Wikipedia:Today's featured article/October 15, 2012



SMS Friedrich der Grosse (1911) was the second vessel of the Kaiser-class battleship of battleships of the German Imperial Navy. She was commissioned into the fleet on 15 October 1912. Assigned to the III Squadron of the High Seas Fleet for the majority of World War I, she served as fleet flagship from her commissioning until 1917. The ship participated in all the major fleet operations of World War I, including the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916, from which she emerged unscathed. After Germany's defeat and the signing of the armistice in November 1918, Friedrich der Grosse and most of the capital ships of the High Seas Fleet were interned by the British Royal Navy in Scapa Flow. On 21 June 1919, days before the Treaty of Versailles was signed, Rear Admiral Ludwig von Reuter ordered the fleet to be scuttled to ensure that the British could not seize the ships. Friedrich der Grosse was raised in 1936 and broken up for scrap metal. (more...)

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