SMS Prinz Adalbert (1865)

Prinz Adalbert (right) and Arminius (left)

Prinz Adalbert was built under the cover name Cheops along with a sister ship named Sphinx by the French shipyard of the Arman Brothers in Bordeaux. Nominally being built for Egyptian fleet, they were actually intended for sale to the Confederate States of America. The French emperor, Napoleon III, intervened and ordered the Arman brothers to sell both vessels to another navy immediately. In early 1864 during the Second Schleswig War between the Prussian and Austrian alliance and Denmark, both the Prussian and Danish fleets sought vessels that could be purchased abroad. On 31 March, Denmark secured the contract for Sphinx but Cheops was sold to Prussia on 25 May. Delivery was delayed due to the war and the Prussians cancelled the order briefly before reinstating it in January 1865. The vessel was finally delivered in October and she was commissioned on the 29th of the month as Prinz Adalbert.[2][4]

Along with the turret ship Arminius, Prinz Adalbert was among the first armored vessels acquired by the Prussian Navy.[5] The ship was named for Prince Adalbert of Prussia, one of the creators of the fleet.[6] She was found to be in poor condition on entering service with the fleet,[7] and while conducting trials off Denmark in June 1865, the ship ran aground.[8] During the Austro-Prussian War in 1866, Prinz Adalbert was mobilized in Kiel under the command of Vizeadmiral (Vice Admiral) Eduard von Jachmann, but due to the lack of opponents in the North and Baltic Seas, the ship remained in the Baltic for the duration of the war.[9]

The ship did not last long in service due to her poor construction, defects with her armor plate, she was unable to use her sailing rig, and her hull leaked badly; much of the fault lay with the use of low-quality wood in the construction of her hull. These problems necessitated significant refurbishment, which was carried out at the naval depot at Geestemünde in 1868–1869. Her armor plating had to be removed and reinstalled, a breakwater was installed at the stern of the ship, and the main mast had to be relocated. She was re-rigged to a schooner rig during this refit. Despite the repairs, Prinz Adalbert continued to suffer from severe leaking throughout her short career and she remained a poor sailing vessel.[1][7]

In May 1870, Prinz Adalbert joined the three armored frigates Friedrich Carl, Kronprinz, and König Wilhelm for a visit to Britain, though Friedrich Carl was damaged after running aground in the Great Belt. Prinz Adalbert, König Wilhelm, and Kronprinz continued on to Plymouth while Friedrich Carl returned to Kiel for repairs. The latter vessel quickly rejoined the ships there and on 1 July they departed for a training cruise to Fayal in the Azores, Portugal. But as tensions with France over the Hohenzollern candidacy for the vacant Spanish throne. While they cruised east through the English Channel, they learned of the increasing likelihood of war, and the Prussians detached Prinz Adalbert to Dartmouth to be kept informed of events. The rest of the squadron joined her there on 13 July, and as war seemed to be imminent, the Prussians ended the cruise and returned to home. Kronprinz had to take Prinz Adalbert under tow for the voyage due to the latter's slow speed.[10]

The ships arrived back in Wilhelmshaven on 16 July, three days before France declared war on Prussia over the Ems Dispatch, initiating the Franco-Prussian War. The greatly numerically inferior Prussian Navy assumed a defensive posture against a naval blockade imposed by the French Navy. For the duration of the conflict, Prinz Adalbert served as a harbor guard ship in Hamburg.[10][11] Her timber hull was found to be rotten in 1871, which forced her decommissioning.[4] She was removed from service on 23 October 1871 and disarmed in 1875–1876. The ship was formally stricken from the naval register on 28 May 1878. She was broken up that year in Wilhelmshaven, and her engines were removed and reused.[1]

• Dodson, Aidan (2016). The Kaiser's Battlefleet: German Capital Ships 1871–1918. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84832-229-5.
• Greene, Jack; Massignani, Alessandro (1998). Ironclads at War: The Origin and Development of the Armored Warship, 1854–1891. Pennsylvania: Combined Publishing. ISBN 978-0-938289-58-6.
• Gröner, Erich (1990). German Warships: 1815–1945. Vol. I: Major Surface Vessels. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-0-87021-790-6.
• Sondhaus, Lawrence (2001). Naval Warfare, 1815–1914. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-21478-0.
• Sondhaus, Lawrence (1997). Preparing for Weltpolitik: German Sea Power Before the Tirpitz Era. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-55750-745-7.
• Sullivan, David M. (1987). "Phantom Fleet: The Confederacy's Unclaimed European Warships". Warship International. Toledo, Ohio: Naval Records Club. 24 (1): 13–32.