SMS Meteor (1865)

Painting of the Battle of Havana by Willy Stöwer

On 7 November 1870, Meteor arrived in Havana, Cuba, where the French aviso Bouvet was docked. The French ship was more heavily armed than the Prussian vessel, with one 16 cm (6.3 in) gun and four 12 cm guns compared to a single 15 cm gun and two 12 cm guns aboard Meteor. The French captain issued a challenge to Knorr, who accepted.[7] Bouvet departed the harbor on 8 November, followed by Meteor the following day; international law mandated that belligerent ships wait twenty-four hours after an enemy vessel left port.[8] The Battle of Havana lasted for two hours, Meteor opening fire first with her 15 cm gun.[9]

Meteor fired eight salvos at about 2,000 meters (6,600 ft), all without effect, before Bouvet returned fire, once the range had fallen to 800 meters (2,600 ft). Neither ship scored hits as they circled each other.[10] The engagement ended after Bouvet rammed Meteor in an attempt to either sink her or permit a boarding party to capture her. The collision knocked Meteor's main mast and mizzen-mast over, and the ship's rigging got caught in the propeller, disabling it. While the two ships were close, their crews fired on each other with small arms.[10] Bouvet attempted to ram a second time, but Meteor's gunners scored a hit on the French ship's boiler and disabled her engine.[11] By this time, Meteor's crew had freed the propeller, and Knorr attempted to capture Bouvet, but the French sailors were able to get their ship under sail and escape to neutral Cuban waters.[12] The Spanish corvette Hernán Cortés, which had been observing the battle, intervened and fired a warning shot to prevent Meteor from continuing the battle.[10] After she escaped, Bouvet sailed to Havana.[13]

Casualty figures vary, ranging from two dead and one injury aboard Meteor and three wounded aboard Bouvet to only two Prussian sailors killed with ten killed and wounded on Bouvet.[10] Meteor joined Bouvet in Havana, where the wounded men were taken to a hospital. The two dead aboard Meteor were buried in Havana, and a monument was later erected there. On 1 January 1871, Knorr was promoted to the rank of Korvettenkapitän (Corvette Captain), and two men were awarded the Iron Cross.[14]

Under pressure from France, the Spanish shipyard in Havana delayed completing the repairs to Meteor until the war ended on 10 May 1871. Three days later, the ship departed for Germany; she sailed up the eastern coast of the United States and Canada before crossing the Atlantic. She reached Plymouth on 13 June and arrived in Kiel on the 25th. There, she was decommissioned on 20 July. From 18 September to 14 October, she was used as a stationary training ship for engine room personnel. On 6 May 1872, Meteor was recommissioned for survey work and was assigned to the Hydrographics Office of the Imperial Admiralty Meteor and her sister ship Drache surveyed the German coast, ending in Mecklenburg on 20 October. On 14 November, Meteor and the gunboat Salamander were forced to take shelter in Friedrichsort due to a heavy storm. She was able to get back underway two days later after the storm had passed. Meteor, Drache, and the transport ship Rhein searched the eastern Baltic for any merchant ships that might have been damaged in the storm. On 7 December, Meteor was again decommissioned, this time in Wilhelmshaven.[14]

In 1873, the ship was recommissioned for another stint with the Hydrographics Office, which lasted from 16 April to mid-September. On 22 September, Meteor left Germany for a deployment to the Mediterranean Sea. After reaching the Mediterranean coast of Spain, she replaced the gunboat Delphin in the Cruiser Squadron under the flagship Friedrich Carl. Following the outbreak of unrest in the Ottoman Empire in March 1874, Meteor was sent to Constantinople to serve as the station ship. As tensions rose in the Balkans—which produced several uprisings against Ottoman rule, culminating in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877—Meteor was reinforced with the gunboats Nautilus and Comet and the aviso Pommerania. The Admiralty also sent the Armored Squadron, led by the flagship Kaiser, to the eastern Mediterranean. Meteor remained in Smyrna until February 1877, at which point she returned to Constantinople. From there, she was recalled to Germany on 3 June; she arrived in Kiel on 4 August and continued to Danzig, where she was decommissioned on the 16th. She was stricken from the naval register on 27 November 1877, her engines were removed, and she was used as a hulk for coal storage at Kiel. Some components from her machinery were reused in the gunboat Iltis then being built in Danzig. Meteor was eventually expended as a target.[14][15]