Gazelle Class Cruisers

Gazelle Class Cruisers

The Gazelle class was a group of ten light cruisers built for the Imperial German Navy at the turn of the 20th century. They were the first modern light cruiser design of the Imperial Navy, and set the basic pattern for all future light cruisers in Imperial service. The design of the Gazelle class attempted to merge the fleet scout with the colonial cruiser. They were armed with a main battery of ten 10.5 cm (4.1 in) guns and a pair of torpedo tubes, and were capable of a speed of 21.5 kn (39.8 km/h; 24.7 mph).

All ten ships served with the fleet when they were first commissioned, and several served on foreign stations in the decade before the outbreak of World War I. Most were used as coastal defense ships early in the war. Ariadne was sunk at the Battle of Heligoland Bight in August 1914, Undine was torpedoed in the Baltic by a British submarine in November 1915, and Frauenlob was sunk at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916. The rest survived the war to see service with the Reichsmarine, with the exception of Gazelle, which was broken up in 1920.

Niobe was sold to Yugoslavia in 1925 and renamed Dalmacija, and the rest of the cruisers were withdrawn from service by the end of the 1920s and used for secondary duties or broken up for scrap. Medusa and Arcona were converted into anti-aircraft ships in 1940 and were scuttled at the end of World War II. Dalmacija was captured twice during the war, first by the Italians, who renamed her Cattaro, and then by the Germans, who restored the original name of Niobe. She ran aground in December 1943 and was subsequently destroyed by British Motor Torpedo Boats. Amazone was the only member to survive the war intact, as a barracks ship, and she remained in service until 1954, when she was broken up for scrap.