The class was a group of five pre-dreadnought battleships built for the German (Imperial Navy), the last vessels of that type to be built in Germany. The class comprised , the lead ship, , , , and . The ships closely resembled those of the preceding , but with stronger armor and a rearranged secondary battery. Built between 1903 and 1908, they were completed after the launch of the revolutionary British all-big-gun battleship in 1906. As a result, they were obsolescent before entering service. The ships nevertheless saw extensive service in the High Seas Fleet, Germany's primary naval formation, through the late 1900s and early 1910s, when they were used for training, which included overseas cruises.
Following the start of World War I in July 1914, the German fleet adopted a strategy of raids on the British coast, which the five -class ships supported. These operations culminated in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916, where all five ships saw action, despite their marked inferiority to British dreadnoughts. Regardless, they intervened to protect the battered German battlecruisers from their British counterparts, allowing them to escape. In the confused night actions, was torpedoed and sunk by a British destroyer. After the battle, the four surviving ships were removed from front-line service and used for coastal defense through mid-1917. Thereafter, alone remained on patrol duty, while the rest were used as barracks or training ships. After Germany's defeat, the Treaty of Versailles permitted the postwar navy to retain several old battleships for coastal defense, including the four -class ships.
was broken up in 1920–1922, but the remainder were modernized and returned to active service in the mid-1920s. Their activities mirrored those of the pre-war period, including overseas training cruises and extensive fleet maneuvers. was decommissioned in 1931 and was to be converted into a target vessel, although this was never done. She was eventually broken up in 1944–1946. and remained in service for training duties through the 1930s into the Nazi-era (War Navy). Both ships saw limited duty during World War II, including bombardment of Polish forces during the invasion of Poland in September 1939 and the occupation of Denmark and invasion of Norway in April 1940. Both ships were sunk near the end of the war.
Design
In 1900, (Vice Admiral) Alfred von Tirpitz, the State Secretary for the (Imperial Naval Office), secured the passage of the Second Naval Law, an amendment to the First Naval Law of 1898. The previous law had called for a total strength of nineteen battleships by 1 April 1904, which was reached with the five s, but the new law increased the projected battle fleet to a total of thirty-eight. The first tranche of vessels—the —introduced the gun, marking a significant increase in firepower over earlier German battleships. The naval command had intended to build ten battleships of the type, starting with the 1901 fiscal year with two ships built per year, but they ultimately only built five. During construction of the s, a series of minor improvements were incorporated into subsequent designs. By the time work began on the second vessel of the 1903 fiscal year, which became , a more significantly altered design had been prepared.
A series of changes were made to the secondary and tertiary batteries for what became , the lead ship of the new class. The designers discarded the wing turrets that the s had used for some of their secondary guns; the turrets had required support structures whose elimination saved weight and allowed the designers to place the secondary battery entirely in casemates in a more efficient arrangement. Removing the turrets freed up deck space that was used to add another pair of guns and place the forward set of four in protective embrasures. and her sister ship were designed for use as flagships for the fleet and a squadron, respectively, which required additional accommodation spaces. After , which mixed sets of fire-tube and water-tube boilers, the remaining four members of the class received a uniform set of water-tube boilers. These were lighter, and the weight savings were passed on to the armor layout in the form of a slightly thicker armor belt and a strengthened upper deck.
