervice history

She was laid down in August 1902 at the Kiel dockyard, and launched in June 1903, during which the inspector general Alfred von Waldersee was made patron of the ship. [Rüger p. 160] The ship was completed in April 1906, at a cost of 15,345,000 Marks. In 1908, "Roon" was serving as the flagship for Rear Admiral Jacobsen, in the Second Group of the Scouting Division of the High Seas Fleet, along with her sistership "Yorck". [ p. 1053] "Roon" was decommissioned in 1911, but recommissioned in 1914, at the outbreak of World War I. At the start of hostilities, "Roon" was serving as the flagship of the III Scouting Group. On 3 November, 1914, she participated in the operation to bombard Yarmouth.

Bombardment of Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby

A month later, on 15–16 December, she participated in the bombardment of Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby. Along with the armored cruiser "Prinz Heinrich", "Roon" was assigned to the van of the High Seas Fleet, which was providing distant cover to Rear Admiral Hipper's battlecruisers while they were conducting the bombardment. [ Scheer, p69] During the operation, "Roon" and her attached destroyers encountered the British screening forces; at 06:16, "Roon" came in contact with HMS "Lynx" and "Unity", but no gunfire was exchanged and the ships turned away. Following reports of British destroyers from "Roon" as well as from SMS "Hamburg", Admiral von Ingenohl ordered the High Seas Fleet to turn to port and head for Germany. At this point, "Roon" and her destroyers became the rearguard for the High Seas Fleet. [Massie, p. 340]

At 06:59, "Roon", by this time joined by the light cruisers "Stuttgart" and "Hamburg", encountered Commander Jones' destroyers. Jones shadowed "Roon" until 07:40, at which point "Stuttgart" and "Hamburg" were detached to sink their pursuers. At 08:02, "Roon" signaled the two light cruisers and ordered them to abandon the pursuit and retreat along with the rest of the High Seas Fleet. [ Massie, p. 340-341] At 07:55, Beatty received word of "Roon"'s location, and in an attempt to intercept the German cruisers, detached "New Zealand" to hunt the German ships down, while his other three battlecruisers followed from a distance. [Massie, p. 342 ] By 09:00, Beatty had become aware that the German battlecruisers were shelling Hartlepool, so he decided to break off the pursuit of "Roon" and turn towards the German battlecruisers. [Massie, p. 343 ]

Operations in the Baltic

After April, 1915, she operated in the Baltic Sea, participating in several bombardment missions. On 11 May, the British submarine "E9" spotted "Roon" and several other ships en route to Libau. "E9" fired five torpedoes at the German flotilla; two passed closely astern of "Roon" while the other three missed as well. [Polmar and Noot, p. 40.] On 2 July 1915, "Roon" participated in a battle with Russian cruisers off the shores of Gotland, Sweden. [Corbett and Newbolt, p. 62] 'The light cruiser "Augsburg" and three destroyers were escorting the minelaying cruiser "Albatross" when they were attacked by four Russian cruisers. "Augsburg" escaped while the destroyers covered the retreat of the "Albatross", which was severely damaged and forced to seek refuge in neutral Swedish waters. "Roon" and the light cruiser "Lübeck" sortied to relieve the beleaguered German destroyers. In the following artillery duel, "Roon" was hit several times, and the German ships were forced to retreat. [Hart, p. 365] On 10 August, "Roon" and "Prinz Heinrich" shelled Russian positions at Zerel on the Sworbe Peninsula. There were several Russian destroyers anchored off Zorel; the German cruisers caught them by surprise and damaged one of them. [Tucker p. 293-294]

Later service

On 16 February 1916, "Roon" was mistakenly reported as having been captured by a British cruiser in the North Atlantic. [Smith p. 350] The ship was also mistakenly reported to have taken part in the Battle of Jutland, as part of the screening force for the main body of the High Seas Fleet. This mistake has appeared in historical works published shortly after the First World War, [Stevens and Westcott, p. 390] however, later works have shown this to be an error. [Tarrant, Appendix II ] In November 1916, "Roon" was disarmed and converted into a training and accommodation ship. Stationed at Kiel, she served in this capacity until 1918. Plans to convert "Roon" into a seaplane tender did not come to fruition. "Roon" was struck from the naval register in 1920 and scrapped the following year.

Notes

Footnotes

References

*cite book |last=American Society of Naval Engineers|title=Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, Inc|year=1909|publisher=American Society of Naval Engineers|isbn=

*cite book |last=Corbett|first=Julian Stafford|coauthors=Newbolt, Henry John|title=Naval Operations|year=1923|location=|publisher=Longmans, Green and Co.|isbn=

*cite book |last=Gardiner|first=Robert|coauthors=Gray, Randal; Budzbon, Przemyslaw|title=Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships: 1906-1922|year=1984|location=Annapolis|publisher=Naval Institute Press|isbn=0870219073

*cite book |last=Hart|first=Albert Bushnell|title=Harper's Pictorial Library of the World War|year=1920|publisher=Harper|isbn=

*cite book |last=Massie|first=Robert K.|authorlink=Robert K. Massie|title=Castles of Steel|year=2003|location=New York City|publisher=Ballantine Books|isbn=0-345-40878-0

*cite book |last=O'Brien|first=Phillips Payson|title=Technology and Naval Combat in the Twentieth Century and Beyond|year=2001|location=|publisher=Routledge|isbn=0714651257

*cite book |last=Polmar|first=Norman|coauthors=Noot, Jurrien |title=Submarines of the Russian and Soviet Navies, 1718-1990: 1718-1990|year=1991|location=Annapolis|publisher=Naval Institute Press|isbn=0870215701

*cite book |last=Rüger|first=Jan|title=The Great Naval Game|year=2007|location=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0521875765

*cite book |last=Scheer|first=Reinhard |authorlink=Reinhard Scheer|title=Germany's High Seas Fleet in the World War|year=1920|location=|publisher=Cassell and Company, ltd|isbn=

*cite book |last=Seligmann|first=Matthew S.|title=Naval Intelligence from Germany: The Reports of the British Naval Attaches in Berlin, 1906-1914|year=2007|location=Ann Arbor|publisher=University of Michigan|isbn=0754661571

*cite book |last=Smith|first=Alfred Emanuel|title=New Outlook|year=1916|location=|publisher=Outlook Publishing Company, Inc.|isbn=

*cite book |last=Stevens|first=William Oliver|coauthors=Westcott, Allan|title=A History of Sea Power|year=1920|location=Annapolis|publisher=United States Naval Academy|isbn=

*cite book |last=Tarrant|first=V. E.|title=Jutland: The German Perspective|year=1995|publisher=Cassell Military Paperbacks|isbn=0-304-35848-7

*cite book |last=Tucker|first=Spencer E.|title=The Encyclopedia of World War I|year=2005|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=1851094202

External links

* [http://www.worldwar1.co.uk/armoured-cruiser/sms-roon.html World War 1 Naval Combat]