SMS Pommern

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Career

Shipyard: AG Vulcan, Stettin
Ordered:
Laid down: March 1904
Launched: 2 December 1905
Commissioned: 6 August 1907
Construction cost: 24,624,000 Marks
Fate: Torpedoed and sunk at the Battle of Jutland, 1 June 1916.
Struck:
General Characteristics
Displacement: 13,200 tons normal
Length: 126 m
Beam: 22.0 m
Draught: 9 m
Propulsion: 3 shaft triple expansion boilers generating 19,000 HP
Speed: 19 knots
Armour: 9.4" belt, 11" turrets, 3" deck
Range: 5830 miles at 10 knots
Complement: 743
Armament: 4-280 mm (11") guns (2x2)
14-170 mm (6.7") guns
20-88 mm (3.4") guns
6-18" submerged torpedo tubes (1 bow, 1 stern, 4 beam)
SMS Pommern was one of the Deutschland class of pre-Dreadnought battleships built for the Kaiserliche Marine between 1904 and 1906. Named after the Prussian province of Pomerania, she was built at the AG Vulcan yard at Stettin (now Szczecin, Poland), where she was launched on 2 December 1905. She was commissioned into the navy on 6 August 1907. The ships of her class were already outdated by the time they entered the service, being inferior in size, armor, fire power and speed to the new post-Dreadnaught battleships.


Career
Shipyard:	AG Vulcan, Stettin
Ordered:
Laid down:	March 1904
Launched:	2 December 1905
Commissioned:	6 August 1907
Construction cost:	24,624,000 Marks
Fate:	Torpedoed and sunk at the Battle of Jutland, 1 June 1916.
Struck:
General Characteristics
Displacement:	13,200 tons normal
Length:	126 m
Beam:	22.0 m
Draught:	9 m
Propulsion:	3 shaft triple expansion boilers generating 19,000 HP
Speed:	19 knots
Armour:	9.4" belt, 11" turrets, 3" deck
Range:	5830 miles at 10 knots
Complement:	743
Armament:	4-280 mm (11") guns (2x2) 14-170 mm (6.7") guns 20-88 mm (3.4") guns 6-18" submerged torpedo tubes (1 bow, 1 stern, 4 beam)

At the Battle of Jutland on 31 May - 1 June 1916, Pommern, under the command of Kapitän zur See Bölken, was part of Rear Admiral Mauve's Second Battle Squadron. During the night action following the main battle, Pommern was hit at about 02:00 on 1 June 1916 by a torpedo fired by HMS Faulknor of the Twelfth Destroyer Flotilla. The hit was followed by a massive explosion in one of her magazines, and the ship broke apart midships and quickly sank with the loss of all 839 men aboard.

The wreck was substantially salvaged in 1957, with the armour and non-ferrous metals being removed. The bow ornament (Bugzier) is now in the German Naval Memorial, Laboe.

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