NMS Mărășești

NMS Mărășești was one of four Vifor-class destroyers ordered by Romania shortly before the beginning of the First World War from Italy. All four sister ships were requisitioned when Italy joined the war in 1915. Originally named Vârtej by the Romanians, she was renamed Nibbio in Italian service. Not completed until mid-1918, the ship engaged Austro-Hungarian ships in the Adriatic Sea only once before the war ended in November. She was renamed Mărășești when she was re-purchased by the Romanians in 1920.

Not to be confused with NMS Mărăști.
For other ships with the same name, see Italian ship Nibbio.
For other uses, see Mărășești (disambiguation).

A postcard of Mărășești
History
Italy
Name: Nibbio
Builder: Pattison Shipyard, Naples, Italy
Laid down: 15 July 1914
Launched: 30 January 1918
Commissioned: 15 May 1918
Out of service: 1920
Fate: Sold to Romania, 1 July 1920
Romania
Name: Mărășești
Namesake: Battle of Mărășești
Acquired: 1 July 1920
Commissioned: 1 July 1920
Fate: Seized by the Soviet Union, 5 September 1944
Soviet Union
Name: Lyogkiy
Commissioned: 20 October 1944
Stricken: 12 October 1945
Fate: Returned to Romania, 12 October 1945
People's Republic of Romania
Acquired: 12 October 1945
Renamed: D11, 1952
Fate: Scrapped, April 1961
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type: Vifor-class destroyer
Displacement:
  • 1,594 long tons (1,620 t) (normal)
  • 1,760 long tons (1,790 t) (full load)
Length: 94.7 m (310 ft 8 in) (o/a)
Beam: 9.5 m (31 ft 2 in)
Draft: 3.6 m (11 ft 10 in)
Installed power:
Propulsion: 2 shafts; 2 geared steam turbines
Speed: 34 knots (63 km/h; 39 mph)
Range: 3,000 nmi (5,600 km; 3,500 mi) at 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Complement: 146
Armament:

After the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 (Operation Barbarossa), Mărășești was limited to escort duties in the western half of the Black Sea during the war by the powerful Soviet Black Sea Fleet which heavily outnumbered Axis naval forces there. The ship claimed to have sunk a Soviet submarines during the war, but this has not been confirmed by post-war research. In early 1944 the Soviets were able to cut off and surround the port of Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula; Mărășești escorted convoys evacuating Axis troops from the port and rescued some troops herself in May.

Later that year Romania switched sides, but despite that the Soviets seized the Romanian ships and incorporated them into the Soviet Navy. Renamed Lyogkiy, the ship only served for a year before she was returned to the Romanians who redesignated her as D11 in 1952. She was discarded in 1961 and subsequently scrapped.

Design and description
Plan and right elevation line drawing of the Aquila-class scout cruisers

The Vifor-class destroyers were ordered in 1913 by Romania from the Pattison Shipyard in Italy, as part of the 1912 Naval Program. They were to be armed with three 120 mm (4.7 in) guns, four 75 mm (3.0 in) guns, five 45 cm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes and have a 10-hour endurance at full speed. Three ships had been laid down by the time Italy joined the Allied side in World War I on 23 May 1915 by declaring war on the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Italians requisitioned the Romanian ships on 5 June, redesignating them as Aquila-class scout cruisers (esploratori). By this time Vârtej approximately 20 percent complete and was renamed Nibbio.[1][2]

The ships had an overall length of 94.7 meters (310 ft 8 in), had a beam of 9.5 meters (31 ft 2 in), and a draft of 3.6 meters (11 ft 10 in). They displaced 1,594 long tons (1,620 t) at normal load and 1,760 long tons (1,790 t) at deep load. Their crew numbered 9 officers and 137 sailors. The ships were powered by two Tosi steam turbines, each driving a single propeller, using steam provided by five Thornycroft boilers. The turbines were designed to produce 40,000 shaft horsepower (30,000 kW) for a speed of 34 knots (63 km/h; 39 mph), although Nibbio reached 37.4 knots (69.3 km/h; 43.0 mph) during her sea trials from 39,500 shp (29,500 kW). The scouts carried enough fuel oil to give them a range of 1,700 nautical miles (3,100 km; 2,000 mi) at a speed of 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph).[2]

The Italians initially intended to arm the ships with seven 120 mm guns and two pairs of twin mounts for 45 cm torpedo tubes, but they changed the gun armament to three 152 mm (6.0 in) and four 76 mm weapons to outgun their nearest Austro-Hungarian equivalents, the Admiral Spaun and Novara-class scout cruisers. Two of the 152 mm guns were mounted side-by-side on the forecastle and the third gun was mounted on the aft superstructure. The 76 mm anti-aircraft (AA) guns were positioned two on each broadside. The torpedo mounts were abreast the middle funnel, one on each broadside. Unlike her sisters, Nibbio could only carry 24 mines.[2]

