German destroyer Z34

Sister ship Z39 underway after the war
History
Nazi Germany
Name	Z34
Ordered	19 September 1939
Builder	AG Weser (Deschimag), Bremen
Yard number	W1004
Laid down	15 January 1941
Launched	5 May 1942
Completed	5 June 1943
Captured	6 May 1945
Fate	Scuttled, 26 March 1946
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type	Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer
Displacement	2,657 long tons (2,700 t) (standard) 3,691 long tons (3,750 t) (deep load)
Length	127 m (416 ft 8 in) (o/a)
Beam	12 m (39 ft 4 in)
Draft	4.62 m (15 ft 2 in)
Installed power	70,000 PS (51,000 kW; 69,000 shp) 6 × water-tube boilers
Propulsion	2 × shafts 2 × geared steam turbine sets
Speed	36 knots (67 km/h; 41 mph)
Range	2,950 nmi (5,460 km; 3,390 mi) at 19 knots (35 km/h; 22 mph)
Complement	316–336
Armament	1 × twin, 3 × single 15 cm (5.9 in) guns 2 × twin 3.7 cm (1.5 in) AA guns 2 × quadruple and 2 × single 2 cm (0.8 in) AA guns 2 × quadruple 53.3 cm (21 in) torpedo tubes 60 mines 4 × depth charge launchers

Z34 was a Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer built for the Kriegsmarine (German Navy) during World War II. Completed in 1943, the ship spent all of 1944 in Norwegian waters, and was twice damaged by British aircraft attacking the battleship Tirpitz. She escorted troop convoys from northern Norway when the Germans began evacuating the area beginning in October. Z34 was transferred to the Baltic with two of her sister ships at the beginning of 1945 and participated in the action of 28 January 1945 when they were intercepted off the Norwegian coast by a pair of British light cruisers. The ship was only lightly damaged during the battle and all three destroyers were able to disengage.

Over the next several months, she escorted evacuation convoys and German cruisers as they bombarded Soviet positions. She also attacked Soviet troops with her own guns. Z34 was badly damaged by a Soviet torpedo in mid-April and had to be towed to port for emergency repairs. They sufficed to allow her to take a group of refugees and cut-off troops to Denmark in early May. After the end of the war the ship was surrendered to the Allies in Germany, and was allocated to the United States when they divided up the surviving ships of the Kriegsmarine. Still not fully repaired from the torpedo hit in 1945, the ship was scuttled in early 1946.