Battleship Admiral Scheer

The pocket battleship Admiral Scheer belonged to the Deutschland class. Like her sisters Admiral Graf Spee and Lützow, this powerful German warship was built with electric arc welding, instead of rivets, which had been used in the past to join steel plates. The manufacturer was the Marinewerft in Wilhelmhaven. It was launched in 1933 and commissioned on November 12, 1934. It was a fast battleship, which was armed with six 280-mm naval guns.

The first WW2 combat sortie of Admiral Scheer would take place on October 31, 1940. On November 5, it attacked a British convoy, sinking HMS Jervis Bay, which was an armed merchant cruiser. In February 1941, she would capture a British oil tanker and sink the merchant ship Gregorios. In 1942, together with the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen and two destroyers, she would patrol the waters off the coast of Norway, attacking the Allied arctic convoys. In 1944, Admiral Scheer returned to the Baltic Sea, where she would rescue German refugees at the end of the war. On April 9, 1945, she was sunk by RAF bombers.

Specifications

Type: Heavy cruiser/ pocket battleship/ Panzerschiffe

Length: 183 m

Beam: 21.3 m

Draft: 5.8 m

Displacement: 15,180 tons

Power Plant: eight MAN diesel engines, with two propellers, generating 55,000 horse power.

Speed: 28.3 knots

Range/Endurance:  10,000 nautical miles

Radar: FuMO-27

Crew: 1,040 sailors + 30 officers

Below, schematic drawing of Panzerschiffe Admiral Scheer

Photo of Admiral Scheer in 1941