Construction and service
Nibbio in port, 1918; her sister Aquila is behind her

Nibbio was laid down on 15 July 1914 by Pattison in its Naples shipyard. She was launched on 30 January 1918 and commissioned on 15 May 1918.[2] Assigned to the Adriatic, the ship was protecting the recovery of a broken-down flying boat in the Gulf of Drin with her sisters Aquila and Sparviero on 5 September when they spotted three Austro-Hungarian torpedo boats sweeping mines. The sisters opened fire and damaged 86 F before the torpedo boats reached the shelter of Medua's coastal artillery. The following month, the trio escorted Allied ships as they bombarded Durazzo, Albania, on 2 October. Nibbio, Aquila and Sparviero covered the ships bombarding Medua on 21 October.[3]

Nibbio and Sparviero were re-purchased by Romania in 1920. Nibbio became Mărășești and Sparviero was renamed Mărăști when they were commissioned after arriving in Romania on 1 July 1920. The ships were formally re-classified as destroyers and assigned to the newly formed Counter-torpedo Division (Diviziunea Contratorpiloarelor) which was renamed as the Destroyer Squadron (Escadrila de Distrugătoare) on 1 April 1927.[4] The sisters were sent to Italy in 1925–1926 for a refit where they had their 152 mm guns replaced by two twin-gun 120 mm Schneider-Canet-Armstrong 1918/19 turrets, one each fore and aft of the superstructure, and a fifth gun on a platform amidships. The aft 76 mm guns removed during this time.[5] Fire-control systems were fitted the following year.[6] The Squadron was visited by King Carol II of Romania and the Prime Minister, Nicolae Iorga, on 27 May 1931.[7] By 1940, the midships 120 mm gun had been replaced by a pair of twin-gun French Hotchkiss 13.2 mm (0.5 in) anti-aircraft machinegun mounts and the remaining 76 mm guns by a pair of German 3.7 cm (1.5 in) SK C/30 AA guns. Depth charge racks had been fitted on the stern and an Italian depth charge thrower was added. The ships could carry 40 depth charges or 50 mines. These changes reduced the displacement of the sisters to 1,410 long tons (1,430 t) at standard load and 1,723 long tons (1,751 t) at deep load.[8]

World War II
Mărășești at sea, 1942

Massively outnumbered by the Soviet Union's Black Sea Fleet, the Romanian ships were kept behind the minefields defending Constanța for several months after the start of the war. They spent that time training for convoy escort operations. Beginning on 5 October, the Romanians began laying minefields to defend the route between the Bosphorus and Constanța; the minelayers were protected by the destroyers. After the evacuation of Odessa on 16 October, the navy began to clear the Soviet mines defending the port and to lay their own minefields protecting the route between Constanța and Odessa. Mărășești was twice attacked off Mangalia, Romania, on 6 November 1941 by the Soviet submarine S-33, but was missed with all four torpedoes. Sometime during 1941–1942, the ship's turbines were damaged and limited her to a speed of 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph). On 20 April 1942, after the ice had melted, Mărășești, Mărăști and the destroyer Regina Maria escorted the first convoy to Ochakov, although the Romanian destroyers were generally used to escort ships between the Bosporus and Constanța. On the nights of 22/23 and 24/25 June, Mărășești, Regina Maria and her sister Regele Ferdinand covered the laying of defensive minefields off Odessa. After Sevastopol surrendered on 4 July to the Axis, a direct route between the port and Constanța was opened in October and operated year-round.[9]

Mărășești and Mărăști and two gunboats were escorting a convoy of three cargo ships on 7 July 1943 when they were attacked by a small wolfpack of three submarines. Shch-201 fired six torpedoes at one of the gunboats and a freighter and missed with all of them. Mărășești depth charged one of the submarines and claimed to have sunk it, but no submarines were lost by the Soviets that day.[10][Note 1] On the night of 9/10 November, the sisters escorted minelayers as they laid a minefield off Sevastopol. The minefield was enlarged between 14 and 16 November as Regele Ferdinand and Mărășești covered the minelayers. The submarine D-4 sank the German 4,627-gross register ton (GRT) freighter SS Santa Fe off Yevpatoria despite an escort of Mărășești and three smaller ships on 23 November.[15]

At some point during the war, the ship's anti-aircraft armament was augmented with two additional 3.7 cm SK C/30 and four 2 cm (0.79 in) AA guns.[8]

Mărășești in 1944

Successful Soviet attacks in early 1944 cut the overland connection of the Crimea with the rest of Ukraine and necessitated its supply by sea. In early April another offensive occupied most of the peninsula and encircled Sevastopol. The Romanians began evacuating the city on 14 April, with their destroyers covering the troop convoys. Adolf Hitler suspended the evacuation on 27 April, but relented on 8 May after further Soviet attacks further endangered the Axis forces in Sevastopol as they closed within artillery range of the harbour. Mărășești made one trip to evacuate Axis troops and was part of the last convoy to reach Sevastopol on the night of 11/12 May. Mărășești and Regina Maria covered the minelayers Amiral Murgescu and Dacia as they sealed off the gap that led to Sevastpol in the minefields defending Sulina on the night of 25/26 May. Mărășești was slightly damaged during a Soviet airstrike on Constanța on 20 August.[16]

