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} |} ''Bismarck'' was the first of two s built for Nazi Germany's ''Kriegsmarine''. Named after Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, the primary force behind the unification of Germany in 1871, the ship was laid down at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg in July 1936 and launched in February 1939. Work was completed in August 1940, when she was commissioned into the German fleet. ''Bismarck'' and her sister ship were the largest battleships ever built by Germany, and two of the largest built by any European power. In the course of the warship's eight-month career under its sole commanding officer, Capt. Ernst Lindemann, ''Bismarck'' conducted only one offensive operation, in May 1941, codenamed ''Rheinübung''. The ship, along with the heavy cruiser , was to break into the Atlantic Ocean and raid Allied shipping from North America to Great Britain. The two ships were detected several times off Scandinavia, and British naval units were deployed to block their route. At the Battle of the Denmark Strait, ''Bismarck'' engaged and destroyed the battlecruiser , the pride of the Royal Navy, and forced the battleship to retreat; ''Bismarck'' was hit three times and suffered an oil leak from a ruptured tank. The destruction of ''Hood'' spurred a relentless pursuit by the Royal Navy involving dozens of warships. Two days later, while heading for the relative safety of occupied France, ''Bismarck'' was attacked by obsolescent Fairey Swordfish biplane torpedo bombers from the aircraft carrier ; one scored a hit that rendered the battleship's steering gear inoperable. In her final battle the following morning, ''Bismarck'' was neutralised by a sustained bombardment from a British fleet, was scuttled by her crew, and sank with heavy loss of life. Most experts agree that the battle damage would have caused her to sink eventually. The wreck was located in June 1989 by Robert Ballard, and has since been further surveyed by several other expeditions. == Construction and characteristics == (詳細はpre-dreadnought , under contract "F". The contract was awarded to the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg, where the keel was laid on 1 July 1936 at Helgen IX. The ship was launched on 14 February 1939 and during the elaborate ceremonies was christened by Dorothee von Löwenfeld, granddaughter of Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, the ship's namesake. Adolf Hitler made the christening speech. Fitting-out work followed the launch, during which time the original straight stem was replaced with a raked "Atlantic bow" similar to those of the s. ''Bismarck'' was commissioned into the fleet on 24 August 1940 for sea trials, which were conducted in the Baltic. ''Kapitän zur See'' Ernst Lindemann took command of the ship at the time of commissioning. ''Bismarck'' displaced as built and fully loaded, with an overall length of , a beam of and a maximum draft of . The battleship was Germany's largest warship, and displaced more than any other European battleship, with the exception of , commissioned after the end of the war. ''Bismarck'' was powered by three Blohm & Voss geared steam turbines and twelve oil-fired Wagner superheated boilers, which developed a total of and yielded a maximum speed of on speed trials. The ship had a cruising range of at . ''Bismarck'' was equipped with three FuMO 23 search radar sets, mounted on the forward and stern rangefinders and foretop. The standard crew numbered 103 officers and 1,962 enlisted men. The crew was divided into twelve divisions of between 180 and 220 men. The first six divisions were assigned to the ship's armaments, divisions one through four for the main and secondary batteries and five and six manning anti-aircraft guns. The seventh division consisted of specialists, including cooks and carpenters, and the eighth division consisted of ammunition handlers. The radio operators, signalmen, and quartermasters were assigned to the ninth division. The last three divisions were the engine room personnel. When ''Bismarck'' left port, fleet staff, prize crews, and war correspondents increased the crew complement to over 2,200 men. Roughly 200 of the engine room personnel came from the light cruiser , which had been lost during Operation ''Weserübung'', the German invasion of Norway. ''Bismarck''s crew published a ship's newspaper titled ''Die Schiffsglocke'' (The Ship's Bell); this paper was only published once, on 23 April 1941, by the commander of the engineering department, Gerhard Junack. ''Bismarck'' was armed with eight arranged in four twin gun turrets: two super-firing turrets forward—"Anton" and "Bruno"—and two aft—"Caesar" and "Dora". Secondary armament consisted of twelve guns, sixteen and sixteen , and twelve anti-aircraft guns. ''Bismarck'' also carried four Arado Ar 196 reconnaissance floatplanes, with a single large hangar and a double-ended catapult. The ship's main belt was thick and was covered by a pair of upper and main armoured decks that were and thick, respectively. The turrets were protected by thick faces and thick sides. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「German battleship Bismarck」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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