German cruiser Blücher
| | Career | |
|---|
| Ordered: |
| Laid down: | August 15 1935 |
| Launched: | June 8 1937 |
| Commissioned: | September 20 1939 |
| Fate: | Torpedoed and sunk April 9 1940 in Oslofjord, Norway |
| General characteristics |
|---|
| Displacement: | 18,208 tons |
| Dimensions: | 675 ft 4 in (206 m) × 69 ft 9 in (21.3 m) × 19 ft (7.7 m) |
| Armament: | 8 × 8 in (203 mm)
12 × 4.1 in (105 mm)
6 × 40 mm
12 × 37 mm
32 × 20 mm
12 × 21 in torpedo tubes
160 mines |
| Aircraft: | 3 |
| Propulsion: | 132,000 hp (98 MW), 32.5 knots (60 km/h) |
| Crew: | Approximately 1,600 |
The
German heavy cruiser Blücher was the German
Kriegsmarine's newest ship at the outbreak of
World War II.
Blücher is most notable for being sunk by Norwegian guns on
April 9 1940, less than three years after her launch, on the first day of the
invasion of Norway (Operation Weserübung).
Blücher, the heavy cruiser
Lützow (formerly classified as a
pocket battleship) and the
light cruiser Emden, commanded by Rear Admiral Oskar Kummetz, were sailing up the
Oslo fjord to land troops for the occupation of the
Norwegian capital,
Oslo, but the 47 year old (and, ironically, German) 28 cm guns of
Oscarsborg fortress opened fire at 05:21 German time (04:21 Norwegian time) from a range of 1400 to 1800 meters, quickly putting
Blücher out of control (
Blücher was hit directly above the bridge in the artillery command station and the second 280 mm hit set fire to aircraft fuel deposits). She briefly returned fire, but as "the bigger guns could not find any aim of military importance", the impact on the fortress was only marginal. She then drifted into range of a
torpedo battery, which hit her with two torpedoes.
Blücher sank at
Askholmene at 07:23 German time (06:23 Norwegian time), taking 830 men with her into the deep.
As a result of the sinking, Oslo was not captured for several hours after the planned invasion of the capital, allowing the Norwegian royal family,
parliament and cabinet to escape: additionally, Norway's gold reserves were moved out of reach of the invaders and ultimately shipped to the
Allies for Norway's use during the war.
Blücher still lies at the bottom of the Oslofjord north of
Oscarsborg fortress.
Blücher was a
Hipper class heavy cruiser. Like her sister ships,
Admiral Hipper and
Prinz Eugen, she was built in the mid-1930s.
Blücher was launched
8 June 1937 at the
Deutsche Werke Kiel AG. Her main armament consisted of eight 8
" (203
mm) guns, backed up by twelve 4.1 in (105 mm) guns, six 40 mm
anti-aircraft guns, twelve 37 mm anti-aircraft guns, twenty 20 mm anti-aircraft guns and twelve 21 in (533 mm)
torpedo tubes. In addition, she carried three aircraft for
reconnaissance and 160
sea mines.
Blücher was about 675
feet long (200 m), with a beam of 70 feet (21 m) and a draught of about 26 feet (8 m). She had a standard displacement of just under 15,000
tons and max displacement of 18,200 tons.
Blücher had three
Blohm & Voß engines that provided her 132,000
horsepower (98 MW) and a top speed of 32.5
knots (equivalent to 60
km/h). Her
armour was well distributed and a match for foreign heavy cruisers. She had a sidebelt of 80 mm (about 3 in), upper deck armour of 30 mm (about 1 in), an armoured deck of 50 mm (about 2 in) while her main armament was protected by 160 mm. Like the other ships in her class,
Blücher had rather short range and machinery that suffered from problems. This limited the ships' use as
commerce raiders in the
North Atlantic.
|
Blücher sinking in the Oslo fjord |
Blücher was the
flagship of the naval detachment sent to capture Oslo in the initial stages of the German invasion of Norway, codenamed
Operation Weserübung ("Weser Exercise"). Despite some early indication that Norway would resist the invasion, notably the attack on the fleet by the Norwegian armed vessel
Pol III, the heavy cruiser was at the front of the line as the German detachment approached Oscarsborg fortress in the
Drøbak narrows. Since the three
Krupp guns (one of which was left unmanned due to lack of trained gunners) of the fortress were severely outdated, having been installed in 1893, the defenders held fire until the vessels were at
point-blank range (most sources state that fire was opened at a range of 1,600 to 1,800 metres (about 1 mile). By sheer luck, the first hit from one of the ancient 280 mm (11 in) guns hit the forward artillery control station, rendering the ship's forward guns effectively blind and unable to fire back. The second hit from the fortress's guns apparently struck the aircraft hangar, setting fire to aviation fuel and infantry munition stored on deck.
