Which country used small and fast naval ships designated to carry torpedoes into battle during the First World War?
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Grillo-class tracked torpedo motorboat The "Grillo"-class was a class of torpedo armed motorboats in service with the "Regia Marina" (the Royal Navy of Italy) during the First World War. The notable feature of these vessels was that each was equipped with a pair of spiked continuous tracks, intended to allow them to climb over harbour booms and attack enemy shipping at anchor. In 1918, two attempts to use them to penetrate Austro-Hungarian harbour defences both ended in failure.
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Torpedo boat A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs rammed enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes, and later designs launched self-propelled Whitehead torpedoes. They were created to counter battleships and other slow and heavily armed ships by using speed, agility, and the power of their torpedo weapons. A number of inexpensive torpedo boats attacking en masse could overwhelm a larger ship's ability to fight them off using its large but cumbersome guns. An inexpensive fleet of torpedo boats could pose a threat to much larger and more expensive fleets of capital ships, albeit only in the coastal areas to which their small size and limited fuel load restricted them.
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Pre-dreadnought battleship Pre-dreadnought battleships were sea-going battleships built between the mid- to late 1880s and 1905, before the launch of HMS "Dreadnought" . Pre-dreadnoughts replaced the ironclad battleships of the 1870s and 1880s. Built from steel, and protected by hardened steel armour, pre-dreadnought battleships carried a main battery of very heavy guns in barbettes (open or with armoured gunhouses) supported by one or more secondary batteries of lighter weapons. They were powered by coal-fuelled triple-expansion steam engines.
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List of sunken battlecruisers Sunken battlecruisers are large capital ships built in the first half of the 20th century that were either destroyed in battle, scuttled, or destroyed in a weapon test. They were similar in size and cost to a battleship, and typically carried the same kind of heavy guns, but battlecruisers generally carried less armor and were faster. The first battlecruisers were developed in the United Kingdom in the first decade of the century, as a development of the armored cruiser, at the same time the dreadnought succeeded the pre-dreadnought battleship. The original aim of the battlecruiser was to hunt down slower, older armored cruisers and destroy them with heavy gunfire. However, as more and more battlecruisers were built, their opponents became ships of their own type, not slower, weaker vessels.
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Yugoslav torpedo boat T3 The Yugoslav torpedo boat "T3 was a sea-going torpedo boat that was operated by the Royal Yugoslav Navy between 1921 and 1941. Originally 78 T", a 250t-class torpedo boat of the Austro-Hungarian Navy built in 1914, she was armed with two 66 mm guns, four 450 mm torpedo tubes, and could carry 10–12 naval mines. She saw active service during World War I, performing convoy, escort and minesweeping tasks, anti-submarine operations and shore bombardment missions. Following Austria-Hungary's defeat in 1918, she was allocated to the Navy of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which subsequently became the Royal Yugoslav Navy, and was renamed "T3".
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SM U-21 (Austria-Hungary) SM "U-21 or U-XXI" was a "U-20"-class submarine or U-boat built for and operated by the Austro-Hungarian Navy (German: "Kaiserliche und Königliche Kriegsmarine "or" K.u.K. Kriegsmarine" ) during the First World War. The design for "U-21" was based on submarines of the Royal Danish Navy's "Havmanden" class (three of which had been built in Austria-Hungary), and was largely obsolete by the beginning of the war.
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HMS Neptune (1874) HMS "Neptune" was an ironclad turret ship originally designed and built in Britain for Brazil, but acquired for the Royal Navy in 1878. Modifications to suit the Royal Navy took three years to complete and the ship did not begin her first commission until 1883 with the Channel Fleet. She was transferred to the Mediterranean Fleet in 1885, but refitted in Portsmouth in 1886–87. "Neptune" then became the coastguard ship for the 1st Class Reserve at Holyhead until 1893 when she was placed in in Portsmouth. While she was being towed to the breakers in 1903, "Neptune" unintentionally rammed HMS "Victory" , then serving as a training hulk for the Naval Signal School, collided with HMS "Hero" , and narrowly missed several other ships. She was scrapped in Germany in 1904.
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HMS Aboukir (1900) HMS "Aboukir" was a "Cressy"-class armoured cruiser built for the Royal Navy around 1900. Upon completion she was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet and spent most of her career there. Upon returning home in 1912, she was placed in reserve. Recommissioned at the start of the First World War, she played a minor role in the Battle of Heligoland Bight a few weeks after the beginning of the war. "Aboukir" was sunk by the German submarine "U-9", together with two of her sister ships, on 22 September 1914; 527 men of her complement died.
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History of Australian naval aviation The first involvement Australia had with naval aviation was in 1911, when an Australian-born Royal Navy officer became one of the first four naval officers to receive pilot qualifications. During World War I, the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) experienced several forms of airborne operation, with HMAS "Brisbane" operating a seaplane, while HMA Ships "Sydney" and "Australia" were used for experiments with aircraft launch platforms. An aircraft embarked aboard "Sydney" was also involved in one of the first naval air battles. Several Australians also flew as part of the Royal Naval Air Service.
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Greek submarine Delfin Delfin (Greek: Δελφίν , "dolphin") was a Greek submarine (actually called a "submersible", "καταδυόμενον", according to the then current French terminology) which served during the Balkan Wars and World War I. It was the second submarine to enter service in the Greek navy, after the "Nordenfelt" I (in service 1886-1901), and is notable as the first submarine in the world to launch a torpedo attack (albeit without success) against a warship.
