Pommern German Battleship

With Tirpitz at the height of his power, the Imperial German Navy embarked on a programme of construction aimed at providing itself with 38 battleships by 1920, so that it might challenge the power of the Royal Navy. Ten modern battleships had been built over the preceding decade, and five more were in construction. Now five more were begun, the Braunschweig class and were to be followed by five more virtually identical ships the Deutschland class all to be launched before the end of the decade. Pommern was the third of those, constructed by AG Vulcan at Stettin (Szczecin) on the Baltic at a cost of 24.6 million Marks. She was laid down in 1904, launched 2 December, 1905 and commissioned into the fleet on 6 August 1907. She sank at 0313 on 1 June 1916 at the Battle of Jutlond, having been struck by a torpedo from a destroyer of the British 12th Flotilla with the loss of her entire crew. Third member of the last class of POMMERN five pre-Dreadnought battleships constructed for the Imperial German Navy, Pommern was lost at the Battle of Jutland, torpedoed by a destroyer.

THE POMMERN IN ACTION

While the five ships were nominally identical, in fact there were consider able differences between them, Pommern being notably more economical than the others (though still consuming almost 14 tons of coal per hour when steaming at 18 knots). All the ships exceeded their design speed of 18 knots (33.3km/h). As a result of her succumbing to a single torpedo, the rest of the class were soon reduced to secondary duties.

TECHNICAL DATA
Type: Battleship
Machinery: 3 vertical triple expansion engines driving 3 shafts, giving a total of 17,7001hp
Dimensions (overall): Length, 1 27.6m (418.7ft); beam, 22.2m (73ft)
Displacement: 13,190t standard, 14,220t full load
Draught: 8.25m (27ft)
Complement: 743 (peacetime), 839 (wartime)