Deutschland was the lead ship of her class of heavy cruisers. She served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. In 1940, she was renamed Lützow after the unfinished Admiral Hipper-class heavy cruiser was handed over to the Soviet Union. Raised by the Soviet Navy in 1947, the ship was subsequently sunk as a target in the Baltic in 1945.
About German cruiser Deutschland in brief
Deutschland was the lead ship of her class of heavy cruisers. She served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. The ship was laid down in 1929 and completed by April 1933. In 1940, she was renamed Lützow after the unfinished Admiral Hipper-class heavy cruiser was handed over to the Soviet Union. Raised by the Soviet Navy in 1947, the ship was subsequently sunk as a target in the Baltic in May 1945. She was originally classified as an armored ship by the Reichsmarine, but in February 1940 the Germans reclassified the remaining two ships of this class as heavy cruiser. Deutschland’s primary armament was six 28 cm SK C28 guns mounted in two triple gun turrets, one forward and one aft of the superstructure. She also carried a pair of quadruple 53.cm 3 cm-mounted torpedo tubes on her stern. Her armored belt was 60 to 80mm thick; her main armored deck was 17 to 45 mm thick. Her main battery had 140mm thick faces and 80mm faces on the gun turrets. Her anti-aircraft battery originally consisted of three 8.cm L45 guns, though in 1935 these were replaced with six 8. 8 cm L78 guns. She had a design displacement of 12,630 t and a full load displacement of 14,290 long tons, though she was officially stated to be within the 10,000-long-ton limit of the Treaty of Versailles. She was powered by four sets of MAN 9-cylinder double-acting two-stroke diesel engines.
Her top speed was 28 knots, at 54,000 PS. At a cruising speed of 20 knots, the ship could steam for ten,000 nautical miles. As designed, her standard complement consisted of 33 officers and 586 enlisted men, though after 1935 this was significantly increased to 30 officers and 921–1,040 sailors. Her hull was equipped with two Arado Ar 196 planes, a replacement for the old pre-dreadnought battleship Preussen, and a number of battleships, including the pre- readnought Preussen and the battleship Ersatz. Her keel was laid on February 5, 1929, at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel, Germany, and she was completed on April 23, 1933. She then went on to serve in the Spanish Civil War, during which she was attacked by Republican bombers. She participated in Operation Weserübung, the invasion of Norway, and the Battle of Drøbak Sound, before returning to Germany for repairs. She ran aground during a planned attack on convoy PQ 17, which necessitated another return to Germany. She next saw action with the heavy cruiser Admiral Hippers, which ended with a failure to destroy the convoy JW 51B. After a series of repairs culminating in a complete overhaul at the end of 1943, after which the ship remained in theBaltic.
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