SZENT ISTVAN battleship 1915.

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aukepalmhof
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SZENT ISTVAN battleship 1915.

Post by aukepalmhof » Wed Nov 25, 2009 8:15 pm

The battleship (dreadnought) was built on the Ganz & Danubius shipyard at Fiume for the Austro-Hungarian Navy. The only one of this class built on that yard.
29 January 1912 keel laid down.
17 January 1914 launched under the name SZENT ISTVÁN one of the Viribus Unitis class.
Displacement 21.689 tons standard, maximum 22.000 tons, dim. 152.2 x 27.3 x 8.9m. (draught)
Powered by 4 AEG Curtis steam turbines, 26.400 shp., four shafts, speed 20.4 knots.
Bunker capacity 900 tons normal, maximum 2.000 tons, oil and coal.
Range 4.200 miles against 10 knots.
Armament: 12 – 12.2 inch, 12 – 6inch 18 – 11pdrs. guns, 4 – 21 inch torpedo tubes, submerged.
Crew 1.094.
17 November 1915 commissioned.

She was the last vessel of this class of four ships built.
After completing she joined the First Division of it Battle Squadron of Pula, where she most of her time spent alongside the berth.
June 1918 the Austia-Hungarian Rear-Admiral Nikolaus Horthy de Nagybánya decided to use his fleet which was mostly bottled up in Pula for an operation against the Allied Otranto barrage between Italy and Albania.
09 June 1918 during the evening the SZENT ISTVÁN together with the TEGETTHOFF and one destroyer and six torpedo-boats left Pula.
The next morning off Premuda on the Dalmatian coast she were sighted by two Italian torpedo-boats under command of Cdr. Luigi Rizzo, who at once attacked the two battleships.
At around 03.30 the SZENT ISTVÁN was torpedoed in a position about 9 miles southwest of Premuda island by the MAS 15 under command of Rizzo, the MAS 21 under command of Midshipman Guiseppe Aonzo was not so lucky he missed his target the TEGETTHOFF.
The SZENT ISTVÁN was hit by two torpedoes near the boiler room, and this large room flooded quickly given the ship a large list.
The two Italian torpedo-boats managed to escape.
Only two boilers on the SZENT ISTVÁN were usable, and providing steam for the electrical generators and thereby electricity for the pumps.
First was tried to beach her on Molat island but this failed, and when the list worsened, the sign was given to abandon the vessel.
At 06.15 that day the newest Austro-Hungarian battleship capsized taking with her 89 lives.
The sinking of the SZENT ISTVÁN was filmed from the TEGETTHOFF, and there are only two films that show the loss of a battleship, the other is the loss of HMS BARHAM during World War II.

After the sinking of the SZENT ISTVÁN the action was called off, and the ships returned to Pula, till the end of World War I.

Hungary 1993 30fo sg4162, scott3409.

Sources: Register of Merchant ships completed in 1892. Dictionary of disasters at sea by Hocking. Many web-sites on the battleship. Jane’s 1914.
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D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen
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Re: SZENT ISTVAN battleship 1915.

Post by D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen » Tue Jun 12, 2018 7:49 pm

Hungary 2018, 800 Ft. StG.?
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aukepalmhof
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Re: SZENT ISTVAN battleship 1915.

Post by aukepalmhof » Thu Jun 14, 2018 8:14 pm

The Hungarian Post gives by this issues of 2018:

About In Memory of the Battleship SAINT STEPHEN. (SZENT ISTVAN),
Magyar Posta is issuing a commemorative souvenir sheet in remembrance of the battleship SMS SAINT STEPHEN (SZENT ISTVAN in Hungarian). Seventy thousand perforated and two thousand imperforated copies of the numbered souvenir sheet designed by the graphic artist Imre Benedek were produced by ANY Security Printing Company. The new issue will be available at first day post offices and Filaposta in Hungary from 29 June 2018, but may also be ordered from Magyar Posta’s online store.
A hundred years ago the last months of the First World War were drawing to a close and both sides were fighting more and more determinedly and desperately for victory. The Entente sealed off the Adriatic Sea at the Strait of Otranto preventing the ships of the Central Powers from moving southward towards the Mediterranean Sea. This blockade had already been broken in 1917 but the Entente managed to re-impose it.
The goal of the new operation launched in 1918, in which the entire fleet of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy took part, was to break the blockade of the Strait of Otranto and to trap the Entente’s naval forces in the Adriatic. The operation was launched on the moonless night of 9 June when the forces of the Monarchy divided into two groups moving out to sea. The SAINT STEPHEN was part of the second group.
The construction of the only battleship in Hungarian history started in January 1912 in the Ganz Danubius ship factory in Fiume (today Rijeka). It took two and a half years for the vessel to be completed. The fact that a new slipway had to be built prior to starting the works is an indication of its size as the existing one was not suitable for such a large ship, which was about 150 metres long and had a displacement of 20,000 tons.
SMS SAINT STEPHEN was among the first battleships equipped with three 305 mm guns in each turret. The main weapons of the ship consisted of these guns, altogether twelve in the four turrets, but the gun turrets placed one over another caused problems of stability. Later, triple gun turrets became the model for the battleships of the American Navy as well. The SAINT STEPHEN had two propellers and a maximum speed of 20.4 knots (38 km per hour).
Although the ship entered service in November 1915, she spent most of the war at anchor in the port in Pola (today Pula) performing mainly anti-aircraft duties. She had to wait for her first mission until the aforementioned night of 9 June. Due to technical problems, however, the convoy could only leave the military base at Pola with an hour’s delay, which meant that the ships had to proceed after dark as well. In the dawn light two Italian anti-submarine motor boats spotted the Austro-Hungarian ships and managed to approach them. The battleship SAINT STEPHEN was hit by two torpedoes at 3.31 am on 10 June. After the detonations, a several hour-long struggle to save the ship began, which unfortunately was not successful. In the end the ship capsized and sank within minutes. Its crew consisted of 1,087 persons, of which 85 sailors and 4 officers lost their lives.
The failure destroyed the last and largest planned Austro-Hungarian naval marine operation. After the tragedy of the battleship SAINT STEPHEN, the monarchy’s fleet did not put to sea again.

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