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HMS Broke (1914) HMS "Broke" was a "Faulknor"-class destroyer leader of the Royal Navy, initially built for the Chilean Navy as the "Almirante Lynch"-class destroyer "Almirante Goñi". The outbreak of the First World War led to her being purchased by the Admiralty in August 1914 shortly after her launching, and renamed HMS "Broke". All of the class were present at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May to 1 June 1916 where "Broke", out of control after hits from German ships, collided with the "Acasta"-class destroyer HMS "Sparrowhawk" leading to the latter's loss. "Broke" saw action in several battles, and was resold to Chile after the conclusion of the war.
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King George V-class battleship (1911) The "King George V"-class battleships were a group of four dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy (RN) in the early 1910s that were sometimes termed super-dreadnoughts. The sister ships spent most of their careers assigned to the 2nd Battle Squadron of the Home and Grand Fleets, sometimes serving as flagships. In October 1914, "Audacious" struck a mine and sank. Aside from participating in the failed attempt to intercept the German ships that had bombarded Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby in late 1914, the Battle of Jutland in May 1916 and the inconclusive Action of 19 August, the surviving ships' service during the First World War generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea.
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SMS Schlesien SMS "Schlesien" was one of the five "Deutschland"-class pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Kaiserliche Marine between 1904 and 1906. Named after the German province of Schlesien, she was built at the Schichau-Werke shipyard in Danzig, where she was launched on 28 May 1906. She was commissioned into the navy on 5 May 1908. The ships of her class were already outdated by the time they entered service, being inferior in size, armor, firepower and speed to the revolutionary new battleship HMS "Dreadnought" .
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SMS Panther (1885) SMS "Panther" was a torpedo cruiser ("Torpedoschiff") of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. She and her sister ship, "Leopard" were part of a program to build up Austria-Hungary's fleet of torpedo craft in the 1880s. She was the lead ship of her class, and was built in Britain by Armstrong, from her keel laying in October 1884 to her completion in December 1885. She was armed with a battery of two 12 cm guns and ten 47 mm guns, along with four 356 mm torpedo tubes.
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SMS S119 SMS "S119" was a "S90"-class torpedo boat of the Imperial German Navy that served during the First World War. The ship was built by Schichau at Elbing in Prussia (now Elbląg in Poland), and was completed in September 1903. The ship was sunk during the Battle off Texel on 17 October 1914.
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HMS Repulse (1916) HMS "Repulse" was a "Renown"-class battlecruiser of the Royal Navy built during the First World War. Originally laid down as an improved version of the "Revenge"-class battleship s, her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war because she would not be ready in a timely manner. Admiral Lord Fisher, upon becoming First Sea Lord, gained approval to restart her construction as a battlecruiser that could be built and enter service quickly. The Director of Naval Construction (DNC), Eustace Tennyson-D'Eyncourt, quickly produced an entirely new design to meet Admiral Lord Fisher's requirements and the builders agreed to deliver the ships in 15 months. They did not quite meet that ambitious goal, but the ship was delivered a few months after the Battle of Jutland in 1916. "Repulse", and her sister HMS "Renown" , were the world's fastest capital ships upon completion.
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HMS Achilles (1905) HMS "Achilles" was a "Warrior"-class armoured cruiser built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. She served with the 2nd Cruiser Squadron for most of the First World War. The ship did not participate in the Battle of Jutland in 1916, but did sink the German raider "Leopard" in 1917. "Achilles" became a training ship in 1918 and was sold for scrap in 1921.
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Whitehead Mark 1 torpedo The Whitehead Mark 1 torpedo was the first Whitehead torpedo adopted by the United States Navy for use in an anti-surface ship role after the E. W. Bliss Company of Brooklyn, New York secured manufacturing rights in 1892. The US Navy made an initial acquisition of 100 Mark 1s, which, by the time they entered American service, were faster, had longer range and carried a larger warhead than Robert Whitehead's earlier models.
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BL 4 inch naval gun Mk VII The BL 4-inch gun Mk VII was a British high-velocity naval gun introduced in 1908 as an anti-torpedo boat gun in large ships, and in the main armament of smaller ships. Of the 600 produced, 482 were still available in 1939 for use as coastal artillery and as a defensive weapon on Defensively Equipped Merchant Ships (DEMS) during the Second World War.
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Mackensen-class battlecruiser The "Mackensen" class was the last class of battlecruisers to be built by Germany in World War I. The design initially called for seven ships, but three of them were redesigned as the "Ersatz Yorck" class . Of the four ships of the "Mackensen" class, "Mackensen", "Graf Spee", and "Prinz Eitel Friedrich" were launched, and "Fürst Bismarck" was not—but none were completed, after wartime shipbuilding priorities were redirected towards U-boat—and the ships were broken up in the early 1920s. The lead ship of the class was named for August von Mackensen, a prominent military commander during the war. In response to the "Mackensen"-class ships, the British Royal Navy laid down the Admiral-class battlecruiser s, all but one of which would eventually be cancelled; the sole survivor, HMS "Hood" , was completed after the end of the war.
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Short Type 184 The Short Admiralty Type 184, often called the Short 225 after the power rating of the engine first fitted, was a British two-seat reconnaissance, bombing and torpedo carrying folding-wing seaplane designed by Horace Short of Short Brothers. It was first flown in 1915 and remained in service until after the armistice in 1918. A Short 184 was the first aircraft to sink a ship using a torpedo, and another was the only British aircraft to take part in the Battle of Jutland.
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HMS Neptune (1909) HMS "Neptune" was a dreadnought battleship built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century, the sole ship of her class. The ship was the first British battleship to be built with superfiring guns. Shortly after her completion in 1911, she carried out trials of an experimental fire-control director and then became the flagship of the Home Fleet. "Neptune" became a private ship in early 1914 and was assigned to the 1st Battle Squadron (BS).