While fire was raging aboard
Blücher, the Norwegian
coastal batteries pelted her with smaller
calibre guns. Although not causing significant damage, this suppressed the fire from her light artillery as
Blücher slowly moved past the fortress. Attempts to extinguish the fire aboard the ship and to tend to the many wounded were also much hindered by the continuous small-calibre fire from the shore.
The invaders were unaware that a torpedo battery had been built at the narrowest point of the
fjord in 1901 and fitted with
Austrian-built
Whitehead torpedoes of the same turn-of-the-century vintage. Aiming the torpedoes at this close range was unnecessary; the only question was whether the 40-year-old weapons would work properly. They did.
Blücher received two direct hits in the
engine room, leaving her drifting out of control in the narrow fjord. The torpedoes sealed her fate. The rest of the fleet, believing
Blücher had hit mines, reversed their way out of the narrows, thus ensuring that Oslo would not be invaded at dawn as intended.
To avoid hitting land,
Blücher dropped anchor at
Askholmen, 6
nautical miles south of Oslo. Her torpedoes were fired into the sides of the fjord to prevent them from exploding aboard the ship.
At 06.23,
Blücher capsized and sank, about an hour after she was first hit. Of the 2,202 men on the ship, some 830 either went down with her, drowned in the freezing water or burnt to death in the flaming oil slick surrounding the wreck. The survivors reached the shore on either side of the fjord. The sailors were ordered to give their life vests to the land troops being transported by the ship, saving the lives of a significant number of soldiers.
#
Blücher was the third German navy ship named after
Prussian Field Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher (most famous for joining with the
Duke of Wellington to defeat
Napoleon at the
Battle of Waterloo). The first German warship named after the Fieldmarshall was a
corvette built at
Kiel's
Norddeutsche Schiffbau AG (later renamed the
Krupp-Germaniawerft) and launched
20 March 1877. Taken out of service after a
boiler explosion in 1907, she ended her days as a coal freighter in
Vigo, Spain. On
11 April 1908, the
Panzerkreuzer SMS Blücher was launched from the Imperial Shipyard in Kiel. This ship was sunk on
24 January 1915, in
WWI's
Battle of Dogger Bank. It succumbed to an overwhelming force of British
battle cruisers under the command of
Vice Admiral David Beatty.#
Hipper also took part in the invasion of Norway, landing troops in the harbour of
Trondheim (Norway's third largest city, roughly half way up Norway's west coast). The troops occupied the city in the early hours, flying the
Nazi flag on the city's old
Kristiansten fortress and other municipal buildings before most of the inhabitants had even awoken.# In addition to the officers and sailors of the crew, the men on board
Blücher numbered 882 "passengers":
Generalmajor Engelbrecht and his staff of officers; soldiers to occupy Oslo; bureaucrats and officials for taking over the administration of the capital and with it most of the central institutions of the country (as well as, importantly, the print and broadcast media); and a
military band.
*
List of Kriegsmarine ships*
List of naval ships of Germany*
List of World War II ships*
List of ship launches in 1937*
List of ship commissionings in 1939*
List of shipwrecks in 1940*
Blücher technical data â€" From Michael Emmerich's website German Naval History
*
Blücher data, history and pictures; also some information on Oscarsborg fortress â€" From the homepage of Jan Arild Aaserud
*
Timeline of the Blücher â€" From Jason Pipes' website Feldgrau.com
*
Blücher photo gallery: launch, cruise, sinking â€" From Michael W. Pocock's website Maritimequest
* Koop, Gerhard; Schmolke, Klaus-Peter (2001).
Heavy Cruisers of the Admiral Hipper Class: The Admiral Hipper, Blucher, Prince Eugen, Seydlitz and Lutzow. Naval Institute Press. 240 pp. ISBN 155750332X.
* Binder, Frank; Schlünz, Hans Hermann (1990).
Schwerer Kreuzer Blücher. Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft. ISBN 378220784X (2nd ed., January 2001).
* Lyon, Hugh (1986).
Encyclopedia of the World's Warships: A Technical Directory of Major Fighting Ships from 1900 to the Present Day. Book Sales. ISBN 0890097801 (reprint edition).
