 Painting of Preussischer Adler, by Christopher Rave
| |
| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Operators | |
| Preceded by | None |
| Succeeded by | Nix class |
| Completed | 1 |
| Retired | 1 |
| History | |
| Name | Preussischer Adler |
| Builder | Ditchburn & Mare, Blackwall, London |
| Laid down | 1846 |
| Launched | 1846 |
| Stricken | 27 November 1877 |
| Fate | Sunk as a target, 26 June 1879 |
| General characteristics (as configured, 1848) | |
| Class and type | Aviso |
| Displacement | |
| Length | 62.72 m (205 ft 9 in) o/a |
| Beam |
|
| Draft | 3.3 m (11 ft) |
| Installed power |
|
| Propulsion |
|
| Speed | 10.5 knots (19.4 km/h; 12.1 mph) |
| Complement |
|
| Armament | 2 × 25-pounder mortars |
SMS Preussischer Adler was a paddle steamer originally built in the mid-1840s for use on a packet route between the Kingdom of Prussia and the Russian Empire in the Baltic Sea. She was requisitioned by the Prussian Navy during the First Schleswig War in 1848 and converted into an aviso, the first vessel of the type commissioned by Prussia. During the war, she took part in an inconclusive action with the Danish brig St. Croix, the first naval battle of the Prussian fleet. After the war, she was disarmed and returned to her commercial role, operating uneventfully on the Stettin–St. Petersburg route until 1862, when the expansion of the Prussian Eastern Railway had rendered the maritime route superfluous. The ship was purchased by the Prussian Navy that year and rearmed, once again as an aviso.
Preussischer Adler was sent to the Mediterranean Sea in September 1863 in company with a pair of gunboats, but shortly after they arrived, they were recalled owing to an increase in tension between Prussia and Denmark that resulted in the Second Schleswig War. While on the way back to Prussia, the three ships rendezvoused with a pair of steam frigates from Prussia's ally Austria. The combined squadron attacked a Danish force enforcing a blockade of the German North Sea ports, resulting in the Battle of Heligoland in May 1864. The battle was tactically inconclusive, but the arrival of the Austrian warships forced the Danes to abandon their blockade. Boiler problems kept Preussischer Adler from taking part in subsequent naval operations and she underwent extensive repairs in 1867–1868.
The ship served in a variety of roles in the late 1860s and early 1870s; in 1868, she took a contingent of senior naval officers to observe Russian naval exercises and she assisted with the completion of the ironclad warship SMS König Wilhelm the following year. During the Franco-Prussian War, she served as the flagship of the Prussian squadron in the Baltic Sea in 1870, though she saw no action. Beginning in 1872, she was used alternately as a training ship for engineers and as a fishery protection vessel. In poor condition by 1877, she was decommissioned in April and struck from the naval register in November. She was ultimately sunk as a target ship during experiments with torpedoes in 1879.