The Ships of Brawling Battleships Steel: Germany Battle Cruiser Von der Tann

Laid down on March 25, 1908, launched on March 20, 1909 and commissioned on September 1, 1910, Von der Tann carried a main armament of eight 11 inch main guns mounted two per turret; one centerline forward, one centerline aft and one wing turret on each side that could fire to both sides and forward and aft. Von der Tann was the only ship in what was the first German battle cruiser class and was the first German capital ship with (coal fired) turbine engines. This was actually the second German attempt to build a battle cruiser. While the first British battle cruisers (Invincible class) were building, it was known that they were designed to replace the pre-dreadnought armored cruisers and the British released information that they would be armed with 9.2 inch guns (in fact, they had 12 inch guns), so the Germans countered by building the Blucher, armed with the superior German 8.2 inch gun. The Blucher (statistics shown above) thus ended up being nothing more than a very powerful cruiser (she was re-categorized as an "armored cruiser″) and she was sunk by real British battle cruisers at the Battle of Dogger Bank on January 24, 1915. After careful comparisons, the Germans decided that their 11 inch gun was the equal of the British 12 inch gun and settled on the smaller weapon for their earliest "dreadnoughts," including the Von der Tann and Seydlitz battle cruisers. Although not as well protected as the later German battle cruisers, the Von der Tann was still better protected than a British battle cruiser and close to the "fast battleship" concept of World War Two. The ship was named after the grandly-styled Bavarian General Ludwig Samson Arthur Freiherr von und zu der Tann-Rothsamhausen (1815–1881), who was born on the same day as the Battle of Waterloo and commanded the Bavarian I Corps during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871. During the war, Von der Tann was, like most of the other German battle cruisers, commonly used in raids to draw out their British opposite numbers. The purpose of these raids was ambush reacting British battle cruisers with submarines or to draw them to the battleships of the High Seas Fleet, steaming in distant support further out to sea. She was involved in the bombardment of Yarmouth on November 3, 1916, the December 16, 1914 bombardment of Scarborough, and, on Christmas Day, became the first capital ship ever damaged by aircraft when a British seaplane accidentally collided with her while scouting the Schillig Roads anchorage. She missed the Battle of Dogger Bank in 1915 but participated in the bombardment of Yarmouth and Lowestoft in April 1916. At the Battle of Jutland on May 31, 1916, she sank the British battle cruiser Indefatigable early in the battle cruiser action and then was hit four times but survived, although a series of malfunctions left her with no working main armament. After the Armistice, she was interned at Scapa Flow from November 24, 1918. In common with most of the rest of the German ships interned there, Von der Tann was scuttled by her own crew on June 21, 1919. Salvaged in 1930, she was scrapped in 1934.

See other German battle cuisers: Derfflinger, Moltke, Lutzow