Schichau-class torpedo boat

During the 1880s, the Austro-Hungarian Navy became aligned with the French Jeune École (Young School) of naval strategy, which, among other things, advocated the use of small but powerfully-armed ships to defeat the larger capital ships of the enemy. One of the innovations that supported the Jeune École school of thought was the development of the torpedo into an effective weapon. The vessel developed to deliver these weapons was the torpedo boat, a small and fast vessel intended to work in conjunction with cruisers. The Austro-Hungarian adoption of the Jeune École strategy, and the development of both high seas and coastal tactics for torpedo boats, went hand-in-hand with the construction of dozens of torpedo boats for the Austro-Hungarian Navy.[1]

The Schichau-class boats had a waterline length of 39.9 metres (130 ft 11 in), a beam of 4.8 m (15 ft 9 in), and a normal draught of 1.9 m (6 ft 3 in). They had a displacement of 88–90 tonnes (87–89 long tons) at full load. The crew consisted of 16 officers and enlisted men. All boats used a single triple-expansion engine driving one propeller shaft using steam generated by a locomotive boiler, although this was replaced by two Yarrow boilers between 1900 and 1910, and a second funnel was installed. Their engine was rated at 1,000 indicated horsepower (750 kW) and they were designed to reach a top speed of 19 knots (35 km/h; 22 mph). They carried sufficient coal to give them a range of 1,200 nautical miles (2,200 km; 1,400 mi) at 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph).[2]

They were armed with two Škoda license-built Hotchkiss 37 mm (1.5 in) L/23[lower-alpha 1] guns, firing a 450-gram (16 oz) high explosive round to a maximum range of 3,000 m (9,800 ft).[3][4] They were also equipped with two 356 mm (14 in) torpedo tubes, firing a Type C torpedo with a 45-kilogram (99 lb) warhead to a range of 600 m (2,000 ft) at 24 kn (44 km/h; 28 mph).[2][5] At the time they came into service, the boats were rated as first-class torpedo boats.[6]

A total of 22 boats were built by three shipbuilding companies; Seearsenal Pola and Stabilimento Tecnico Triestino in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Schichau-Werke in Germany.[7] At the time they were built, boats of this class were initially given names, but they were redesignated with numbers on 1 April 1910.[6][8]

On 7 November 1893, Krähe (No. 22) collided with the torpedo cruiser SMS Lussin in the Hvar Channel.[9] After all boats of the class were reconstructed between 1900 and 1910, Nos. 27, 29–30, 33–38 and 40 were converted into minesweepers between 1911 and 1913. No. 28 was discarded by the navy in 1911,[7] and transferred to the Austro-Hungarian Army, serving as Tender 28.[6] At the outbreak of World War I the class was obsolete.[6] In August 1914, the Schichau-class torpedo boats and minesweepers were split between the various local-defence forces for the main Austro-Hungarian ports on the Adriatic coast. Nos. 21, 24, 32 and 39 formed the 13th Torpedo Boat Group of the 7th Torpedo Craft Division at Pola, with Nos. 27, 30, 33–34, 37 and 40 forming part of the local minesweeping flotilla. Nos. 20, 23 and 26 were stationed at Trieste as part of the 15th and 16th Torpedo Boat Groups. Nos. 19, 22, 25 and 31 formed the 20th Torpedo Boat Group of the 10th Torpedo Craft Division at Sebenico, alongside a minesweeping group that included Nos. 29 and 35. At Cattaro, Nos. 36 and 38 were part of the minesweeping force.[10]

On 23 August 1914, No. 26 was mined and sank off Pola. No. 22 ran aground and sank off Sebenico on 3 March 1916, but was salvaged and repaired later that year. All of the remaining torpedo boats were converted to minesweepers during 1917. The boats of the class all retained their torpedo tubes, but only Nos. 19 and 21–24 still carried torpedoes. [7] On 16 November 1917, Nos. 23, 27 and 30 were part of a minesweeping force that supported the bombardment of a 152 mm (6 in) Italian shore battery at Cortellazzo near the mouth of the Piave. None of the torpedo boats suffered any damage. After an Italian force of seven destroyers and three MAS boats appeared, the bombarding force withdrew.[11] On 19 December, a large Austro-Hungarian force again engaged the Italian shore battery at Cortellazzo. The force was supported by Nos. 20, 23, 27, 30, 32 and 34. None of the ships of the bombarding force suffered damage during the mission. On 5 April 1918, the Huszár-class destroyer Uskoke and No. 26 put a landing party ashore at Ancona, but the party was captured.[12] On 5 September, Nos. 19 and 38 were supporting another torpedo boat in the Gulf of Drin when they encountered an Italian force. The Austro-Hungarian boats broke off contact and escaped.[13]

Twenty boats survived the war. Under the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, sixteen were allocated to Italy, and she made use of five as customs vessels but scrapped the rest. The customs vessels had also been scrapped by 1925. The remaining four vessels were allocated to the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later renamed Yugoslavia). The Yugoslavs retained Nos. 21, 36, 38 and 19 as the minesweepers D1–D4 respectively.[7][14] In Yugoslav service the minesweepers were armed only with machine guns.[15] D1, D3 and D4 were discarded in 1924,[16] but D2 was retained as a training vessel until 1941.[17][18] Captured during the World War II Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, D2 served in the Royal Italian Navy as D10. She was captured by the German Navy on 11 September 1943 in the Bay of Kotor[19] at the time of the Italian capitulation, and was lost in their hands off Kumbor in the Bay of Kotor sometime thereafter.[20][lower-alpha 2]