SMS Pommerania

Pommerania in 1887
Class overview
Operators
Preceded bySMS Falke
Succeeded bySMS Zieten
Completed1
Retired1
History
NamePommerania
BuilderAG Vulcan
Laid down1864
LaunchedSeptember 1864
Commissioned27 April 1871
Decommissioned16 October 1889
In service1 May 1865
RenamedAdler, 1892
Stricken10 August 1890
FateSold, 1892, converted into a merchant ship and sank with all hands, 20 January 1894
General characteristics
Class and typeUnique aviso
Displacement
Length55.2 m (181 ft 1 in) loa
Beam6.9 m (22 ft 8 in)
Draft2.35 m (7 ft 9 in)
Installed power
Propulsion
Speed14.5 knots (26.9 km/h; 16.7 mph)
Range300 nautical miles (560 km; 350 mi) at 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph)
Complement
  • 4 officers
  • 61 enlisted men
Armament2 × 8 cm (3.1 in) hoop guns

SMS Pommerania was a paddle steamer originally built for use as a packet ship but was acquired by the North German Federal Navy in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian War. Commissioned too late to see service during the conflict, she was initially used to conduct fishery surveys that were later used as the basis for the German Fisheries Act in 1874. Pommerania went to the Mediterranean Sea in 1876 in response to the murder of a German diplomat and remained in the region to observe the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878. After returning to Germany in 1879, she spent much of the 1880s either operating as a fishery protection vessel or conducting surveys of the German coastline. Decommissioned in 1889, she was struck from the naval register in 1890, sold in 1892, and was converted into a sailing schooner. She was renamed Adler, but was lost with all hands on her first voyage as a merchant ship in January 1894.