After King Michael's Coup on 23 August, Romania declared war on the Axis Powers. Mărășești remained in harbour until she was seized by the Soviets on 5 September together with the rest of the Romanian Navy.[17] Renamed Lyogkiy on 20 October, the ship was commissioned into the Soviet Navy as part of the Black Sea Fleet, along with her sister, on 14 September. They were returned to Romania on 12 October 1945[18][19] where they resumed their former names. The sisters were then assigned to the Destroyer Squadron before beginning an overhaul. When the Destroyer Division was redesignated as the 418th Destroyer Division in 1952, Mărășești was renamed D11. The ship continued to serve until April 1961, when she was discarded and subsequently scrapped.[4]

Notes
  1. This submarine has been identified as M-31,[11][12] but no losses are listed for the month by naval historians Jürgen Rohwer, Mikhail Monakov, Norman Polmar and Jurrien Noot. The latter pair attribute the loss of M-31 to German aircraft on 2 October, while the former list it as of 17 December 1942 to a German patrol boat.[13][14]

Citations
  1. Twardowski, p. 421
  2. Fraccaroli, p. 266
  3. Cernuschi & O'Hara, pp. 69, 73
  4. "Historical Overview: The Counter-Torpedo Squadron/Destroyer Squadron". www.navy.ro. Romanian Naval Forces. Retrieved 2 November 2018.
  5. Whitley, p. 223
  6. "Distrugătorul Mărăşeşti: Asul de treflă al Marinei Regale Române" [Destroyer Marasesti: The ace of the Royal Navy]. www.navy.ro (in Romanian). Romanian Naval Forces. Retrieved 10 November 2018.
  7. "Istoric Distrugătorul Regele Ferdinand Asul de cupă al Marinei Regale Române" [History of the Destroyer Regele Ferdinand: Ace of Hearts of the Royal Romanian Navy]. www.navy.ro (in Romanian). Romanian Naval Forces. Retrieved 10 November 2018.
  8. Axworthy, pp. 348–349; Whitley, pp. 223–224
  9. Axworthy, pp. 333–335, 337–338; Hervieux, pp. 76–77; Rohwer, pp. 112, 160, 176; Whitley, p. 224
  10. Hervieux, p. 81; Rohwer, p. 254
  11. Whitley, p. 224
  12. Rotaru & Damaschin, p. 271
  13. Rohwer & Monakov, p. 265
  14. Polmar & Noot, p. 346
  15. Hervieux, p. 81; Rohwer, p. 287
  16. Axworthy, pp. 342–345; Hervieux, pp. 82–84, 87; Rohwer, pp. 319, 351
  17. Axworthy, p. 345; Hervieux, p. 88
  18. Rohwer & Monakov, p. 268
  19. Berezhnoy, p. 13

Bibliography
  • Axworthy, Mark (1995). Third Axis, Fourth Ally: Romanian Armed Forces in the European War, 1941–1945. London: Arms and Armour Press. ISBN 978-1-85409-267-0.
  • Berezhnoy, Sergey (1994). Трофеи и репарации ВМФ СССР [Trophies and Reparations of the Soviet Navy] (in Russian). Yakutsk: Sakhapoligrafizdat. OCLC 33334505.
  • Cernuschi, Enrico & O'Hara, Vincent (2016). "The Naval War in the Adriatic, Part 2: 1917–1918". In Jordan, John (ed.). Warship 2016. London: Conway. pp. 62–75. ISBN 978-1-84486-326-6.
  • Fraccaroli, Aldo (1985). "Italy". In Gray, Randal (ed.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships: 1906–1921. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. pp. 252–290. ISBN 978-0-85177-245-5.
  • Hervieux, Pierre (2001). "The Romanian Navy at War, 1941–1945". In Preston, Antony (ed.). Warship 2001–2002. London: Conway Maritime Press. pp. 70–88. ISBN 978-0-85177-901-0.
  • Polmar, Norman & Noot, Jurrien (1991). Submarines of the Russian and Soviet Navies, 1718–1990. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-0-87021-570-4.
  • Rohwer, Jürgen (2005). Chronology of the War at Sea 1939–1945: The Naval History of World War Two (Third Revised ed.). Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-59114-119-8.
  • Rohwer, Jürgen & Monakov, Mikhail S. (2001). Stalin's Ocean-Going Fleet. London: Frank Cass. ISBN 978-0-7146-4895-8.
  • Rotaru, Jipa & Damaschin, Ioan (2000). Glorie și dramă: Marina Regală Română, 1940–1945 (in Romanian). Editura "Ion Cristoiu". ISBN 978-973-995447-1.
  • Twardowski, Marek (1985). "Rumania". In Gray, Randal (ed.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships: 1906–1921. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. pp. 421–422. ISBN 978-0-85177-245-5.
  • Whitley, M. J. (1988). Destroyers of World War 2. London: Cassell Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85409-521-3.
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