1. Design

2. Service history

3. Notes

4. References

SMS Zara was a torpedo cruiser of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, the lead ship of the {{sclass-|Zara|cruiser|4||1879}}. She was laid down in August 1878, launched in November 1879, and commissioned into the fleet in July 1882. The ship was armed with a battery of light guns and four torpedo tubes. She proved to be poorly designed, being too slow for use as a fleet scout or as a flotilla leader for torpedo boats, so she saw little active service. Throughout the 1880s and 1890s, she was frequently in reserve, being activated infrequently to participate in training exercises. She served as a guard ship in Cattaro Bay for most of World War I, before being withdrawn for use as a cadet training ship in June 1917. She served in this capacity until the end of the war in 1918, and was ceded to Italy as a war prize in 1920. The Italian Navy had no use for the vessel, and sold her to ship breakers in 1921.

Design

The ship's gun armament consisted of four {{convert|9|cm|sp=us|adj=on}} 24-caliber (cal.) Breech-loading guns in single mounts, along with one {{convert|7|cm|abbr=on}} 15-cal. breech-loading gun and two {{convert|25|mm|abbr=on}} Nordenfelt guns. She was also armed with four torpedo tubes. The torpedo tubes were located singly, two in the bow and at either beam. Zara was protected with a thin {{convert|19|mm|abbr=on}} armored deck.^[1]

Service history

The keel for Zara was laid down on 1 August 1878 at the government shipyard in Pola. She was launched on 13 November 1879, after which STT delivered her engines.^[1] Zara{{'}}s construction marked the first major use of domestically produced Bessemer steel by the Austro-Hungarian Navy.^[2] Initial sea trials were scheduled for 28 and 29 April 1881, but a severe storm delayed them until 6 May. On her speed trials, she reached an average speed of {{convert|14.12|kn}}, less than her designed speed of at least {{convert|15|kn}}. The naval engineer A. Waldvogel proposed replacing the bronze screw with a larger steel one to increase her speed, though during sea trials held between 14 and 24 November, she only reached an average of {{convert|14.02|kn}} with the new screw at full power.^[3]

On 17 July 1882, Zara was commissioned into the Austro-Hungarian fleet. Upon entering service, Zara was found to have several significant defects; she rolled badly, was insufficiently ventilated, and her bow-mounted torpedo tube did not work as effectively as intended.^[4] She was also too slow for use as a reconnaissance vessel or a leader of a torpedo boat flotilla. As a result, she saw little active service.^[1] In September, Zara participated in a demonstration of the fleet's torpedo vessels for Kaiser Franz Joseph I in Pola. Franz Joseph came aboard Zara to observe a group of torpedo boats launch an attack against an old schooner.^[5] In 1885, the bow torpedo launcher was rebuilt, and in 1886 she was assigned to the torpedo training school. That year, a {{convert|47|mm|abbr=on}} Hotchkiss gun was installed on her bow. Four more 47 mm guns, of the quick-firing L/33 type, were added in 1887, with two on each broadside.^[4]

She spent 1902 in reserve, but served in the torpedo school from 1903 to 1906, during which time she was converted fully into a training ship. She conducted training cruises along the Dalmatian coast from 1907 to 16 September 1913. On 14 October, she was reduced to a tender for the torpedo school, a role she held to May 1914. She was assigned to the training school for naval cadets on 21 May, but this service was short lived. She was converted into a guard ship on 28 June and stationed in Cattaro Bay, the same day that Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo, the catalyst for the start of World War I a month later. She served in that role until June 1917.^[12]

She returned to the cadet training school, and on 18 June left Cattaro for Pola. At 12:55 while cruising off the island of Lacroma, an accidental explosion tore a large hole in the bow, though the damage was above the waterline, allowing Zara to make port in Ragusa. The shipyard there effected temporary repairs to ensure her hull was strong enough to allow her to continue on to Pola, which she reached on 26 June. In Pola, a commission determined that the cause of the explosion was a badly deteriorated warhead in one of her two torpedoes,^[12] though some later sources state she struck a naval mine.^[7] After her bow was permanently repaired, Zara served in the training school until the end of the war in November 1918. With Austria-Hungary's defeat, the Allies seized most of the Austro-Hungarian fleet as war prizes, and Zara was allocated to Italy, which scrapped her by 1921.^[8]

Notes

References

• {{cite book|last=Bilzer|first=Franz F.|title=Die Torpedoschiffe und Zerstörer der k.u.k. Kriegsmarine 1867–1918|year=1990|publisher=H. Weishaupt|location=Graz|isbn=3900310661}}
• {{cite book |editor1-last=Gardiner|editor1-first=Robert|editor2-last=Gray|editor2-first=Randal|title=Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships: 1906–1921|year=1984|location=Annapolis, MD|publisher=Naval Institute Press|isbn=0-85177-245-5}}
• {{cite book| last = Greger| first = René| year = 1976| title = Austro-Hungarian Warships of World War I| publisher = Ian Allan| location = London| isbn = 978-0-7110-0623-2}}
• {{Cite book| last=Sondhaus| first=Lawrence| title=The Naval Policy of Austria-Hungary, 1867–1918| year=1994| location=West Lafayette| publisher=Purdue University Press| isbn=978-1-55753-034-9}}

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