SMS Helgoland was a dreadnought battleship of the German Imperial Navy. She was the lead ship of her class and was commissioned on 23 August 1911. She saw limited action against Britain’s Royal Navy during World War I. The ship was ceded to Great Britain at the end of the war and broken up for scrap in the early 1920s. Her coat of arms is preserved in the Military History Museum of the Bundeswehr in Dresden.
About SMS Helgoland in brief
SMS Helgoland was a dreadnought battleship of the German Imperial Navy. She was the lead ship of her class and was commissioned on 23 August 1911. She saw limited action against Britain’s Royal Navy during World War I. The ship was ceded to Great Britain at the end of the war and broken up for scrap in the early 1920s. Her coat of arms is preserved in the Military History Museum of the Bundeswehr in Dresden. She is named for the offshore islands seen as vital to the defense of the Kiel Canal, which she protected with a 300-mm-thick main armored belt. She had a crew of 42 officers and 1,071 enlisted men and was armed with a main battery of twelve 30. 5 cm SK L50 guns in six twin gun turrets, with one turret fore, one aft, and two on each flank of the ship. After 1915 the boilers were modified to burn oil; the ship could carry up to 197 metric tons of fuel oil. After 1914, two of the 8.8 cm guns were removed and replaced by 8. 8 cm anti-aircraft guns. She also had six 50 cm submerged torpedo tubes; one was in the bow, one in the stern, andTwo on each broadside. She replaced the pre-readnought in I Battle Squadron in February 1912, taking 1,100 tons of coal, the German record for loading coal, in two hours. On 10 July 1914, she left the Jade fleet to take part in the annual training cruise to Norway.
The next year followed a similar pattern, though a similar training pattern was instituted, with several exercises along the U.S. coast. The German fleet also trained along the Skagerrak and Kattegat during the Skanderborg exercises in November and December 1914. In May 1915, she was present at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916, though she was located in the center of theGerman line of battle and not as heavily engaged as the König- and Kaiser-class ships in the lead. On 1 July 1916, she took part in a training cruise along the coast of Norway, along with several German fleet-boats along with U.K. battleships. She left the Estuary in July 1917 to take the part in several annual training maneuvers along the North Sea. On 9 February 1918, she beat the record for the German crew loading coal by loading 3,200 metric tons, which was previously held by the crew of the Nassau-class battleship Posen II. In March 1918, the crew congratulated the Kaiser on a victory in a battle with the British battleship HMS Posen. In September 1918, Helg Roland was commissioned into the High Seas Fleet as the replacement for the old coastal defense ship Siegfried, as part of the I Scouting Squadron. She served until August 1911, just under three years from when work commenced.
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